“I don’t care aboutpeople, Romy.” I was running, feet hitting the ground, my words coming out breathless and rushed. “I’m coming. Whether you leave… or I get you out myself!”
“Hector, stop!” Romy hissed. “Don’t you dare come. You know what will happen if you?—”
Romy couldn’t finish her warning when an earth-shattering explosion rocked the world. A great force ripped me off my feet, sending me flying backwards. My spine screamed in pain as I hit the ground, blinded by a billowing cloud of smoke. I rolled over, groaning out for the air that was knocked from my lugs. I triedto shout for Romy, but the phone was no longer in my hands and my throat burned.
Disoriented and in sheer agony, I rolled onto my side to find other people laid beneath the rubble and shattered stone. It was like the world had fallen into a horrifying silence, but it shattered in a wail of screaming. Out of the rubble and gathered cloud of dust and destruction, grey-coated people hobbled and ran—not towards the White Tower, butawayfrom it.
As the smoke and dust settled, I got my first look at the destruction. The White Tower—a building that had stood proud and gleaming through time—was now a ruined mess. The side of the wall looked as though it had been torn out by a great clawed beast.
Before I could get to standing, the next assault began. A swarm of leather-clothed bodies marked by a large upside-down pentagram swarmed out of the panicked crowd like ants, their focus on the ruined heart of the Coven. Their focus wasn’t on the witches inside of it, but the innocent humans around us. I counted no more than ten, but my vision was slow and my head aching so badly I saw double.
I didn’t need my vision to clear to recognise the sound of death though. A keening cry lifted through the chaos, and ended abruptly. I blinked through dust, just in time to witness the murders begin.
7
ARWYN
Iwoke strapped to a chair in the middle of a large empty space. If my hands weren’t tied to the arms of the chair I would’ve reached up to my chest, fingers desperate to reach for the multitude of holes gifted from the guards beyond my room as they rained bullets upon me.
A snarl broke out of me as I strained against my bindings. No matter how hard I fought against them, they didn’t budge. It wasn’t twine or rope that held me in place, but thick metallic bands that rubbed my skin raw.
It was easy to panic, but instincts took over. My dad, the monster he was, had moulded me to be focused during times of duress. So, I took a deep breath in and focused on the details. No matter how small, they could help me get out of this unscathed.
My eyes took everything in. I was no longer inside my bedroom, that much was clear. It looked like this large space was some sort of old aeroplane hangar with a domed roof, the sheer size of the space dwarfed in shadow.
That wasn’t the only detail that disturbed me.
Bahmet was silent. It was as if someone had taken a knife and carved the demon out of my soul. And yet, somehow, I knew he was still lingering. Only he’d been snuffed out like a candle.
“Hello?” I called out, keeping my voice steady.
“Well, good morning. Our prince has awoken.” The voice that replied was light, and unrecognisable. What followed it was the methodical tap of heels against old stone. I strained to get a look over my shoulder to watch a middle-aged woman slink out of the darkness. I’d never seen her before, or at least my memory didn’t offer me anything to grasp. And yet there was something entirely familiar about her. Warm brown skin, bright inquisitive eyes, and a head of braids the colour of gold and brown.
I toyed with the multitude of questions to ask the stranger, but she got one out first.
“How are you feeling?”
My snarl broke into a feral hiss. “Is your question supposed to be a joke?”
“Not at all.” She lifted her finger and clicked manicured nails. As the sound echoed around the barren hangar, a new noise interrupted. The squeak of wheels, and the shuffle of booted feet. I followed it with my eyes until I saw two Witch Hunters, both armed with impressively large guns. They pushed what looked like an old box towards me. The closer it got, the more I saw that that was exactly what it was.
A television.
“I think you could make your own assumption as to how I am,” I snapped, looking down at the torn mess of my shirt. My skin was marred with bruises, but there were no holes. Whatever I was shot with wasn’t your typical bullet, clearly.
The woman clicked her tongue. “I’m merely inquiring into how you are feeling because you were shot, then pumped full of enough thistlebane to poison the entire Thames river. It was a risk, to give you so much, but then again it would seem you have a knack for surviving things that should kill you.” Her heels clicked until she came to stand directly before me. “Am I not allowed to be worried about you, Arwyn?”
“Mind freeing my hands so I can catch a fuck in my palm to give you?” I leaned forwards, nails gouging wood as the urge to fight my way free burned beneath my skin.
“Ouch,” she replied, nose scrunching. “That’s not a nice thing to say to me.”
“I don’t even know who you are.”
She smiled, and for a moment I almost choked. That smile, the genuine way it lit up her chestnut eyes, warmed her cheeks, filled my head with another person. “All in good time, Arwyn. But for now, there is something I would like you to watch.”
The television was positioned before me. I eyed both the guards, wondering if they were the ones who’d shot me. Neither looked familiar, but they feared me nonetheless. I smelt it on them, oozing from pores as they eyed me, hands never straying from the hilt of their guns.
I’d fear me too. The unkillable, demon-infested half-witch. Son to their dictator, and heir to this entire fucking freak show. And yet, I wanted no part of it. And I gathered my father had worked that out now… hence the metal bindings.
