“The front door would make it easier to trace the path they carried me in from before,” I agree, and all three Scorpions nod.
It’s decided.
“You want a boost to the top, or would you rather go the easy route and shadow walk to the front door?” Scorpius asks me, his eyes moving from the ivy-covered stone in front of me to the dark shadows on the other side of the large tree trunk. “Technically, we can shadow walk right into the fucker’s room, but we usually like to get a feel for the layout and exits when we move in on a hunt. Your call though.”
It’s all I can do not to bash my head against the wall for my stupidity. I’m so used to hiding my thura and relying on my body that it didn’t even dawn on me to shadow walk to my destination.
Scorpius reaches up and presses a black strand of hair out of my face. “It’ll get easier in time,” he assures me, and I’m not entirely sure if he’s talking about using my thura or wading through what was done to me. “Until then, I’m always up for the hard way.”
I smile at his cheeky grin and push up on my toes, needing to taste that cocky smirk. I sink into the kiss for a beat, and then it’s over before it even started. I pull the other blade from the small of my back and let the dark part of me stretch and slip into every nook and cranny of who I am.
“Shadow walk it is,” I whisper, and in perfect synchronicity, we all move to the dark cloak on the other side of the tree.
“We’ll follow your lead, Telson,” Skull announces, as though there were any doubt, but there isn’t. I know who I am to them and who they are to me, and I’m ready for anything and everything that comes next.
With a nod, I access the in-between. And just like they taught me to, I slip into the shadows, eager to make the world bleed.
ChapterForty-Four
The door opens silently, and I almost want to scoff at how right Skull was. The duke has everything but basic sense. He assumes there isn’t anyone in the court who would dare to take what’s his, to stand against him. History should have taught him better, but it’ll be a pleasure to remind him of who I am before I feed him his own cock and watch him choke on it.
We step into a foyer that is a perfect match to my memory. The red-carpeted stairs look the same, as do the faces that stare out with dead eyes from paintings hung on the walls. Flashes from the last time I was here bombard me. I stop, one foot on the bottom step, and try to shake free of the shackles of pain and fear that are echoing through my thoughts.
“You’re not her anymore,” Skull mumbles quietly in my ear, his hand pressed to the small of my back. “You are not defenseless. You are not at their mercy. You are the dangerous one now.Youare their reckoning.”
His lips meet my neck in a brief but mooring kiss, and with a deep breath, I banish the memories from that night. I’m not here to relive them. I took back my power and my body a long time ago. Tonight is a new chapter, one that will stamp justice on the pages of everyone the monster within these walls has hurt, and I know there are others. Tonight is my gift to all of us, whether any of them ever know or not.
The stairs welcome our ascent silently, and we bank to the left at the top. We stick to the shadows as we slip down the long wide hallway. Closed doors line our path, but I don’t bother to check whether they’re occupied or not. Only the duke and his personal guard are calling to my blades. If anyone else on the other side of these doors chooses to add their name to that list, Skull, Scorpius, and Bones are there to deal with them.
I stop outside of the room I was brought to at the end of the hall. I use my hands and the language of assassins to signal that this is the place and what the plan is on the other side of the door. I’ll slip in first, and they’ll follow. They’ll check for any secret entrances into the room and guard all of the exits while I get the names of the duke’s guards. When I’m done with him, we’ll hunt them. That is if the shit stain’s screams don’t have them rushing right into our blades. One can hope they make it that easy.
I press my ear to the seam of the door, making sure no one on the other side is up taking a piss or something. The faint sound of snoring is all I hear. I twist the knob and carefully push the door open. Moving in like a wraith, I immediately note that it looks different from how I remember it. The deep green velvets and dark wood accents have been replaced by soft yellow silk and warm walnut furnishings. There’s a feminine touch to the space that wasn’t here before, which makes sense when I spot the blonde hair fanned out on a pillow at the head of the bed.
If there were any doubt about the owner of the room, it vanishes when I look to the other side of her and see the duke on his side, deep in the clutches of sleep. I stalk to the bed, tracing the details of his face with a rage-filled gaze. His light brown hair is longer than it was but holds the same curl that kept falling into his face when he was on top of me. His pale skin is the smooth, line-free display that the rich can always afford to maintain. There’s a scar on his upper lip that wasn’t there before. I hope one of his victims gifted him the mark by biting him. His face is serene in sleep, but I know all too well the evil smirk he likes to wear when taking things that don’t belong to him.
I raise a hand, signaling to the others that it’s about to begin, and then I lean over the duke and press my dagger to his throat. He gasps as the sharp edge of steel violently pulls him from his slumber. I ready myself for the putrid green eyes that will open in shock any moment now, eyes that stalked me in my nightmares, eyes that I’ll never fucking forget.
With a jerk that helps my dagger find his blood, he stares up at me, fear crumpling his features and floating in his…blueeyes. I startle, confusion shoving at me as I take in the monster, but I shove my bewilderment away and press harder at his throat.
“You promised me as you handed me off to your guards that you’d remember me and my sweet cunt. I hope that’s true,” I snarl at him as I press my face closer.
He blinks those fucking blue eyes up at me, his stare filled with nothing but terror, and I yank a memory from the vault I locked them in to try to figure out how I got his eyes so bloody wrong. I stare down at him, like he stared down at me, but the blue in front of me and the green from my memories don’t reconcile.
“Oh stars, no!” the female next to me cries out.
She sits up with shocked terror, looking around the room and pulling her bed sheet to her chest as though it will protect her. She whimpers when she spots the Scorpions, and tears begin to trail down her sharp cheeks and drip off her chin.
“Who…who are you? What do you want?” she gasps out as she scoots back into the cushioned fabric of her ornate headboard.
“You know who we are,” Scorpius tells her casually.
“Andyouknow why we’re here,” I growl at the duke. “Did you really think no one would ever stop you?” I seethe at him. “That you could rape and torture to your heart’s content and there’d be no reclamation?”
“I…I’ve never r-raped a soul. I would n-never,” the duke stammers as he lifts his hands in what he hopes is an innocent gesture.
“I’m going to make you swallow your cock like you expect us to swallow your lies. Tilleo drugged me.Youcarried me to this very room, cut my clothes off, and tied them around the poster of your fucking bed.”
His gaze alights with recognition, and I smile cruelly down at him as I witness it.
