Eamon peeled himself out of the Vicereine’s arms and the party’s whispered conversations petered out into deafening silence.
The Emperor stalked over to greet them. “The male of the hour. You’re just in time.”
Eamon snapped his fingers, and two Vasilikans abandoned their post, rushing for a couple tucked away at a high-top. The guards dragged the confused couple onto the dance floor, and the party-goers circled them.
Eamon wrapped an arm around Tristan’s shoulder, pushing through the gathering crowd. Cassandra scurried to keep up.
The couple—a Beastrunner Fae male with golden eyes and long russet hair and a mortal female with a sharp black bob—didn’t dare struggle against the Vasilikans, though their clenched fists and rapid breathing conveyed their fury and terror.
Eamon surveyed them with a sneer before turning to address the dead-silent party.
“It seems as though my absence from the colonies has inspired some of you to become rather lax with our laws.” He shook his iridescent wings. “I blame Leonin Erabis—may he rest in peace in the realm of Anaemos. My father’s leniency—” he glanced over at Tristan “—should never have been tolerated.”
The party-goers pressed in closer.
“Many of you have taken humans as consorts, which is your right, of course. Feed from them, play with them, fuck them. That’s what most of us are here to do tonight, right?” He smirked and the gathered crowd tittered, eying each other nervously.
“But I want to be extremely clear about where the boundaries lie.” His cold hazel eyes once again darted towards Tristan, who wore a careful mask of neutrality. Cassandra didn’t dare move closer, didn’t dare touch him.
“You do not shelter them. You do not love them.” He signaled one of the Vasilikans, who grasped the high neckline of the woman’s dress and ripped it down. “And you certainly do notmarkthem.”
The crowd gasped at the crescent-shaped scar on the woman’s upper shoulder.
Eamon faced the golden-eyed Beastrunner, who was straining against the Vasilikan’s hold. “What were you thinking, Hector?” His whisper sliced into the male, who collapsed against the guard like a puppet cut from its strings.
Eamon turned back to the crowd. “These laws are in place for a reason. The separation of our species must be maintained or we risk upending our fragile peace.” His eyes cut back to Hector. “I do not share my father’s laissez-faire attitude towards these crimes.”
He signaled the Vasilikan again and the guard unsheathed a Typhon broadsword.
Though every cell in her body was screaming at her to look away, Cassandra watched as the Vasilikan pushed the quietly sobbing woman to her knees.
“Do you have anything to say?” Eamon asked Hector.
Hector gazed down at his consort, pure anguish contorting his features. “I’m so sorry. I love you,ma’anyu.” His voice broke on the last word.
The woman beamed at him, mouthingI love youthrough tear-streaked lips.
The Vasilikan slashed the broadsword down, and the smile remained on the woman’s face as her head toppled across the dance floor, coming to a stop at the foot of a Fae female who jumped back with a horrified squeak.
Hector roared—a howl of gut-wrenching despair—as the other Vasilikan dragged him out of the ballroom.
“Let this be a reminder to you all—” Eamon delivered the message directly to Tristan “—that while Fae and humans share this world, and intermingling in the colonies can’t be avoided, there is a natural order that must be respected.”
Several palace servants rushed in to gather the woman’s body and mop the blood from the dance floor.
Eamon stepped over them while they worked, smirking. “Now thatthatnasty business is done, let’s get on with our debauched evening!”
The lights dimmed and the anxious crowd welcomed the cue. More drinks appeared in hands, and sloppy laughter echoed as couples reclaimed the newly-gleaming dance floor. A different kind of music began to play—a slow, heady melody over a pounding beat.
Varuna, clad in a floor-length, sleeveless silk gown in a deep red that matched her signature lip color, slunk back into the Emperor’s arms, giggling as he whispered in her ear before playfully biting the exposed neck beneath her tight chignon.
“I need a fucking drink,” Tristan grumbled, ushering Cassandra towards a bar tended by a milky-skinned Deathstalker female.
Cassandra hung back as he ordered, attempting to calm her pounding heart and still her shaking hands.
Not a single one of the party-goers, not even the other mortal consorts, seemed bothered by what they’d just witnessed. Were brutal executions such a frequent occurrence at the Vicereine’s gatherings?
Cassandra’s eyes stung and she squeezed the skin between her thumb and forefinger to distract herself from the sorrow threatening to render her useless.
