I rushed behind Carnelian while he was distracted with fighting Azurill, jumping on his back and placing my blade to his throat. He came to a standstill as my knife cut into the skin, his red blood dripping like rubies, matching the rest of him.
“You had my parents killed. My entire godsdamned household!” I screamed in his ear, “You forced me to live in hiding on the streets while you feasted and slept in feather beds. While I slept on lumpy mattresses in the cold, my stomach rumbling from hunger, and the nightmares of the night you destroyed my life ran on a loop in my head.” I finished with a hiss.
“True power is only gained from bold moves.” Carnelian sneered, even as he kept his head and neck completely still. “Your family was weak, and they lost everything because of it.”
“They were strong,” I argued, passionately. “Stronger than you’lleverbe. Because they knew the value of love and loyalty, two things you will never understand.”
“And you do?” He laughed wryly. “I’ve seen how you were raised, and I know you were taught to look out for yourself, to ensure your own position and survival. Just as I do. Don’t be a hypocrite.”
It was my turn to laugh, “A hypocrite? I was forced into survival mode because of you, but I wasnotraised that way. Myparentsraised me; Ula just picked up the slack once your monsters took them from me. And now, you’re going to pay for every drop of blood spilled frommyblood.”
I swung myself around him and pushed him into the wall in one move, wanting to look him in the eyes, and then…I sank the knife deep into his chest. Not close enough to his heart to kill him, but close enough to watch his eyes widen in panic. When I pulled the knife out and stuck it in his abdomen, followed by his thigh, I watched happily as he sank back into the wall, his strength leaving him in ruby-red drops gushing from the wounds.
“Bring me Casaan,” I said, waiting until Azurill and Balthazar brought the now sobbing would-be-prince before me. I looked into Carnelian’s eyes, “You tried to exterminate House Marit, and for that crime, I will succeed where you failed and destroy every drop of Rousseau blood in this despicable court. Your line, your lands, your imagined dynasty, allgone. All thanks to the one little girl you couldn’t kill.”
If looks could kill, the hate and impotent rage in Carnelian’s eyes as Ruri and Alwyn held him still would have left me dead on the floor, the way he’d oncethoughthe’d left me. I looked down at Casaan consideringly, grabbing him by the chin and forcing him to meet my eyes.
“It seems only right to start with the one who started it all himself. The man who killed my parents directly.” I smiled, a chilling thing, devoid of all warmth. I buried the new life and emotions I felt now for a moment to live in that wrath I’d spent so many years drowning in.
And then I stabbed Casaan straight through the heart.
The scream from his father echoed, and I looked to see Sienna racing into the room towards her son. A part of me almost felt bad for a moment before I remembered who these people were. They had brought this reckoning on themselves.
Emrys grabbed her, wrapping his arms around her flailing body as she tried to escape his grip, before manhandling her out of the room altogether. I looked at Azurill as I pulled the blade from the chest of my parents’ murderer. There was no disgust, not from him, only understanding and vindication.
Erodite, how I loved that man.
“Once we’re done with this one, we need to deal with the rest of them,” I told him, and he smirked slowly at me.
“Does that mean the rest of us can play with the other members of House Rousseau? Or are you going to be greedy with them too?” he teased, making me bite my lip to stop the laugh from bubbling up.
I turned to Carnelian, considering. The shocked devastation in his eyes was everything I wanted, but I could tell he hadn’t given up. Not yet. Maybe never. I hated to admit that I saw pieces of myself in him, but it gave me enough insight to know the truth.
People like us, we didn’t bend. We could only break.
So I slipped my knife to the center of his throat and rammed it straight through. Watching with a smile as the great lordbroke, his blood gushing outin ruby-red waves as he choked on it. His great noble blood turned against him in the end, destroying everything he was.
It was beautiful.
As I watched the light leave his eyes, my shoulders sank in shuddering relief. A type of peace I had never known overtaking me as I looked at the two dead lords before me. My family was finally avenged, and now, as I looked back to Azurill, my king, my love—I knew the future was finally looking brighter than any diamond.
.
Chapter fifty-two
Linnea
“Look who we found, trying to scurry away like the rats they are,” Emrys announced dramatically as he and Balthazar returned with several guards, each holding the arms of Lord Darcel, his wife, Grethyn, and finally, his daughter, Sania.
“Anyone want to explain why Lord Darcel here is carrying a vile of blood in his pocket?” Emrys asked, quirking a brow in my direction.
I was too busy glaring at the family in question to answer for a moment, lost in thoughts of how different things could have been if they hadn’t betrayed us.
“My father was smart enough to lock Pearl’s vaults with a blood lock,” I finally explained, “As long as a member of the main line of House Marit lived, no others could open it.”
“Damn,” he whistled, “I knew Lord Elros was a crafty one.”
I ignored his commentary, still staring at the members of House Helmi, and jumped when Azurill appeared beside me. He put a steadying hand on my back, and I turned my head to meet his eyes. I could see the question in them, and I wanted to reassure him I was alright, but my thoughts were so consumed, it would have to wait.
