His son, though… Kavin stood, filled with youthful rage, self-righteous energy, and something I recognized from my own turbulent heart.
Love.
He loved Roya. Even if she had told him she would never be his mate, he loved with a ferocity that rivaled my own.
“You may try,” Kavin answered, and the two Alphas came together with a giant roar, their swords meeting with such force that they filled the air with sparks.
There was a flurry of hits, and Wulfram let out a laugh as he parried his son’s blows. “Well done, boy. You’ve stayed in shape. Been lifting more than books, eh?”
Kavin didn’t answer, just fought with determination.
Then Wulfram dug deeper. “Maybe you’ve been lifting something else. Your little Omega’s skirts? Is she as pretty underneath her clothes as her face promises?” Kavin’s blows grew wilder as he snarled his rage.
As they fought, the Guildmaster slipped almost invisibly through the crowd of guards. I watched, impressed despite my hatred for him. He could almost vanish in a room full of people, make you forget he was ever there.
“You disappointed me, Thorn,” he purred when he was close enough. I made sure my hand was on my dagger hilt. He had poisoned me and wanted me to suffer the indignities of that death, but he wasn’t above twisting a knife as well.
“As did you. I never thought to be ashamed of my Guild.”
“Necessity, Thorn. The Guild needed the money, and the blood.”
“But not the code, the honor we teach?”
His meager smile twisted under the branch of his moustache. “Honor is a fairy tale we tell the weak to make them feel better about failing, assassin. You should have learned that by now.”
His hand snaked out, lightning quick, and I caught the blade that would have cut my throat with the hilt of my own just in time.
My throat? I took a second to wonder why he would try to hasten my end. Did he think there was some way I could still live?
“You don’t deserve to be the Guildmaster,” I bit out, my mind calculating furiously. He knew something; I only needed to discover what it was. There could still be hope. “I think I’ll give a little gift to my brothers in arms before I sleep.” And with that, we were whirling in a battle that was just as vicious, if not far quieter, than the one between the Starlakian warriors.
Within moments, the rest of the room—including Kavin and his father—had fallen still, watching. The Guildmaster and I both fought with daggers, but I only had the two I had taken from the ship, not my own precise ones. I took damage from the Guildmaster’s perfectly balanced blades.
Each cut reminded me that I had failed Roya, but each jab and thrust I sent back was a prayer to the Goddess that I would take this man out as I went, and cleanse the world of his perfidy.
One cut went deep enough to make me hiss, and I whirled away, pressing the edge of my cloak on it to staunch the flow of blood.
Across the room, Wulfram stepped forward unconsciously, as if to help. The other assassin, Nordin, was there in an instant, his blade at Wulfram’s jugular with a warning. “Thorn is Anathema. This is the Guild’s business. To interfere is death.”
“What are you saying, man?” Wulfram’s voice was dangerously calm.
“I’m saying you should step back and leave this fight alone.”
Wulfram nodded. “I hear you.” He stepped back, sword lowered. Then, in a movement so smooth it reminded me of the wind blowing over a field of wheat, he spun away from the assassin in a great circle. His sword swung up as he turned, and when he was facing Nordin once again…
I blinked.
The sword had already moved through the air at the man’s neck, as if he were cutting through a pat of butter with a hot knife. The room erupted into shouts as Nordin’s head toppled slowly from his shoulders, arterial spray decorating the floor around him.
Wulfram let out a laugh. “You don’t tell an Alpha what to do,” he said, kicking the man’s head away from his boot. “Now, I was trying to spar with my boy.”
With that, he dove back into the fight with Kavin, and I caught the Guildmaster’s blade just before it entered my windpipe. Almost every cut he aimed was intended to be a fatal one. I still couldn’t see it, couldn’t see how, but there must be a way I could survive, a path he needed to take from me.
I fought on, until the floor was slick with my blood, until I could fight no longer. I had no more strength in my arms, though my spirit raged inside me. Then, just as I began to fall, the door flew wide. And my jaw dropped when I saw who was there.
It was Icarus, glowing with a strange golden fire, his wings spread on both sides of his body, tipped with light. Behind him, a man wearing an eye patch who had to be Talon ran in, protecting his brother’s back from the Haviran guards who immediately began to charge at them both.
And lastly, an angel, dressed in white and gold, stepping lightly across the bloody floor, her eyes dripping with golden tears for me.
