The Warrior King (Inferno Rising #3) - Abigail Owen Page 0,107
she allowed herself to look it would be to find Sam completely shut down, as stone-faced as Carrick and the other gargoyles. The upper class of the Black Clan may not entirely trust him—yet—but the commoners sure as hell did. Realization whispered in her ear—based on the numbers in front of and behind her, they outnumbered the upper class, at least two to one if not three to one.
Not to mention the services they provided ran the mountain, true in every society she’d experienced. And yet the upper class never clued in to the fact that if the lower-middle and working classes stopped supporting the system, it would crumble beneath their privileged feet.
Samael, look at your people, she silently willed him. Power was found in numbers, power in giving the voiceless a platform, a common element to unite them.
How could he think to walk away from them? From her?
“I will allow your return on one condition,” Gorgon said.
Haikaf glanced at the men standing closest to him, as though not quite believing it could be that easy. “What condition, my king?”
“A vow, here and now, that no matter what happens in the days to come, you will not abandon your king, whoever he may be, and clan again.”
Haikaf stared at Gorgon for a long beat, then turned his back, a dangerous move a warrior would never have made, to confer with those around him.
Meira watched Gorgon’s face, as the king no doubt could hear much of the discussion. She also watched for when he might need to lean on her again. From this angle, she could see how he swayed slightly, like a skyscraper in harsh winds.
“We will,” Haikaf snapped at the other men on a burst of prickles over her skin.
She shifted her gaze to the prodigal shifters across the way. The debate across the room had clearly heated, with Haikaf shaking his head vigorously.
“I will,” he finally snarled at a man taller than himself by a head, large for a black dragon, more a gold dragon’s size with muscles layered over muscles. “Do what you fucking want.”
Haikaf stepped back, still facing his people. “If you are unable to make this vow, leave now.”
“We will be killed if we try,” someone from the back shouted.
“Samael.” Gorgon waved his beta forward. Meira couldn’t help but turn her gaze to the man who’d stolen her heart—back stiff, head held high, jaw tight, black eyes blazing with fire that set shadows dancing over the planes of his face. Except for an errant lock of hair that refused to stay put, he was about the most intimidating thing she’d ever seen. Sexy as hell.
“I guarantee your safety to get away from the mountain, but not after that,” Samael said. “Make your choice.”
Damned. I’m damned for loving him even more for that. Everything inside her hurt. Ached in a way that she knew came from holding the truth inside. From Gorgon, but from Sam, too. Her love for him needed to be in the open for all to see and know.
Love. The first time she’d seen him in that mirror, she’d given up her heart to this man, only she hadn’t been able to admit it to herself. Promising herself to Gorgon had been the biggest mistake of her life. Why Kasia had seen nothing in her visions, Meira would have to ask her sister later.
She pulled her own shoulders back.
No matter what had brought them here to this moment, she’d be damned if Sam was going to kill them both by sacrificing himself.
Almost as though he’d taken that as a signal, Haikaf turned and went to one knee, his right hand in a fist over his heart. “I vow to never abandon king or clan again.”
One by one, each man and woman behind him did the same, their vows becoming a jumble of sound in the room.
Not a single dragon shifter left the mountain.
…
Samael cast his gaze out over the people on their knees, his soul shredding with each repeated vow. These were his people, those he’d known as both boy and man. Many faces were familiar to him. Haikaf had once worked with his father, though he’d been a younger man at the time.
Vows they made because of him.
What would they do when he died, when he no longer remained to hold their trust to keep them safe, to do the right thing by them?
They’ll have the king. And Meira.
Meira had not been raised in royalty as she might have been had Pytheios