“Then why would you have slept with him?” Her sexual habits confounded him!
—Why not?—
Lose control, lose your mate. Biting back fury, he said, “Why did you ensorcel Omort?”
She jutted her chin mulishly.
“Answer or swim.”
Her eyes darted as a purple fin sliced the water nearby. —I commanded him to use no sorcery in the fight with Rydstrom.—
Everyone in the Lore knew that Rydstrom the Good had slain Omort the Deathless, reclaiming his kingdom of Rothkalina; but Thronos had wondered how the rage demon king had circumvented Omort’s vast powers. “Why would you favor Rydstrom, betraying your own brother and . . . lover?” he grated, scarcely able to utter the word.
Her face screwed up with revulsion. —Lover??? He was everything vile! Not to mention that he was my BROTHER. Oh, that’s just not— The thought ended abruptly; she turned to throw up again, heaving, but only blood came out. —I’d rather die!—
Did he dare to believe her? Surely disgust that violent couldn’t be contrived.
She swung a glare at Thronos, eyes sparking with rage. —I will kill you in your sleep for saying things like that to me!—
“Why should I, or anyone else, believe you weren’t his concubine? It’s common knowledge that Omort liked to mate his sisters, and you lived under his protection for centuries!”
—You want to know the truth about what life was like under his protection? Horrifying. We lived with his insanity, saw it made manifest every day! He routinely threatened to kill me, came close so many times.—
“Again, you lie. If you hated what was happening, then why wouldn’t you abandon him? I know that you and Sabine were free to come and go. And why would he want his own sister dead?”
She turned away, her gauntlets balled into fists. —Go to hell.—
“You’ve already taken me here. Now answer me!”
Silence.
He grabbed her shoulders. “Feel the serpent’s breath?”
She struggled in his arms, weak as a babe. —He poisoned Sabine and me with the morsus.—
“What is that? I’m not as versed in cowardly poisons as you Sorceri are.” They loved deploying their poisons as much as they loved drinking and gambling, deeming themselves “toxinians.”
—The morsus kills from withdrawal. If we left him for more than a few weeks, we’d die of pain. He had the only antidote, doling it out at intervals, so long as we didn’t displease him.—
It sounded too strange to be true, which had Thronos leaning toward belief. Only a sorcerer would do that to his own family. “Why should I believe you?”
—A) I don’t care if you believe me or not because you don’t matter. B) Your friend Nïx will verify everything I’ve told you.—
He . . . believed Melanthe. Which meant Thronos’s old friend wrath was placated a degree. The sorceress hadn’t been a delighted participant in those atrocities.
Though she was lacking in so many other ways, Thronos decided then that she would suffice as a wife. “I do believe you in this, which means I will be marrying you. You’ll be pleased to know that torture is now off the table.”
Her eyes flickered. —As if I’d ever accept you as my husband! You have no right to abduct me! You’re no different from Omort. Taking away my choice, my life. And we killed Omort at the first opportunity.—
“Threatening me again?”
—The only reason we went with him in the first place was that he promised to protect us from Vrekeners!—
“Not from me. I’ve seen you only a handful of times over these years. I dogged your heels, but always when I closed in, you escaped through sorcery. If there was a splinter group who targeted you, I had no knowledge of it.”
—How could you not know what your own men were doing?—
He felt her probing his thoughts, trying to read his mind. He put up his shields within an instant, but apparently that was all she’d needed; she gasped.