Chelsie’s hands began to shake where she was holding his wounds, and then she gripped down harder than ever. “I can’t,” she whispered, refusing to meet his eyes. “I can’t fight her. I’m sorry. I’m so,sosorry.”
“You’re pathetic,” Justin sneered, pushing off the ground again. “Looks like it’s up to me to—”
Chelsie released her grip on the sliced artery at his knee. After so much blood loss, it took only seconds of free bleeding to make him pass out. She clamped her hand back down as soon as he went limp, her chest heaving as she yelled for Frieda.
Bethesda’s aide was there in an instant. So was Fredrick, which shouldn’t have been a surprise. He’d always been the most rebellious of her Fs. Sneaky, too, which was the only reason he was still alive.
“We’re taking him to medical,” she said, indicating where they should hold Justin to keep him from bleeding out any more than he already had. “You keep him steady. I’ll cut.”
They did as she asked at once, but while Frieda followed the directions with her usual silent acceptance, Fredrick wasn’t so easy. “Who did this?” he whispered, glaring at Conrad, who was standing beside Bethesda at the edge of the hole Julius and Gregory had left in the mountain. “Was it—”
“No,” Chelsie said, drawing her sword. “It was me.”
The hurt and shock in Fredrick’s eyes was more than Chelsie could take, so she didn’t. She just looked away and did what she’d done for six centuries. She did her job, slicing the air on all sides with her Fang in a perfect square to form a hole in the world that would take them to the infirmary.
As always, it was a perfect strike, but even though she knew better, Chelsie couldn’t help stealing one last look through the gaping hole in the mountain down at where the idiot whelp who’d become her favorite brother was now pinned on the ground. Pinned anddying,just like all the others.
And yet again, it was all her fault.
That bitter truth was the last straw. Chelsie turned away with a strangled sound, closing her eyes as the air split, dropping the four of them right into the middle of the Heartstriker’s scrambling medical staff.
***
Bethesda allowed herself a small sigh of relief when she felt Chelsie leave. She’d used that particular tool very hard of late, enough that she was starting to get worried about breaking her. Even Chelsie had her limits. She was contemplating what to do about that when another unwelcome problem reared its ugly head.
“I don’t like this,” Conrad growled, scowling down at the painfully one-sided fight below. “Gregory’s killing him.”
“That’s the point,” Bethesda said irritably. “I didn’t put a hole in my mountain to leave the job unfinished. And anyway, I thought you liked duels.”
“Thatis not a duel,” Conrad said, stabbing his finger at the bloodstained sand where Gregory was clawing at Julius like a dragon gone mad. “This was badly done, Bethesda.” His eyes flicked over his shoulder to where Chelsie had just vanished. “All of it.”
“You’re not going to gripe about your sister again, are you?”
“Chelsie made her own bed,” Conrad said, and from the tone of his voice, he clearly thought she deserved it. Yet another reason Bethesda had chosen him as her knight. “But I was referring to Justin.”
“Oh, he’ll be fine,” she said with a laugh. “He’s tougher than you are. He just gets pigheaded sometimes, and he needs a stern hand to steer him back to the right path.”
“But that’s the problem,” Conrad said, turning his cold green glare on her. “I’m not sure you know what that is anymore.”
“Don’t start,” Bethesda growled. “It’s bad enough you had a hand in that contract to begin with, but I am still your mother, and I am doing this for all of us. Julius’s weakness would have brought the whole clan down.”
Conrad’s glare didn’t budge. “Would it?”
Bethesda bared her teeth, but as always, Conrad didn’t even seem to notice. “I signed Brohomir’s contract becauseyoulost,” he said, turning back to the fight. “By your own edicts, that makes you unworthy of rule. That said, you are still my mother and part of the leadership of this clan, which is why I’ve continued to protect and support you despite your fallen status. But there is a line, Bethesda. You have never been honorable, but stabbing Justin in the back just for doing his job? Sending Gregory to maul a twenty-four-year-oldchildwho won’t fight back?” He shook his head. “That’s too far. Even for you.”
“I see treason week continues,” Bethesda snarled, pulling herself up to her full height. “But you’ve gone turncoat too late, Conrad. With this defeat, my youngest son’s bizarre hold over otherwise civilized dragons will be forever broken. There’s no way any of them will follow him now that he’s been so utterly defeated by Gregory, who couldn’t even stand up to ahuman.” She chuckled. “That’s as low as it gets, and about what I expected from Julius. He’s nothing without help.”
Conrad shook his head. “Were any of us at his age?”
“That doesn’t make me wrong.”
“It doesn’t,” he agreed, giving her a strange look. “But that’s Julius’s power, isn’t it? He sincerely wants a better future, and he’s willing to put his life on the line for it. That kind of conviction inspires others. It makes them want to help him, if only to see what kind of world he’d create if he won.”
“Gag me with a spoon,” Bethesda said, rolling her eyes. When her son refused to join in the mockery, though, she grew wary. “Come now, Conrad,” she said with a nervous laugh. “Don’t tell me you’re falling for this nonsense, too?”
Conrad shrugged. “I am the Clan Champion. I side with whoever makes us stronger.”
“And that’s why he has to go,” she snapped. “He’s the embarrassment who’s bringing us all down!”
