Galen roars in pain and tries to wrench out of Bellanca’s hold. A mighty twist pulls him free of Griffin’s hands and hauls Bellanca right off her feet. She squeezes with all her might. There’s no way she’s letting go. She looks out of control. Demented. Impressive.
I cradle Appoline against my chest, wondering where this family came from, and if they’re the ones I should have been terrified of all along.
“You don’t have to do this,” Griffin calls to Bellanca over the snap and snarl of her raging fire. “I can do it for you.”
My heart catapults up my throat. He made that offer to a woman he doesn’t even know because of me, because of how killing Thaddeus left a black mark on my soul and nightmares in my life. But this is different. This is like with Otis. This is revenge, not self-preservation.
Bellanca looks at Griffin, seeming to hear what he said, but then grips her brother even harder. She screams, sounding unbalanced in a familiar way. Her magic races over her shoulders and then surges higher to frame her face. Her long, thick mass of red hair swirls and mixes with the flames. Blue-green eyes glint like jewels in the heart of a volcano, and then the firestorm leaps from her and engulfs Galen.
His shouts grow deafening and then stop abruptly. He falls, his substantial weight finally dragging him from Bellanca’s fiery grip. At her feet, Galen Tarva burns until there’s nothing but smoldering bone on the shattered marble.
Bellanca slowly closes her fists. Her hands shake as the fire still coiling around her head and arms disappears back into her body.
“That’s one way to do it,” Carver murmurs next to me, a hint of wary admiration in his voice.
I nod, then glance to my sides. Everyone is here, and apart from Flynn and Griffin, who look like they’ve just gone three rounds with a Centaur, I see no damage they didn’t already have when we arrived.
Movement against the wall draws my attention. Lystra helps an unsteady but conscious Ianthe stand, and my heart sings with joy as the two girls stumble over.
Apparently done playing with snakes, Cerberus finally decides to be helpful again and turns on a cornered Acantha. It only takes two mouths to rip her in half while his third head bays in gory triumph.
Cowering on the dais, Galen’s two sons don’t say a word. They look catatonic with fear. Auntie Bella just showed them a thing or two; their father has ceased to exist; and the three-headed guardian hound of the Underworld is chewing on Aunt Acantha’s bones.What a day.
Ignoring everything and everyone else, Bellanca drops to her knees next to Appoline. Her red hair still sparks, and she smells faintly of wood smoke and burning leaves. With quick flicks, Bellanca’s sharp gaze takes in the way I’m holding her sister. Then her eyes turn glassy and fill with tears. “Appie?”
Appoline’s chest shudders under my hand.
“Someone get a healer,” I say. “It’s not too late.”
Bellanca leaps up, but Griffin catches her around the middle, stopping her.
“I’m sorry,” he says gravely, “but I can’t let you leave this room.”
Fire crackles all over Bellanca again as she struggles against Griffin’s hold. Fueled by fear and fury, she burns holes in his bloodstained clothing and then howls in frustration when her magic doesn’t work on him.
“Lystra!” she yells. “Run!”
Lystra abandons a still-swaying Ianthe and sprints for the double doors, only to run into the stone wall that is Flynn. He’s so covered in the guards’ blood that she hits him with a wet smack and then squeals in disgust. Flynn shackles her wrist, and she immediately starts beating on his chest with her other hand until he grabs that one, too, and forces it down.
Not a spark of magic nips the air around her.Poor girl.
“Don’t hurt her!” Bellanca screams, her whole body raging with fire again. She kicks back at Griffin’s legs and then slams her head toward his jaw. His shins take a beating, but he angles his face away just in time.
“It’s…all right, Bella.” Appoline looks up at me with the weirdest smile. “I knew it would be like this.”
“No!” Bellanca looks even wilder now, truly terrified.
“Griffin!” I cry. “There’s still time. We can heal her!”
Appoline keeps smiling at me. She’s older than I am, but I feel oddly maternal and protective of her as she leans on me and grips my hands. Harsh prickles stab at my eyes. I plead with Griffin again, my voice raw and rough, but he shakes his head. My heart hollows at his denial, and I feel like the epicenter of an earthquake, not sure if I’ve wrought ruin on the innocent, or leveled a terrible construct.
“But she saved me!” Appoline sacrificed herself for me, just like Eleni, and I don’t even know why.
“If I let one of these women out of the room and she doesn’t come back, she will always be a threat to us. All of this will be fornothing,” he says fiercely.
“No.” I shake my head. “She’ll come back for her sister.”
His expression remains firm, grim as well, and his eyes tell me two things. Maybe I’m right, or maybe I’m transferring onto other people my own guilt and regret for not going back for Ianthe. Either way, he won’t budge, and I realize something about Griffin; he’ll make decisions I never could.
