“Fiona,” he repeats. He looks over at Fiona, who starts sobbing and blubbering incoherently again. “You wish me to kill Fiona first?”
“No!” I shout, holding up my hand. “No, wait, no. Don’t… just that, it’s just that…”
I’mlost.Fiona is the pretty one. Fiona is the submissive, money-grubbing one who would turn any trick in the book for money and power. This is all completely backwards.
“Fionais the one everybody wants,” I say quietly, stupidly.
He looks at Fiona and shrugs, screwing up his face in an expression that is identical to a human’s. “Fiona is nice,” he agrees. He jerks his head in the direction of the quiet and dangerous Kerz, who is standing, like a mean sentinel, in front of me. “But he says I take you.” He puts a hand on the Kerz’s shoulder and wallops him hard. The Kerz’s body doesn’t move an inch. “Very smart, son of my father’s brother. He has my ears. He says take you. I listen. This is deal.”
I look from one impassive face to the other. “But surely—”
“This is deal.”
“Anya,” my father whimpers from behind me. I look back at him. He’s a diminished man. He’s also a complete bastard. But I don’t want him dead.
I also have other plans formylife.
I wait, to see if my father has anything else to say. He just pleads with his eyes.
“Anya!” Fiona screeches. “Don’t be an idiot! They’re going to kill us all—”
“Fi,” I say, and shockingly, this shuts her up. “Shutup.Shut up, shut up, shut up, for just aminuteof your fucking life.” My hands drop into the slippery blood and I stare at them and the coagulating mess, wondering why I’m not puking all over the place. I’m panting, my thoughts are a blizzard and I cannot grasp a single one.
I look up, for some reason, to the very smart son of the general’s uncle. I don’t know why. He’s scary as fuck, but he seems less scary than the general. “Why?” I ask him.
“This is good question,” the general agrees. He rests his arm on the cousin’s shoulder, something he has to lift his elbow considerably to do. He’s a mad, mad, mad man. “But Rysethk is Kerz of mystery. He should be in charge, you know. I should kill him, to be honest. He is too smart. Very good warrior. But he’s son of father’s brother. Cushion. Kerz don’t kill family. Unlike you dishonorableskeept.”
Under any other circumstances, this hilarious mix-up between ‘cousin’ and ‘cushion’ would have tickled me to death.
He gives this milliseconds to sink in, then abruptly sighs. He seems… bored.“We are on tight schedule. I wish to leave. All that remains is to determine if this is a family affair… in which case, Mr. Mann,” he looks at my father, “I apologize profusely for disgraceful interruption.”
His gaze lowers to me. “If it’s not family affair, though, Anya Mann, I really must proceed with settling of accounts. So tell me. Is this family matter? Or business?”
“Anya,” a chorus of voices whispers and sobs.
I stare at my hands.
“Can I… at least change my clothes?” I hear myself say.
A laugh. And then I’m in the air, being lifted, and before I realize what is happening, I’m thrown over someone’s shoulder. I feel the hot hand, the sharp claws, on my inner thigh, midway up my dress. I struggle to look around as I’m carried away, in a sea of blue-skinned, enormous, dark-robed Kerz. The general is not carrying me. It must be his cousin.
I lift my head to look behind me. The scene is too gruesome, and the faces of my family are unreadable; their mouths are open in shock. But also relief.
Nice.
I go limp and close my eyes.
CHAPTER3
Rysethk
Zethki squints into the small slit in the door to the prisoner hold and scowls. I wait, arms crossed in front of me. At moments like this, I feel a surge ofkryththat I hope doesn’t make its way to my arms or my neck.
Zethki is a hothead, prone to irrational decisions, and it’s my duty to keep him in line. But taking him down would not be easy, if it ever came to that. Hiskrythis like a nuclear reaction: easy to start up, hard to stop.
“I like the other one better,” he says at last.
It’s a dangerous moment. His voice is filled with the petulance that has only gotten worse since his father conferred his title on him.
