Page 130 of Enchanted Crown
She leaned in to pat my cheek. “I knew Esta would marry you from the first time I met you.”
I grinned. “Was it the dashing good looks?”
She cocked her head. “Those didn’t hurt anything.”
I laughed.
Her eyes went back to her family, back to that pyre. “It was the way in which you see things. The way in which you seeher.”
I swallowed hard and looked to the receiving line to see there were only a few people left. “Would you like to go say goodbye? I can walk with you down there.”
“No,” she said with a slight shake to her head. “I said my goodbyes at dawn this morning. I knew it might be my only chance.”
As the final people moved through the line, the rest of usgathered around. I noted there were considerably less shifters present than there had been for Samori and Savanna’s funerals. I didn’t know if that was an intentional slight, but even Serkan’s funeral held more shifters than Lennix’s.
All that was left was for Esta to say the final send off, and then the stomping would begin. She would light the pyre and that would be the end.
But she wasn’t allowed to say a word.
Morana’s brother Oziel moved past his mother’s arms trying to stop him, and stomped our way, heading for Esta. He looked to be in his early twenties, and you could see the family resemblance between him and Jagen. Both were broad shouldered and had the Mallick brown eyes that Esta missed out on.
“No!” he yelled. “She doesnotget to send him off. Anyone but her!”
I didn’t at all like the way he was speaking about my wife.
Spittle was spewing from his mouth, his face red as he again yelled, “She did this. She doesn’t get to hide behind her crown and then send him off like he meant anything to her!”
I had only made one step forward when Nana’s cane smacked Oziel in the chest. “You do not get to blameherfor your father’s death when we all know how sick he was. If you would like to blame something, blame the crown itself. Blame what ate away at his heart, his jealousy.”
“Shebroke his heart,” Oziel Mallick screamed at Nana.
“And he broke mine,” Nana said coolly, “by letting his greed for the crown pass to your sister.”
I thought for a moment Nana was reaching him, helping him through this outburst. But when he leaned back only to come back close to Nana and spit in her face, “You’re all at fault then,” I knew we had a problem on our hands.
And when he reached out with two arms to shove Nana Mallick, I saw red.
Nana gasped out in pain as she hit the hard ground, Oziel already on the move toward Esta.
He could be angry, but shoving an old woman? One which was the former queen of Dra Skor?
He took three large steps toward Esta, but I was already there, stopping him.
“I have no issue with you, Wylan prince,” he snapped.
He was only afraid of my magic, which was already at work, stopping his feet where he stood. And he also knew even in his rage that he needed me to heal him. “See that’s where you’re wrong,” I offered calmly. “You approach my wife,your queen, like that, and you very much do have an issue with me.”
He stopped his progress as he fought against my magic now encasing his feet. It was no use though. He wasn’t the only one who was angry.
“This can go one of two ways,” I told him. “I do not think for a moment that an entire bloodline has to die in order for peace in Dra Skor to be found. But I also will not allow a threat to Dra Skor, a threat to Esta, to retreat only to strengthen and build again.”
I felt a shadow at my back and turned my head to look over my shoulder. I found Zaire and Malachi flanking me.
“It’s your call,” I told Oziel as I turned back to him. “But you have to let this rift between your families die today. Like it should have.”
To give Reyald Mallick credit, he came forward from Esta’s side and added, “This was your father’s and my feud. It was never meant for you kids. None of this was Esta’s doing. Blame me if you’d like, but she had nothing to do with it.”
“It’s your decision,” I repeated to Oziel. “I am going to drop my magic now, and you get to decide how this ends.”
