“We need to go.” Someone gripped her arm, a guard whose name she didn’t recall.
“Save her!” Thalia sobbed, tears mixing with the blood on her hands.
“Get them out!” another roared.
Thalia was hauled to her feet, her silk slippers soaked in the rising gore, her hem ruined and stained brighter than wine. Ariadna had picked out the gown herself.
“Get the queen and princess out!” It was her father, screaming at the guards as the Vampyr who would have been her sister’s husband faced him. The guards were trying to get the royal family out of the throne room, trying to seal the Vampyrs inside even though there were still innocents there.
The queen joined Thalia, her crown lost, eyes white with fear. She grabbed Thalia hard enough to bruise.
“Ariadna!” Thalia yelled until her vocal chords shredded. She turned, trying to get back into the room, trying to get to her sister.
But all she saw beyond the guards forming rank around the two of them was her father.
Her father, whose eyes widened as he stared down at his chest—at the hand protruding from it.
Then his spine splattered to the floor, and he collapsed.
“No!” the queen screamed.
The doors to the throne room closed, leaving only chaos trapped inside—
“I’ve been looking everywhere for you.” Camilla’s bright voice appeared behind her, far too cheerful for the misery hanging over Thalia’s neck like an axe. “A servant said they saw you heading to the library, but this clearly isn’t the library, so what are you—” The shifter’s words died as Thalia slowly raised her head.
She hadn’t even realized tears were streaming down her cheeks until the water landed on her curled fists. “Who were they?” she got out.
Camilla’s face flashed. “Who was who?”
“Don’t play dumb,” Thalia snarled. “Who were the Vampyrs that came thirteen years ago to Agripa? Which House were they a part of?”
Camilla froze, glancing at the ruined map on the desk. “Do you really want to know?”
“If you do not tell me this second, I will carve it out of you.” Thalia jerked away from the desk, her hands sticky with ink—with the phantom weight of blood. “Who were they?”
The shifter didn’t back down as Thalia stopped before her. Camilla’s eyes hardened. “House Gallinus.”
Thalia felt the words land, punching deeper than a blade. She turned, the walls spinning and warping like the dirty edges of a mirror.
“Thalia?” Camilla’s words came in and out, the shifter’s voice garbled as if she spoke underwater. “Thalia?”
Thalia bolted.
She ran out of the room, her boots skidding across the stone. Her anger fueled her, each footfall reverberating up her leg, filling her lungs with white-hot rage. She skidded around the corner, her shoulder barking as she slammed into the wall with enough force the sconces shook.
No one stood watch outside the throne room. But Thalia didn’t care, not as she burst through the doors and her eyes landed on the one Vampyr she sought.
“You.” Thalia locked eyes on Lord Adrian. The leader of House Gallinus stood off to the side, watching something that was going on in the middle of the room.
Thalia didn’t care.
She’d gut the lord from head to navel, pulling out his intestines for the vultures to pick at. Then she’d sever his head and spike it on the castle wall for all to see what her wrath had brought.
She’d taken one step toward the Vampyr when someone blocked her.
“Get out of my way,” Thalia growled at Cassius.
“What is the meaning of this?” Lord Adrian hissed in outrage. It only stoked the fire inside Thalia more.
