Even though I was a master of sorcery, I never abandoned my old talents. Like a serpent in the rocks, I still knew the best time to strike.
With a pounding yet heavy heart, I sent the message into Riyan’s mind. “He does not care about being a family. He tried to force me into a blood bond so I could bear him a new heir.”
Vermillion rage surged through our bond. Riyan set his jaw and gave Derrick a knowing look. Derrick returned with a nod.
Riyan gripped his axe handle.
Derrick covered Astrid’s eyes.
“Look at that pathetic sod on top of the tower,” General Hyton shouted, “trying to sway you with the tears of a stupid—”
Chop.
I lifted my chin as I watched the black blood spill out of General Hyton’s severed neck. The sky shimmered for a moment, revealing a white raven that only I could see. The raven descended to earth to take the son she loved to the other side.
Riyan’s back muscles shook. Red waves churned and crashed in his mind. Slowly, Riyan’s trembling arm raised as he held up the head of Ragnar Hyton, General of the Lycaster army, and the famed Little Diamond in front of the six Barons.
Riyan had slayed his final giant.
“Who is next?” Riyan roared. Even the mountain shook from the power of his fury. “Who dares to challenge the last Hyton heir—”
Riyan’s head snapped back. The tail of an arrow stuck out of his right eye.
And the diamond in my heart exploded.
I only registered the sound of Riyan’s body hitting the ground as my body filled with light.
I did not know who had fired the deadly arrow…but they would pay.
They wouldallpay.
I screamed, holding the heat of a blazing star in my throat. Thunder cracked at my command and the clouds poured down on the fortress. My hands twisted around the magic in the rain. My feet left the ground.
Every one of the Man of the Mountain’s tears in the rain, in the grass, and in the blood of the men outside of the Bloodstone Fortress gate lit up in burning barbs of pure pain. My blood was the sun. My scream was the terror of the night.
There was no sky or ground. There was no air.
There was only my hunger for vengeance.
Cries of anguish echoed in the distance. The soldiers of the Lycaster army dropped to their knees, pressing their faces into the mud as they screamed. All of their minds and hearts openedas they begged like worms for me to doanythingto ease their torment.
The fabric between worlds stretched at the seams. Mere memories became monsters. Freya’s laughter shrieked through the air. The agonized cries of brother slain by brother tore through the clouds. Barbarian iron clashed with Latiman steel. The Man of the Mountain’s wails filled the sky and suddenly I was not alone.
Someone else was within me—someone I knew, but had never met.
Her power flowed within me. I was her hands and feet. I carried her heart.
The first sorceress.
Then the flames around my heart grew until there was no separation between my body and the magic. I was light. I was punishment. I was justice.
I was a fucking monster.
My bones bent and my skin hardened into scales. I pushed into the sky, using the raindrops like a path to crawl down each of the hundreds of trembling tethers. I slithered through the army’s disgusting minds, my tongue flicking out as I smelled their evil deeds and my fangs glimmering as I hunted down the guilty.
Then I found him. The false hero. The gutter rat that preyed on the vulnerable.
Grigory Orion Thornebow.
