Truths slap me as if I were hearing them out loud, or through lies. Mother isn’t all-powerful. She can be bullied, cornered, and even scared. This also explains her infuriation over Griffin, and her obsessive need for me to return home, even though it would mean having a rival in her nest. Although not for long, I guess. My Kingmaker Magic never detected any lies in her words because shedoeswant me back in Castle Fisa, and she’s always wanted to “teach” me to be a queen just like her, but she was going to ship me off to Galen Tarva before I lost myself entirely and turned against her in cold blood.
I swallow a sense of bone-deep betrayal, infuriated to even feel it. It’s not as though I thought Mother could turn over a new leaf—or ever would.
Oh Gods. Did she send Ianthe here as insurance that I’d eventually comply?
As much as I despise her, I’m not above using Mother to get us out of this. “Alpha Fisa wants me alive.”
Galen chuckles. It’s a dark sound. “Even Alpha Fisa doesn’t always get what she wants.”
And with me dead, all pacts—or binding promises—involving me are off.
“Here you finally are, in my castle, and I’ve decided I don’t need you after all.” Galen smirks. “A Power Bid came early, thanks to Beta Sinta, and I won’t wait any longer. My time has come.”
He doesn’t even know Beta—Alpha—Sinta is in the room. “And you’ll do what? Level everything?”
“That would be counterproductive to comfortable living.” Galen shrugs. “Fisa City and Sinta City should suffice.”
I gasp. That could mean hundreds of thousands dead. Even Mother never mass-murdered.
I stare at Galen, aware of Griffin clashing violently with the guards somewhere behind me and of his frantic shouting for me to get up. I wish I could. I swear to the Gods, I’d listen to him for once. But my legs just won’t work after getting hit with the throne, although they are twitching more. I was so sure something would come up, like it always does, and that somehow we’d win the day. Cerberus came, but the hound could have destroyed our enemies by now, and he hasn’t. I never imagined Galen’s strength, or the physical and magical cost of my own exhaustion.
Galen lowers his voice until there are hints of a growl. “I’m going to end you with a knife.”
A hot rush of feeling sweeps down my legs. I turn my grimace into bared teeth. “Short and lethal. My favorite.”
He chuckles again, his mirth grating and harsh, and yet disturbingly genuine. “Little Talia, how you’ve grown.”
“Yeah? You’re still old.”
His mouth turns down. “It was Eleni I wanted. Beautiful. Much more biddable. But you had…special talents.”
“Eleni would have eaten you alive.”
He steps closer, eyeing his sister Appoline with impatience. She’s hovering off to one side.Humming?
Bone crunches not far behind me. There’s a masculine howl. It’s not Griffin’s.
A true megalomaniac, Galen keeps talking like he has all the time in the world. “In the neck, right? Isn’t that how you do it?”
A vision of Thaddeus punches me behind the eyes. My knife in his throat. His blood on my hands.
Of course Galen knows about that. All the royal families keep tabs on each other.
Galen pounces like the predator he is, and no last-minute magic erupts to save my life. I throw my upper body to the side. Griffin’s horrified yell rings in my ears. There’s the sickening thud of steel sinking into flesh, and I cringe—but feel nothing at all.
I twist back around in time to see Galen pull his blade from Appoline’s chest. He glares at her, shock and anger in his eyes.
Appoline staggers and then falls on top of me. My arms come around her slim body, and I somehow sit us both up to face her brother. She’s shaking, and I try to work her behind me. Appoline is slight, smaller than I am, but whatever strength she has left makes it impossible for me to move her.
“What are you doing?” I try to shield her. She feels so fragile, like a child in my arms.
Her heart thumps hard under my wrist. “Protect you.”
I don’t understand. “Why?”
His eyes as cold and hard as chips of ice, Galen raises his bloody knife again. Griffin rams into him from the side, sending both men flying. Over by the wall, Bellanca lets out an enraged shout and runs toward them. Sparks snap like wildfire between her fingertips. Flames lick over her hands and up her arms.
Still locked together and grappling fiercely, the men rise to their feet. I shout a warning to Griffin, but Bellanca slams into her brother’s back, not Griffin’s. She wraps her now furiously burning hands around Galen’s thick neck.
