I tried to breathe normally but utterly failed. I had to lie fast.
“One of the professors mentioned him,” I said.
Ezreal smirked. “Fascinating. And did this professor tell you who he is?”
I shook my head slowly.
Ezreal’s footsteps shook my bones, but I refused to back away as his breath condensed on my cheek.
“King Valenthor Ryth’enir, also known to close friends and family as Ryden is the King of Raven Falls,” he said.
The King of Raven Falls. That couldn’t be right. That was Blake’s father.
He leaned back enough to look into my eyes and smirked.
A tremor struck my nerves, and my limbs shook. What did that mean? Was he suggesting that this man, Ryden, could be my dad? There was no way.
Pleasure twisted his features like a madman as he watched me writhe in the shock of his revelation.
What a sick bastard.
“You must be delusional. Tell me what you know. Is he my dad?” I asked.
He laughed maniacally and paced before me. My skin crawled as I watched him; his behavior and reactions were nothing short of insane. My body was waging a war between rage and fear, but it didn’t matter as it was presenting in the same symptoms.
He stopped, his malevolent gaze finding mine. “The lives of the students at Nightfall are more sordid than the entirety of the Falls Court.”
“You think this is a game?” I shouted. “Your entertainment? Tell me what you know!”
His demeanor stilled. “Your insight into your mother’s affairs has extended your life. I might as well enjoy the show as you chase after pointless answers. But I can only speculate who your father is. Maybe it is Ryden, maybe it is not. Your mother was no more than a whore.”
My arm stretched out and a pointed blade of crackling silver everi seared toward his head. He easily deflected it with his hand, where it exploded in rock and debris.
“Since you seem so concerned about it,” he drawled, “I will let you in on a secret. King Valenthor may be your father, but he is not Prince Rykiren’s.”
Shock struck like an arrow to my chest, seizing my chest. Could that be? Was Blake not… the prince?
“Why should I believe you?” I growled.
He smirked. “I do not know. You asked. But I am finished playing now.”
Suddenly, a cold more intense than I’d ever felt, paralyzed me. It wrapped its frozen blades around my skin like razor ribbon.
“This cold,” I whispered.
The shadows around us thinned and twisted. They moved toward me, wrapping themselves around my ankles and snaking up my legs.
“Is something the matter?” Ezreal asked. “Are you cold?”
“You,” I breathed. “It was you.”
Rage exploded around me as flame curled around the shadows, igniting them in an impossible sight. The bracelet on my wrist, the gift from my mom, glowed in a white, ethereal light, the everi within me drawing me to it. Touching it with the tip of my finger, it was warm, and the power within it sent shockwaves through me as wispy tendrils of light began to spill from it.
I watched in awe as it morphed, shimmering with raw everi, into the sword Derrick gave me, ablaze with a white flame that lit the room, a small emerald shard crafted into the hilt.
I stared into the eyes of the monster that killed my mom.
“I hate you,” I said, my voice quaking, then swung the sword with all my might at the monster before me.
