I don’t want to breathe.
I want to rip through whatever wall Amarantha built between me and Finnian with my bare hands. I want to follow the gold thread until it leads me to him, and her, and I want to wrap mythorns around her throat, and I want to watch the light leave her eyes while Finnian watches and knows he’s free.
I want to be the weapon.
I pause. That feeling. Being the one to end it all. To take out the other. I don’t know if it’s Fae or Graves. But what I do know is it feels damn good.
I want to embrace it. To swim in my blood thirst.
I close my eyes, breathing through the need to kill her, because even if I do, even if I take her out, then I take her court.
I have my own court to revive.
My eyes flicker open.
The room is staring at me. All of them. My guys. My cousins. The queens. The goddesses. Dagda with his arms crossed behind the bar, watching me the way you watch a storm decide whether or not to make landfall.
I pocket my stone. It’s warm against my thigh. Warm like Finnian’s hand was five minutes ago when he was standing right here and the world made sense.
I turn to Pepper.
She’s already looking at me. Not with concern. Not with pity. With excitement. She’s seen this face before. She’s worn this face before. Her chin lifts a quarter-inch and she bounces on her toes.
Yeah. Let’s go.
“Tiana.” My voice comes out steady and I don’t know how. Because I’m not steady. I’m broken. Ruptured from the inside out. “You’re going after Finnian.”
Tiana’s already moving. Already reaching for her boots. “I spent a long time in that court. I built half her wards. I know every passage, every blind spot, every servant entrance she thinks she sealed.” She looks at me. Her violet eyes have stopped being polite. Not that she’s ever well and truly been polite. “She took my people. She burned my home. And now she has someone who belongs to us.”
“Bring him back.”
“I’ll bring you her head.” She terrifies me a little.
“Kestra.” I turn to the Unseelie queen. “Moros.”
Kestra nods as though she already knew. Her braided hair is still streaked with blood from whatever she fought through to get here and she looks like she could walk straight into the Unseelie Court and carve a path to the throne room without breaking stride.
Because she can.
“Kieran goes with me.” She doesn’t ask. She tells me.
And here it is. The moment I knew was coming the second the plan started forming.
Kieran looks at me.
I look at him.
The silver-blue bond pulses steady between us, carrying everything neither of us is going to say out loud in a room full of people. The shadows at his feet are churning. The temperature drops three degrees, then four. His mouth doesn’t open but the bond between us is roaring, and through it I know exactly how much it costs him to keep his face still.
He should stay with me. But his father is the Unseelie king and his sister is about to walk into that court and try to take the throne and Kieran has spent his entire life protecting Kestra and I won’t be the reason he stops now.
She’s my family, too.
“Go.” One word. It costs me more than the entire battle in the Dark Forest.
He crosses the space between us in two steps. His hand grips the back of my neck, cold fingers threading into my hair, and he presses his forehead to mine. Just for a second. Just long enough for the bond to flare so bright I see it behind my closed eyelids.
“I will come back to you.” His promise vibrates against my lips.
