The Shadows (Black Dagger Brotherhood #13) - J. R. Ward Page 0,25

a failure!”

Xcor shook his head. “The people have spoken. They chose to put Wrath on the throne he had previously inherited, and there is no fight to be won when there is not one front, but one thousand. Traditional laws and cultural norms are flimsy mantles of power and influence. Democracy, however, when it is truly exercised, is a stone fortress that cannot be surmounted, blown asunder, or burrowed under. What you fail to understand, second in command, is that there is nothing further to battle with—assuming that you are conducting this assault with any hope of prevailing.”

Throe narrowed his eyes. “Tell me something, has your Chosen been educating you? I don’t think I’ve ever heard anything close to that come out of your mouth before.”

Xcor forced himself to stay quiet.

He and his fighters had been banded together long before Throe had come into the mix. But if those males could not see past this ill-fated ambition? Then Throe could have them all.

Xcor would bow to none herein.

In the silence that followed, Throe looked around at the fighters who had once shunned him for his dandy weakness, but had grown to respect him as a warrior over the last two centuries. “Manipulation is most successful when waged by one of the female sex. Think not that he speaks propaganda the now? Fed to him by precisely that which can most seduce his mind, his body, his emotions? You have smelled the bonding for yourself. Know that the soul follows the heart, and his is no longer with us, with our goals, with what we may accomplish. This is not strength that addresses you, but the sort of weakness he once deplored in others. See? Even now, he stays quiet!”

Xcor shrugged. “I have no taste for pontificating.”

“Did you even know the definition of that word six months ago?” Throe countered.

“What say the lot of you?” Xcor glanced around with a sense of abiding boredom. “The choice is yours, but know this. Once it is made, like ink in the skin, it is indelible.”

Zypher was the first to get to his feet. “I have but one allegiance.”

With that, he went over to his gear and unsheathed his steel dagger. Slicing his own palm open, he approached Xcor and put out his hand.

Xcor shook what was proffered and found that he had to clear his throat. Balthazar was next, taking the same knife and cutting himself, putting forth his blood—and Syphon moved with equal efficiency, pledging himself.

Syn watched it all with lowered lids, staying still. He was, as always, the wild card—but even he rose and came across to Xcor. Taking the blade, he stabbed his palm and twisted, his upper lip curling up as if he liked the pain.

Xcor accepted the last of his soldiers’ vows and then he looked over at Throe. Bringing his dripping red palm up, he bared his fangs and hissed, biting his own flesh and then licking the combined blood clean.

“As if this would go another way.” He smiled cruelly. “You have never been one of us.”

Throe’s handsome face twisted into a nasty expression. “You forced me to join you. You did this to me.”

“But you shall undo it, is that correct? Fine, I gave you your freedom a year ago. Let your ambition exercise your destiny if you wish, but once you walk out that door, it is a permanent closure. You are dead to us, your deeds your own and no one else’s.”

Throe nodded once. “So be it.”

The male marched across and picked up his holsters and his coat; then went to the door. Pivoting, he addressed the group. “He is wrong about much, but most especially the throne. A war with a thousand fronts? I think not. All that must needs be done is eliminate Wrath. Then the mantle shall be assumed by the strongest hand—and that male is no longer among this group.”

The fighter closed the door behind himself with a clap.

Xcor ground his molars, knowing damn well Throe must have set up a contingency plan before he made his bid to them all—or he wouldn’t have been so nonchalant about leaving with mere minutes before dawn.

Throe had gambled and lost—except only when it came to the lot of them. Where would this take him next? Xcor had no idea.

But Wrath should well be worried.

There was some shuffling around. Throat clearing. And then, of course, commentary.

“So,” Zypher blurted. “You gonna tells us what color her eyes are?”

“’Tis the least you could do,” Balthazar