for the death of my son,” the king said, his voice wavering slightly.
Nadya exchanged a look of alarm with Rashid. It wasn’t possible.
“We will start with the Silver Court,” he continued, fist clenched. “And we will bring them to their knees.”
A sweeping sense of magic being used washed through the hall. Izak jerked his arm down. Lightning crashed outside, jolting the hall with erratic, frantic flashes. The magic was overwhelming, Nadya could taste it in the air, copper, blood. The thought of how much it would take to control the skies like that was … unimaginable.
Malachiasz looked up at the ceiling, his expression unconcerned. Then he smiled.
“So, it worked.” His voice contemplative, but still audible. “I wasn’t sure, you know. It had not been confirmed that using the blood of a powerful mage would heighten the process.”
No. Nadya’s blood froze in her veins. Parijahan’s eyes closed and she leaned back against a pillar. Rashid’s expression blackened.
“It feels little different to me,” the king said, razor-sharp.
“How are you to know what the power of gods feels like?” Malachiasz asked. “You have nothing to compare it to.”
“And you do?”
Malachiasz clasped his hands together. “Well, I was—how was it put?—the ultimate success of my cult before this. You got what I promised, did you not?”
A biting glint of iron teeth. A puppet master, pulling them all along with his honeyed words and panicked pleas for trust. Nadya watched from the shadows with narrowed eyes. They were supposed to let the king think he had won, but that had not meant giving him the power he so craved.
Nadya’s will to fight leaked out of her. Had Malachiasz done it anyway? Orchestrated blasphemy in an attempt to destroy her kingdom?
She hoped she was wrong. She had to be wrong.
Except the king needed Malachiasz to complete the ceremony. Which meant Malachiasz had done it willingly. Had he betrayed them? For what?
But as she watched him sitting on his throne made of skulls and bones, she saw him for what he always was. Tranavian to his core: merciless and beautifully cruel. She had been a fool to believe him. There had been so many signs she had so willfully ignored, choosing instead to put her faith in a monster.
What could the king do to the heavens with the power he now bore? If man-made magic had created the veil keeping the gods out from Tranavia, what could this do?
Nadya thought fast. If it was down to her to stop this, then so be it. She looked at Rashid, who appeared as confused as she felt.
“I don’t understand why,” he said under his breath.
She tugged the silver pendant over her neck and eyed the spiral; she wrapped the cord around her hand as she would her prayer beads. If all she had was a bloodthirsty forgotten god-that-was-not-a-god, it would have to do.
The king took ?aneta’s shoulder and pushed her closer to Malachiasz’s throne. She stumbled, falling at the Black Vulture’s feet.
Malachiasz leaned forward, tipping her face up with one iron claw. “You did wish to be queen,” he hissed. “The price of power is blood; it always has been. The price of becoming like a god? Well, that’s death.” He crooked his head, the movement off-putting in its fluidity. “But such disloyalty. Such fickle whims belong to those who dream of rising above their station to places they do not belong.” He trailed his iron claw down her cheek.
Her expression turned to horror.
His mouth tilted upward slightly at the corners. “Subtlety would have been better for a queen. Betrayal is a taint not so easily ignored. Can I tell you a secret?” His smile widened when she didn’t respond. “My order was built on betrayal. You’ll fit right in.”
Nadya saw ?aneta’s lips form the word no, her terror silent. Malachiasz straightened, towering over the girl as he waved a languid hand to the masked Vultures who grabbed her.
“We are so selective in those we welcome into the order,” he said. “Congratulations. You’ve been selected. I do look forward to your next inevitable betrayal,” he called as ?aneta was dragged screaming from the room.
Nadya shut her eyes.
“He wouldn’t,” she heard Rashid murmur.
But that was just the thing—he would. He had never been a tortured victim of his cult; any such implications had been a carefully painted falsehood to gain her trust. He was their ultimate success. There was nothing he wouldn’t do to get what he wanted.
And that was what Nadya didn’t understand. What did he want?
33
SEREFIN
MELESKI
Svoyatovi Nikita Lisov: