In a second, Dádhi…“I’m going to save your brother. Aodhan’s going to wake up. This nightmare will be over before the sun rises. I promise.”
Fist still held against her mouth, she whispers, “The s-sun won’t rise for m-months.”
I regret my metaphor and am about to repackage it when I spot a faint white line just above her eyebrow—the mark of a freshly healed scar.
“P-Please hurry.”
I lock my gaze on her mouth, concealed behind her fist. I itch to tow it aside and inspect her teeth, but instead, I carry my hand up to her cheek, covering her feather tattoo with my thumb.
“I’ll get him out,” I say, as I drag my thumb toward her hairline in a sham caress. “It’s going to be all right.”
The crisp edges of her feather blur. My anger at having fallen for her dupery inflames my temper.
As I contemplate whether to behead the two-faced Faerie or keep her alive for Konstantin to decide her fate, fire rips across my waist.
50
KONSTANTIN
My rage burns so hot I half believe I will end up melting my iron manacles, as well as the chains coiled around my body. But of course, I burn through nothing. I’ve never loathed my element more than in this moment.
“Any movement on the quay?” Timo Volkov asks the kid standing nearest me, one of his sons.
Five out of his six hateful boys are gathered in my rail car, shotguns poised in their hands. Every time their grease-blackened fingers so much as twitch, I hold my breath—not for my sake; for Izolda’s. After all, the bullet from earlier might’ve knocked me out, but—according to Ksenia—my skull hadbouncedit out. I still felt like I’d taken a battering ram to the head…and looked it.
The Volkov half-blood shakes his head. “No movement, Atsa.”
Timo readjusts his barrel, leveling it at Izolda, who lies curled and unconscious on my cabin bed. “Send one of our people to check what’s taking so long.”
“Now, now, Timo.” Bohdan reclines further in the armchair—myarmchair—and folds his legs. “Ksenia would hate your lackof trust.” He nods to me. “Especially after she delivered her big bad brother.”
I clutch his umber stare, picturing all the ways I will torture him once I break free, because Iwillbreak free. And then, with an iron sword, I will hack him into pieces that I’ll scatter across my oceans for the tides to bury deep. Contemplating my vengeance floods me with adrenaline that sharpens my senses, keeping me awake and alert.
Izolda whimpers in her sleep. Is it the memory of her mate being shot that torments her, or is she in pain because of her perforated palms?
I can still hear Ksenia inform her twin not to fret, that the blade wasn’t iron—unlike the one she used on my palms—and that her skin would knit in no time. The same way I can still hear Ksenia place the blame on me: “If only our brother had handed over his talisman and kingdom, I wouldn’t have had to harm you, Iz.”
I should’ve admitted right away that I couldn’t take it off because of a bargain, but I’d been worried Ksenia would go after my fiancée and hurt yet another person I love. Not to mention that when she’d dragged me into my own Throne Room, I’d still foolishly believed Salom was assembling an army to liberate the castle.
What Bohdan did to him stains the backs of my gummy lids. I swiftly replace the image with what I will do to him, even though I’m well aware it won’t bring back the man who loved me like a father.
Fuck.
Gritting my teeth, I bear down on one of my hands, trying to thread it out of the manacle by popping my bones out of alignment. Sweat pours down the sides of my face as another bone gives. My vision blanks, and I sway.
When I reel my one working lid up, I find I’m sprawled onto my side. A treacly aroma tickles my flaring nostrils and turns my stomach. Bohdan is peeling himself a pear, watching me as though I were a snared reindeer. My line of sight on the feasting monster is cut off by two sets of legs, both ensconced in the uniforms of my fallen guards. The Volkov sons crouch.
Vasily prods me with the barrel of his gun. “Up.”
“Grab his arm,” the other says, as color finally seeps over the monochrome fragments of my blackout.
They haul me back to sitting. I seal my jaw, reining back my howl of pain, unwilling to give them the satisfaction of hearing how they’ve reduced me.
Once seated against the wooden baseboard, I test my broken hand, nearly blacking out when the iron manacle jostles the bone shards and the iron dagger gash that’s yet to heal. Evidently, garlanding me in toxic metal wasn’t enough for the lot of them.
I breathe in and out until the new dots of gray sprinkling my vision wash away. And then I hoist my shoulder to thread my hand out of the cuff. My skin is so slick with blood that the metal band slips…and slips. I flatten my spine to the wall, drinking the air in great drafts to avoid keeling over again.
“The instant Isla releases you of your bargain and you hand us your necklace, you and Izolda will be free to go into exile.” A perfect spiral of green peel drops onto the glass tabletop. “You already have an in with Luce, but I’m sure Eponine or Zendaya will be only too glad to host you.”
