Page 5 of Devoured

“Since you’re feeling a bit lighter today, Vanessa, I suppose it’s a fantastic time to share my news.”

Beside me, Sin tenses. His hands clench the mahogany edge of the table until his knuckles turn ghost white. “Mother, no. We’re still discussing—”

“Nonsense, Sinclair. You’re engaged to be mated to Vanessa in three months. She will be ecstatic.” Cora props her head on her hand, licking the tips of the fangs that have begun to descend from her mouth. “Won’t you, Vanessa?”

It’s only a game, I tell myself.

“Maybe,” I offer with a small shrug, jerking my chair the tiniest bit closer to Sin. “If my fiancé is involved, I’m sure I’ll love whatever… gift you’ve prepared for us.”

She cackles at that. The sharp bark of a rabid hyena. “Fabulous. I am so glad to hear it.”

At that, the spark of a lie incinerates deep inside my heart. A painful flicker of flames.

With Cora, for some strange reason, my abilities as a Truthseer don’t always work. Most of the time, I can’t feel her at all. Very rarely can I ever sense that she’s telling the truth. It’s as if honesty doesn’t exist for her. As if truth and lies are opinions rather than facts, and she simply refuses to believe in them.

But right now—the glint in her eyes, the smile on her lips—she’s lying. Worse, she wants me to know she’s lying.

It’s only a game.

“What is it?” I ask Sin, the lilt of curiosity painting my question calm and easy. “What were you discussing?”

“Nothing.” He turns his head slowly, away from me and toward his mother, and his muscles tense enough that the material around his biceps stretches to within an inch of its life. “Later, Mother.”

Cora’s smile withers. Her gaze hardens. Internally, I wince.

If Sin thinks he’s playing this game well, he’s wrong.

Proving my point, Cora stands abruptly. Her chair squeals along the tile floor as she shoves it backward. The discordant shriek captures the attention of every werewolf in the room. Glowing red, yellow, brown, and gray eyes flick toward the queen with either urgency or—in the case of Evie and Calix—unabashed hatred.

“An announcement!” Cora’s crown glitters in the darkness, all the while plumes of smoke smother the tables, the chairs, even the chandeliers. “As you are all well aware, Castle Severi is changing. With the corpses of the old regime rotting in the Realm of Superiority, we must move forward as one in this new world. A better world.”

Her voice drops then, and her tone sharpens. My entire being narrows on the next two words that fall from her hideous lips: “Our world.”

3

VANESSA

CORA SEVERI’S BITTEN PACK OF WEREWOLVES ALL BUT salivates at her words.

I don’t know who they were before Cora came along, but it isn’t just their inability to fully transform that’s concerning. It’s not that they often maintain their human ears or toes after shifting into their werewolf forms. It’s not even that Cora herself turned them, had to put a bit of her black soul in every single one.

It’s the way they look around the castle, the way they take in their surroundings with wide, hungry eyes. It feels a lot like how a barracuda might infiltrate a fish tank, not even bothering to hide its bloodlust from easy prey.

I swallow hard and lean forward to listen to Cora.

“For a millennium, werewolves existed in the shadows. For a millennium, we hid ourselves away, cowering between realms while never truly belonging to either. That’s over now. We will not hide, we will not cower, and we will not persecute one another for the power running in our veins.”

A shiver racks my spine.

My claws push painfully at my nail beds, knives waiting to break through skin, as her werewolves nod and snarl in agreement. Their restlessness presses against the hall—as thick and suffocating as the smoke—until even Calix shifts in his seat.

Cora spreads her arms wide to encompass all of us as she continues. “We are werewolves, and we are more fearsome than anyone outside these castle walls. We have driven away the sirens and vampires. We have made the faeries—the first of our kind—vanish into the night sky. The human realm will bow to us. We can use them to bolster our numbers; we can grow our populace to new heights. We will not hide. We will not cower. We will not allow anyone else to conquer us again.”

Her werewolves roar their approval. They smack goblets together, spill wine down their throats, rattle the table, and blow the smoke faster, faster. Until, once more, it’s impossible for me to breathe.

After Calix murdered my best friend and Sin bit me, they stole me from my father. They ripped me from my home, my school, from everything I loved. And now Cora wants to destroy what remains? Slowly, I lower the toast to my plate before removing my hands, hiding them under the table. I won’t let her. I can’t let her. If her control seeps out of this castle, if she somehow poisons the rest of the state, the country, the world—

My stomach churns. Sweat dampens my hair.