Page 13 of Blood of Two Crowns

My Knowingness whispered the very words I’d spoken to Mareina only a week ago.Truly, monsters are made, not born.

I couldn’t help but wonder what this world had done to this twisted creature that had made her so grotesquely inhumane.

However, at this particular moment, I didn’t have the time or patience to ponder it.

I permitted a minuscule tendril of my magic to slip through the barriers of flesh and bone, seizing her lungs and drawingthe air from them. A prickle of guilt wound through me as I watched her ribs spasm, trying and failing to breathe. After a few moments, she rolled over, clawing at her chest and throat. Her brow hardened with anger and anguish as she held my gaze.

“If you think I’ll let you die this easily, you’re gravely mistaken. I will spend every fucking moment here beside you in thishell,torturing you until you bring me to my father. The fact thatthisis hell to you shows me just how fucking privileged and sheltered you are.”

Her struggle slowed, eyes rolling in the back of her head.

Ohhhh, no, you don’t.

Zurie gasped for air, coughing and wheezing to catch her breath.

“How are we feeling now? Agreeable?”

Zurie glared up at me, but I’d inflicted enough torture over the years to recognize my enemies’ bitter submission.

“I want out of this dungeon. I want my room back. And I want your word that no harm will come to me.”

I tilted my head, holding her sharp, crystalline gaze.

“I owe you nothing, Zurie. Either you do as you’re told, or you will discover methods of torture that will have you begging for Mors to rescue you.”

I turned, striding back towards the door. The sound of rustling behind me the evidence of her persuasion. Rather than travelling down the hallway that ledoutof the dungeon, she led us deeper into it, towards a circular room with an arched doorway. A shaft of sunlight poured into the center of the room where a dais lay. Runes lay carved into the floor, and the closer we drew, the more powerful the hum of magic became. The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end.

“You remind me so much of him,” Zurie murmured with surprising softness.

My heart began to thump a nervous beat. I’d dreamed my entire life of meeting my father. And to think, he’d been in Zurie’s dungeon this entire time.

She climbed to the center of the dais andtorea chunk of flesh from her wrist with her fangs. Blood spilled, and she began to murmur words in an unfamiliar language. The runes crisscrossing the circular stone platform upon which she stood glowed with an otherworldly light.

But how? She was wearing a fucking palladium collar.

In that same moment, her eyes, alight with satisfaction, lifted to mine. “There is no power in this world that can stifle the magic of words or the magic in your blood.”

The ground beneath our feet began to tremble and Zurie’s gaze snapped back to mine as she shouted to be heard, her eyes bright with dark excitement.“He might kill me, you know.”

When my eyes lifted from the runes to hers, her grin grew broader. “Only you have the strength to stop him from killing me if I’m wearing this palladium collar.”

She seemed entirely content in laying her fate in the threadbare net of my compassion.

“What if I could bring Mareina back to you?”

Her fangs somehow glinted in the shadow as her smile grew impossibly wide.Fucking manipulative wench.

“Is it possible that you’ve been so surrounded by asshole-sucking sycophants that you’ve lost your talent for manipulation?”

Zurie cackled as the ground beneath our feet splintered before it stilled, and we held our breath for several moments.

“And I’m certain the only person who hates you more than I do, is her. You’ll have to forgive me if I don’t have faith in your capabilities to perform such a feat.”

From the grin on Zurie’s face you’d have thought I’d said something charming. “Of her own accord, my darling. What if Icould get her to come back to you? To give you a real chance… Andeliminatethe competition.”

Disgust and something darker suffused me. “The one thing I place above my own well-being is hers. And as much as I resent him, if there’s anyone else who will protect her in this world, it’s him. I will not take that from her, even if it’s at my own expense.”

Zurie’s expression was lined with disappointment. “You really are your father’s son.”

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