Page 143 of Rise of the Siren Queen
My words slithered through the chamber, each syllable a lash of barbed steel. They echoed with venom, thick and suffocating. I didn’t raise my voice. It didn’t need to. The weight was far more lethal than any scream.
My hands trembled, not from fear, not from weakness, but from the raw, volcanic rage surging through every vein. It wasn’t just anger. It was grief sharpened into a blade. Wrath honed by loss. All of it—allof it—was ready to explode from the cage of my ribs.
“Youcontributedto her death,” I snarled, stepping closer to Ithra, each movement slow, deliberate. My fury burned behind my eyes, wild and untamed. “And now, you might as well crawl to Hades and beg for a spot beside the wretched corpses that spawned you.”
She kept her chin raised, some fool’s pride still clinging to her posture, but her body betrayed her. The trembling was subtle, but it was there. Fragile. Weak. The venomous serpent was now reduced to a quivering husk beneath the weight of my gaze.
I slid into her mind like a blade through flesh.
Not forcefully, no, that would’ve been merciful.
Ilingeredthere, whispering promises of terror into the fragile fabric of her sanity. I didn’t need to destroy her mind. Not yet. I needed her toknowshe was breakable. That I couldruinher with a thought.
I possessed her brain as if it were mine by birthright. Because it was. Every flicker of muscle, every stuttered breath,mine. I could crush her where she stood, reduce her to a breathing corpse, but I didn’t.
The anticipation… gods, theanticipationwas sweeter than any scream.
I tasted her fear. Let it melt across my tongue like the finest wine. I savored the tremor in her jaw, the tears that rimmed her lashes but refused to fall. She wasn’t crying yet, but she would. Shewould.
I pulled back slowly, not because I was done, but because I was enjoying this far too much to rush. Her fear still hung between us like incense, heady and thick. Her mind was a web I could unravel at a whim, and she knew it.
Sheknew.
She sealed her fate the moment she dared to lay a finger on my grandmother. Now, she would pay for every scream, every bruise, every drop of blood drawn in silence.Justice? No, this wasn’t justice. This waspunishment. This wasretribution. And I would be its priestess.
A slow smile spread across my lips. It wasn’t kind. Wasn’t sane. It was a grin stitched from darkness and stitched with vengeance. I was not a savior.
I was not their light. I was the storm that would unmake them.
She was my first offering to Erinys, the goddess who had always lived inside me, clawing her way to the surface. And I would deliver.
Her ragged gasps grew louder. Her sobs stuttered like a rusted cog in a broken machine. She shook like a child caught in winter, and yet, somehow, defiance still sparked in those fading eyes. It was pitiful. A final ember, trying to defy the flood.
Perfect. I wanted Draven to choke on the sound of her agony.
I leaned in, voice glacial. “You had a chance,” I whispered. “But now? You’re nothing but alesson.”
With a flick of thought, I seized control once more. Ronan released her chains on my unspoken command, and I forced her to stand, marionette strings dragging her upright with sharp jerks and spasms.
Her limbs were no longer hers.
“And since you took such pleasure torturingmy grandmother…” My voice twisted into something far more dangerous than rage,delight. “You’ll repay the favor. You’ll punishyour own son. Fitting, isn’t it?”
Panic bloomed in her eyes like blood in water.
I gripped her tighter, yanking her mind until her body moved in shudders, stumbling toward Draven like a broken puppet. Her hands twitched. Her shoulders locked. But still she swam.
I made herbend. I made hersubmit.
She clawed mentally at the walls of her prison, but there was no escape. I had built this cell from her worst fears, andIheld the only key.
The dagger scraped against the marble as I made her pick it up. Her fingers were shaking too hard to grip it, so Iforcedthem closed around the hilt.
Draven roared in fury, fighting me with everything he had. But I didn’t care. His strength meant nothing in the face of my will. His fire was mine to snuff.
Hismother—his symbol, his shield, his puppet-master—was now mine.
And I shattered her right in front of him.
