Cora shook her head. “Your word means nothing.”
“What matters to you, then? Blood? Well, then let me tell you this. I have a vested interest in you. A reason why I’d rather not kill you, and it has to do with your bloodline.”
“What…what do you mean?”
His lips curved in a cruel grin. “You, Aveline, are my kin.”
43
Darius’ words rattled around in her mind, but she couldn’t make sense of them. “What do you mean I’m your kin?”
“You share my blood,” Darius said. “Well, notmyblood exactly. We both share my father’s blood, the blood of King Tristaine Solaria. Your relation to him is diluted over many generations, but I can still sense it when I stand before you. The same way my son thought he sensed the weight of prophecy on you. That’s what his report had said. That the moment he saw you as a child, he felt a connection and knew you were the prophesied mother. Can you imagine how embarrassed he’d be to discover just how wrong he was? What he felt wasn’t the magical tug of prophecy, but the connection fae feel to their kin. Had he been humble enough to harbor at least a shred of doubt, he’d have done his due diligence to follow your family tree. He’d have followed your mother’s ancestry to the Southern Islands, then several generations back to King Tristaine of Syrus, his grandfather.”
Cora didn’t know what to think. What to feel. She was distantly related to Morkai. He’d targeted her, hurt her, cursed her all because of a prophecy and a sense of connection he hadn’t understood.
He’d been wrong.
So recklessly and foolishly wrong.
Every conclusion he’d come to about Cora had been the result of his mistakes.
Everything she’d suffered.
Every loss she’d been forced to bear.
Rage boiled inside her, curling her fingers into fists. Flames filled her mind’s eye as a dark weight fell over her, smothering her.
Then a whispered voice.Should it have been her?
A thorn of guilt shattered her anger. She forced the dark thoughts from her mind, forced her fury to cool enough to maintain her tether to the present.
Darius spoke again. “I truly mean it when I say I don’t want us to be enemies. All I ask is for one hour of your time. Just see what Syrus is like. See what kind of king I truly am. Hear me out, and I’ll answer any questions you have.”
She breathed deeply, opening her senses to him, to his energy.
“I will not hurt you,” he said, “nor will I demand an answer about our alliance today. I will give you time to decide.”
She tested the flow of his energy, its lack of constriction. His words didn’t feel like a lie.
While she couldn’t imagine anything that could convince her to ally with him, this could give her a chance to learn more. And she had one advantage.
She could worldwalk.
Darius had made no mention of her abilities yet, and he couldn’t have learned about them from his son’s report. Morkai would have relayed details about Cora’s clairsentience, but he’d never learned about her worldwalking powers while he’d been alive. It was possible Darius suspected she was a worldwalker based on their shared bloodline with Tristaine, but the ability obviously wasn’t gifted to all his descendants. Morkai hadn’t been able to worldwalk. Cora’s mother hadn’t shown even the slightest inclination toward magic.
As far as Darius knew, she was just a clairsentient witch, still learning her magic.
Her abilities may not be as impressive as Darius’ were, but if she sensed danger, she could disappear in a heartbeat, just like him. And maybe, if she could catch him unaware, if she could get hold of a weapon, even just a knife…
She could end his life.
But what had Ailan said about killing him?
He can be killed just like the rest of my kind—beheading or excessive blood loss.
He can be killed so long as he can be outsmarted.
She wasn’t sure she could behead or force excessive blood loss while outsmarting him, but there was at least a chance.
