Screams erupt from the streets around the colosseum. A shiver courses up my spine as I take in her words.
“She says it like we’ve been oppressing her, and not as if her minions took over Spring and Summer,” Dayton snarls. “Fuck this. I need to get to her and—”
“Wait.” I grab his arm. “You challenge her right now and you’re dead. You may have broken your curse, but she’s been amassing her power for decades. Our priority must be the people of Hadria.”
Dayton nods, but I can feel the tension in his chest, the rage building within it.
Or maybe that’s my own rage. I stare up at her. This so-calledQueenstole my mother and tore my family apart. Now, she’s threatening the home of my mate.
I may not have shadow magic, but I do have something she doesn’t.
The blood of a Queen.
Sira’s voice echoes out again, each word a rumble of thunder: “In repentance for the wrong that has been committed against me, I hereby claim Hadria as my own. Citizens, you and your families will be safe,” her shadows ripple, “as long as you swear fealty to the Below, and me as your Queen. Those who choose to maintain their misguided loyalty to Aurelia’s dog, who you refer to as the High Prince of Summer, will suffer the same fateas the noble family of Summer.” Lightning flashes behind her. “Complete and utter annihilation.”
“You fucking tyrant!” Dayton screams. “Get out of my fucking city!”
She can’t hear him. But she might be able to hear me.
I whisper to the wind, willing it to drift up to her. A promise. A vow. A covenant that I will see through to the end.We will not kneel in the shadows. We will rule again from a throne among the stars.
Sira snaps her head, eyes searching. I pull Dayton from the balcony and back inside, keeping an eye on the floating Queen through the window.
“If you will not kneel,” she snarls, “then you will die.”
Sira yanks upon her shadows as if they were a steed, and they turn, starting to roll back away from the city. “I will return at dawn to accept your fealty.”
I take in a deep breath, knees buckling. She’s leaving. We have time to figure this out, time to—
A darkness falls over the colosseum. Dayton and I look up through the window, Sira’s shadow clouds are straight above us. I can’t see her anymore, but her voice is louder than ever: “One last thing before I go. I cannot suffer the rebels who threaten the safety of those in Hadria to live. Let them be an example for those who think of rejecting my generosity.” She sighs, and it’s as if the city takes a breath. “Your precious colosseum and the lives of the rebels will be the balm that soothes my broken heart.”
“What?” Dayton cries. “What does she—”
Before he can finish his words, a torrent of shadows descends from her cloud and flashes of emerald flame dot the arena.
A bloodcurdling scream erupts from the floor below us.
“Feast, my darlings,” Sira’s voice booms, “but only on the rebels in the colosseum. We wouldn’t want to hurt one of my new loyal citizens.”
With horror, I watch as her cloud carries her away from the city, but it’s so much smaller now, one shadow after another pouring down into the arena. Skeletons, bodies imbued with emerald fire, manifest within the shadows, spreading across the sacred sands.
Another massive rumble shakes the building, and Dayton grabs me.
A sheet of blackness covers the window, its movements frantic, desperate. The glass cracks, and darkness seeps through the fractures. I scream and scramble away.
“We’ve got to get out of here,” Dayton cries, quickly donning his dual blades and grabbing my hand.
He pulls me out of the room and into the hallway. Chunks of rock shatter on the ground, and pieces of the floor erupt up in plumes of dust and rock.
“The colosseum,” I gasp. “They’re destroying it.”
CHAPTER 101
Rosalina
Dayton’s hand grips mine tightly, pulling me along as we navigate the labyrinthine corridors of the apartments attached to the colosseum. My heart pounds in my chest as the ground trembles beneath us. Dust and debris fill the air, choking my lungs as we push forward.
“Those fucking shadows are going to bring this whole place to the ground,” Dayton snarls. “We’ve got to get out of here.”
