Ash met his gaze, unflinching.
He snarled, fire forming in his throat, but the black manacle there smothered the flames before they could escape—and likely prevented his shifting as well.
“Flaeron,” Attor said, his tone like razors.
“You killed my sire!” Flaeron’s bellow of outrage echoed through the massive square, blood dripping from his split lip.
What now?
“You deserve death!” he shouted at Race, defiant even as the Resistance fighters closed in, their blades drawn.
“Death?” Race’s tone remained deadly calm—the kind of calm that came before fire. He stood there, legs spread, arms folded, his bronze crown catching the sunlight. “For what yoursiredid for millennia? For trying to free my people from his rot? Or, for your pathetic attempt to harm my mate?”
“My sire wanted good for everyone!” Flaeron thrashed against the guards, trying to break free. “That whore would have made him a perfect gift?—”
Attor seized him by the hair, dragging him up until their eyes met. “Never speak of my queen that way. Say it again, and I’ll peel the skin from your flesh one layer at a time. You will wish for death.”
Flaeron sneered, baring his fangs.
“He’s a vile piece of work, isn’t he?” Ash muttered, wanting to fry the twit.
Bloody fascist arses, clinging to their thrones and delusions like dragon ticks.
Race drew her into his arms, her cheek smooshed against his chest. “Calm,” he murmured.
Ugh.She exhaled a frustrated breath.
“Malcarion’s reign is over,” Race said, his voice cold, absolute. “You should have conceded.”
“To a coward who ran and hid for millennia?” Flaeron spat. “I should have killed you last night!”
“What?” Ash jerked back, but Race kept her against him.
He stroked her spine, the motion deceptively unruffled. In his other palm, twin orbs of flame formed, and he rolled them between his fingers like molten marbles.
“For your attempted assassination,” he said, the orbs spinning lazily, “you’ll be drawn and quartered by dragons at dawn.”
“Just behead me, you spineless bastard!” Flaeron spat blood at Race’s feet.
“That’s His Majesty,” one of the guards snapped, slamming a fist into Flaeron’s jaw. He hit the floor hard, crimson streaking his mouth and chin.
Race dropped the fireballs on the platform, and they bounced and rolled toward Flaeron, circling him.
The idiot laughed. One continued to circle him while the other spun toward a blood-stained arch—one Malcarion had apparently used to torture and execute Resistance fighters. The fiery orb raced up it, and the entire thing glowed—no flares, nothing, just seams of red blazing through the marble before it crumbled to dust.
“By Pyr’xian scales,” someone whispered in the dead silence.
Flaeron’s smirk faltered.
The second fireball zipped past his feet, trailing molten sparks as it darted toward the remaining arches of torture. One by one, the structures ignited in eerie red seams and held for several seconds before collapsing into piles of ashes.
Race didn’t even blink. “Beheading you would be a mercy you don’t deserve. Take him away.”
A ripple tore through the gathered crowd, shock, relief, rage all bleeding together, as the guards dragged the sputtering traitor across the square?—
Shouting erupted, a wave of fury rolling outward.“Kill him! End him!”
Ash buried her face into Race’s chest, breathing harshly. “Dear Lord, I truly hope it’s finally over.”
