Page 50 of Crown of Chaos

The prick hadn’t wasted time replacing me, had he? That he was here wasn’t shocking. It was that he was in the same room as my family and they weren’t trying to kill one another. In fact, it appeared as if everyone was accepting of the Hecate bloodline being in the same room as them. Knox didn’t edge forward, choosing to remain beside Celia. Hell, my family had already betrayed me, so why not add another bucket of salt on the wound? I’d intended to test the waters with him sooner than later, but I never thought he’d do so with my family or the whore currently gripping him harder than her pussy could manage to grip a cock. But the last time I’d been near her, she had smelled of at least nine different men, so if he wanted her, he could keep her and stay the fuck away from me.

“This would be the one I was advising you about, my love,” Aurora declared with silent warning gleaming in her stare. “I assure you we did not invite her,” she whispered to him before turning to me. “Aria’s departing now, aren’t you?”

“Both Reign and Rhaghana are dead.” I forced my tone to stay neutral so she wouldn’t hear how deeply she’d just cut me.

My chest tightened when she awarded me with a scathing look. There was not a single ounce of regret for their loss on her face. I’d expected betrayal from Knox, but this hurt. It fucking ached on a level that sucked the air from my lungs. The recklessness was one thing, but the blatant disregard of the loss of one of us was a new low for her.

“Reign’s dead? And Rhaghana, too?” Kinvara asked, her lips quivering with shock.

I nodded, noting the tears building in her eyes as she stepped back. She glanced to my other sisters, who were all watching me warily.

Hating that they were looking at me like that, I let my attention drift to Knox. Celia had plastered herself tightly against his chest with her palm resting just over his heart, but there was something grim and worrisome dancing in his eyes. I swallowed, swinging my attention back to Aurora, but a small whimpering cry caught my attention. Rage rushed through me as I slid my senses through the room, seeking the source of that feeble noise.

“Do you have anything to inform me of? Such as where you’ve been, or maybe why you left me to die?” I asked as a muffled tapping pricked my ears.

While I waited for more of Aurora’s lies, I continued scouring for the source of the sound. Pictures covered the wall, but there was a fragment of light shining from a slim gap between the wall and the floor. Turning back, I frowned when I saw Aurora looking for the same source of the noises I was picking up. I forced my scrutiny to linger on the guilt boiling inside her sparkling stare. If she and I can hear it, then everyone in this room could hear it, too. It had me swallowing past the lump in my throat and plastering a calm mask over my features to hide my rage.

“There seem to be children inside the walls.” Somehow, I delivered the words around the seething malice that had ignited inside me. They could all smell the stench of rot and waste coming from beyond that hidden doorway. I knew they could.

“Leave it alone, Aria. It doesn’t involve you,” she hissed through clenched teeth. “Just drop it now. I’m warning you to pause and consider about what you intend to do. I am your queen.”

“You’re the queen? I thought you had to remove the one currently sitting her righteous ass on the throne before you could ascend. Silly me, I guess. But, considering you’ve rushed everyone into certain death twice and abandoned your people the same number of times, you should probably claim a new position. I wasn’t informed that you’d raised your status to the monarch, but, then again, you probably thought Hecate had killed me after you ran away, so I can see why you didn’t think to tell me. It was probably the same miscommunication that happened when you failed to tell me you were my mother.” I placed my finger against my lips, tapping them in thought before continuing. “Yes, that must be it.” My fury-filled stare held hers.

“Do not do this here. I’ll not respond kindly if you embarrass me and disregard an order from your queen,” she barked loudly enough for it to echo through the room.

Smiling tightly, I tittered. “I have no queen, and if I did, it wouldn’t be you.” Drifting my gaze to the male standing beside her, his lips curved cruelly, revealing yellowing teeth. “Ladies, let’s peek at what’s scurrying between the walls of this gentlemen’s home. I’m going to assume he has a pest problem, and we know how to deal with those, don’t we?”

Aurora was pulling magic before I’d even finished speaking, which I guess I should have expected. I could see Celia out of the corner of my eye, and she was smiling. Knox didn’t move, but he wasn’t holding the bitch, either. Several individuals who were wearing crowns lingered around Knox, and beyond them, guards were taking up positions.

My heart pounded against my chest, and I followed Aurora’s lead. I untangled the magic and erected another barrier behind me. My group approached the wall, inspecting it for the opening. The sound of clicking echoed throughout the area minutes before the stench hit us.

Nausea burned against my esophagus because I knew exactly what that smell was. It stank of death and feces. I warred against the compulsion to mask my mouth to avoid gagging in front of dozens of people. The ladies behind me weren’t as controlled, and at least one of them—Soraya, if I had to guess—vomited before they withdrew from the secret chamber.

“Oh my, it seems you have tiny witches within the walls. Care to explain how they ended up there?” I requested, driving an eyebrow up with my query.

“You better get in line, as your queen demanded. Be a dutiful dog and listen to your owner before I put you down like the rabid bitch you are.” His olive-green eyes sparkled with hatred. “I know who you are. I also realize that you can’t touch me. You are nothing but a third-generation Hecate witch who longs to become the ruler. You won’t ever rest on the throne because Aurora is ten times more influential than you are.”

“That’s shocking, all things considered. She’s stronger than I am?” Aurora’s face turned mottled as she seethed at audacity to challenge her before the council. “Are you more powerful than I?”

“Cease this, now,” she ordered, her chest heaving with indignation.

Crying started beside me, and I twisted to peer at the emaciated child dressed in soiled clothes. Her deep-blue gaze swam with suffering no child should ever know. The cloaked figure who’d exited the wall directed the girl to the others, keeping her within the barrier I’d placed to guard them from my family and their magic. Women slipped out from the wall in threadbare dresses, carrying infants cradled in their arms.

The moment I wound back around, magic slammed into my torso. I choked, drawing my palms up as Aurora and my sisters continued directing painful blows of powerful magic at me. Throwing my hands forward, I shoved my magic at them, and they flew backward. I regained my footing, glaring pointedly at Aurora. Betrayal slashed through me deeper than the assault, cutting my insides open like knives shredding paper.

“What the fuck?” I murmured through the anguish their treachery caused. “What’s wrong with you guys?”

“You do not know what you’re doing. You’ll ruin all we’ve struggled to achieve,” Aurora roared, pulling even more power from my sisters as she geared up for another assault.

“He has children in his fucking wall! Innocent babies are inside that chamber, withering from neglect, Aurora! You may be perfectly fine with abusing babes, but I will never be okay with torturing or killing children. I get it now, I do. I refused to believe you’d pretended to be my savior, but you weren’t. You were my mother, and you didn’t save me at all. You created me to use me, to wield me like a perfect weapon. But you can’t control me because you’re too fucking weak, isn’t that right?” I demanded, hearing Kinvara asking what I was talking about in the background.

“No, Aria Primrose.” She sighed tenderly, love burning in her stare before she blinked, removing all emotion. “My mistake was in falling in love with an infant who merely had one purpose, which was to die and provide me with the power inside you. But every time you died, you just came back stronger,” she answered, truly angry that I’d failed to die when I was an infant. “I did not fail in murdering you, daughter. You just wouldn’t remain dead long enough for me to claim what was mine by right. Freya offered to help because she was tired of watching me endlessly struggle to end your life.”

It felt as if my air was being sucked from my lungs. My heart splintered and felt as if someone had set fire to the shards. Opening my mouth, I struggled to reply, or even produce a sound of derision, but she’d thrown the grenade at me, and I couldn’t put the pin back into the thing.

“Wow, didn’t see that coming,” Esme uttered from behind me.

“What does that mean?” I demanded, feeling infinitely more lost than I had ever felt before. “Youmurderedme?” I dipped my head to the side, wondering if she’d misplaced her fucking brains.

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