The hinges shriekedas Maxen slammed the door of the dungeon wide. He glared at the man bounded and gagged on the floor. They hadn’t even provided him a chair. Everything, even the table, had been removed.
Good.
This man was not to be underestimated.
Maxen stalked forward, Drake slipping in behind him with a torch held high, its light slashing across the damp walls. Peregrine shifted, dragging himself upright against the stones. His face was a ruin of bruises, one eye swelling shut, yet that damned cocky glint still clung to him like a fool.
His hands flexed open and closed, as though eager for a throat.
“So you are the enemy in the shadows. I should have bloody known.” He crouched before the man, yanking the gag that covered his mouth down. “I just didn’t think you to be this damn eager to be shipped off.”
“Fury,” Peregrine drawled. “What a pleasure. If I’d known you were coming, I’d have ordered better accommodations.”
“Mocking me won’t work. Who are you working for?”
Peregrine grinned. “You don’t think I’d take you on alone?”
“Who,” Maxen’s eyes bored into Peregrine’s swollen face as he repeated, “are you working for?”
Peregrine spat blood to the side, sneering, “Working for. You make it sound as though I take orders like some common thug.”
Maxen’s hand shot out, fisting Peregrine’s cravat and jerked him forward so violently the man finally grimaced. “Answer me.”
“I don’tworkfor anyone.”
“You think me a fool? You think I don’t see another’s hands in this?”
Peregrine’s eyes flashed. “I should think you see very little, Fury, with that storm cloud forever across your brow. And yet here you are, gnashing your teeth at me like a beast with no prey left. Has the girl got you so on edge?”
The mention of her was the spark on dry gunpowder.
Maxen flung him back against the wall so hard Peregrine coughed, still laughing even as the stone knocked the wind out of him. “So youfell by the hand of a woman.”
Maxen’s boot came down hard on the Peregrine’s ribs.
Peregrine grunted in pain.
Served him damn right.
“You think this is amusing?” Maxen leaned in, eyes burning. “You think a thousand men haven’t tried to claim our throne? You breathe because I allow it. And right now, I’m less inclined than I’ve ever been.”
“Kill me, then.” Peregrine spat blood to the side. “It would at least prove you can do something besides brood and bark.”
“Maxen,” Drake warned.
He needn’t have bothered. “Death is mercy. I don’t deal in mercy. I deal in absolute ruin.”
“You should thank me,” Peregrine with a grin. “I spared her life.”
The next punch split his lip. “Spared? Don’t talk to me about spared.”
“You are quick to temper. Like him.”
Maxen froze. A muscle ticked in his jaw. “Like who?”
Peregrine’s grin widened, grotesque with blood. “The man who sired you.”
Drake cursed behind him. “What the devil are you saying?” his brother demanded.
