Page 95 of Fae Champion

“I do.” The confirmation was another whisper, barely there at all.

I whirled toward him, eyes so wide they strained. All this warning about not letting on about our bond, whatever the hell it was, in front of the queen, only forhim to admit to her what he’d only told me an hour before? Was he out of his ever-loving mind?

The answer was evident: yes, he most definitely was. Why would he offer up something as fragile as love to her on one of those fancy silver platters that adorned her regular evening parties?

“How could you love …her?”

The queen’s disbelief and disdain were so dense that I reacted before thinking. “Hey! There’s nothing wrong with me.”

She looked at me as if she were concerned I might taint her by proximity. “That’s a matter of perspective, and in Embermere my opinion is law.”

“That’s right, my queen,” said the obsequious Ivar.

My pulse beat in my neck as I warred with the desire to rip out his throat, then Braque’s, and finally, their precious queen’s. If I was lucky, my new, mysterious power would allow me to do it and spare the mirror world any more of their wretchedness.

“You can’t loveher,” the queen told Rush, who only stared up at her with vulnerability shining in those striking eyes of his.

Where the hell was the warrior drake whom everyone admired? Who kicked ass against the strongest fighters in their land?

“But I do,” he said. “Please spare her.”

“No. And unless you kill her right now, I won’t spare the others you supposedly love either.”

The healthy tan of his skin gave way to wan paleness. “Your Majesty, please don’t…”

Shetsked. “You’ve given me no choice. This is all on you, Rush. The sooner you do what you’re duty bound to do, the sooner this all ends.”

“Spare her, and I’ll do whatever you want,” Rush pleaded. “Take me instead.”

But the queen was already saying, “Bring out Hiroshi, Ryder, and West.”

27.THE KINGDOM OF EMBERMERE REQUIRES MANY SACRIFICES

In luminous chains that I presumed must nullify their powers, whatever the full extent of them might be, Hiroshi, West, and Ryder shuffled through a slim, side doorway into the throne room. Though I’d seen them all just yesterday, their faces had somehow grown gaunt since then.

Their stares lingered on me first before swinging over to Rush. They were laden with apology, especially West, whose amber flecks were bright in his otherwise brown eyes with all he seemed to wish to say but didn’t.

“No,” Rush uttered, disbelief thick in that lone word—surely not that the queen would stoop so low, but perhaps that it had come to this.

The queen merely chuckled before … something thick and blubbery began squeezing itself through the same threshold. At the squelching and grunting, the queen glanced toward the door and rolled her eyes before sharing a look with Ivar and Braque. She obviously considered them her confidants, and this was just another day they’d gossip and snicker about later.

The creature eventually pushed its way through the doorway.

Flesh.

There was a whole lot of it on display—supple, dewy, and faintly pink. A male, I realized, based on the knobby, hangy bits hardly contained behind a dingy-looking loin cloth. The creature was as tall as Rush but maybe three times wider even with all of Rush’s muscles. Roll after roll of skin cascaded down his squat body as if he were a baby who gorged himself on his mother’s milk. His head was bald, round, and shiny, just like the rest of him. Too-large eyes scanned the space quickly before resting on the queen, a goofy smile raising his jowls.

“They’re here, queenie. I brung ‘em.”

The queen’s answering smile wasn’t nearly as proud or pleasant. “Yes, I can see that.” Then, as if an afterthought, “Good job, Bandel.”

The pygmy ogre—that’s what he had to be—preened under her stingy praise, exposing blunt, dull teeth that looked like they gnawed on large bones at every meal.

More flab filled the doorway, and another beast began grunting and squeezing through the hole much too small for it.

A second pygmy ogre made his way through the opening with a cringe-worthypop, lumbered next to thefirst, setting his many rolls and dangly parts oscillating, and grinned toward the throne.

“I’m here, queenie!” he sang.

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