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I want my fucking justice.
What good is all this power if I can’t do anything with it but desperately try to protect the ones I love from even further harm?
“The game of queens is the hardest game of all,” Guillaume said. “You may not think so, but you’ve played an impressive game so far.”
My throat ached but the greater pain was in my heart. Shredded, sliced, and ground into hamburger at the thought of losing any of my Blood.
What this queen takes, she loves, and what she loves, she keeps for all time.
Those words echoed through my head. My words. When I’d been a new, naïve queen. When I didn’t know everything I’d built could be destroyed in the blink of an eye.
“You felt this way before, remember?” Sliding his hand up beneath my hair, Rik cupped the back of my head in his big palm and kissed my forehead. “When you called Vivian, everyone was passed out and you still needed more. Okeanos bought you a little time, but then you ascended to Triskeles. It’s no wonder you need more Blood.”
“There’s a reason powerful queens have dozens or even a hundred Blood,” Guillaume said. “You leveled up. You need a broader base to support—and continue—that growth.”
“But…” I burrowed deeper into Rik’s arms, pressing my nose into his neck. Rock and iron, hot from the forge. His scent made hunger stab through me, even though I’d fed from him already this morning.
He rested his chin on the top of my head. “I know. I do. I don’t want things to change either. It pains me to admit it, but you need more than we can currently provide.”
I loved my Blood with my whole being. If anything ever happened to one of them that I couldn’t heal, I’d never fully recover. I’d always feel their broken bond like a phantom limb’s debilitating agony the rest of my life. It was more than the blood we shared. Even more than the pleasure.
Our souls mingled together, creating something bigger and more magical than anything this world had ever seen.
“Exactly as our goddesses intended.” Llewellyn hovered over G’s shoulder simply because there wasn’t more room at my feet for him to crowd closer. “And your mother.”
Once my mother’s former Blood, Llewellyn was mated to House Isador. He knew Esetta Isador better than anyone. Yet even as her alpha, he didn’t know everything. My mother had been very good at keeping secrets. She hadn’t wanted anyone to know of my birth so I could grow into my power free and unrestrained.
Though deep inside me, there was still a little girl who longed to lay my head on her chest and feel her fingers stroking my hair as she told me how much she loved me.
“She loved you decades before she ever managed to conceive you.” Llewellyn’s red-gold eyes sparkled with falling stars, burning with his gift. “I can show you countless scenes where we planned for your future.”
“Was it like this with her? The Blood bond, I mean. Did it feel so…” I couldn’t even think of the appropriate words to describe it. Deeper than the deepest ocean. Higher than the highest mountain. More infinite than the farthest realm of space. Yet also so tight and close and perfect. Bringing another person—or people—into our special relationship might unravel everything. Drama, jealousy, fears…
“Yes and no,” Llewellyn replied. “I loved her with my whole being, the same as I love you. I cared about her other Blood, but most of us were more distant. She used us as individual weapons and often sent us out into the world on secret assignments. We were only rarely all together, and even then, we weren’t as connected. We couldn’t be. We each held our queen’s secrets, which kept us from ever forming bonds as deeply as yours.”
I kept no secrets from my Blood. I didn’t think I could even if I wanted or needed to. I barely had a thought cross my mind, and they leapt into action to complete the task before it even registered fully in my head. I certainly wouldn’t send any of my Blood away for any length of time. The thought made my nerves itch and burn throughout my entire body. “What kind of assignments?”
“Mostly reconnaissance to other courts, carrying private messages to Isador’s many allies. All of us were sent away in the end.” His voice cracked ever so slightly, though his eyes burned red-hot.
The end. Before my mother broke her bonds so she could slip away and conceive me without anyone knowing. “I thought Blood went insane without their queen’s bond and turned into thralls.”
Thralls were the monsters that had hunted me my whole life. They’d killed my adoptive human father and Mom, Selena Isador, the woman who raised me. Though later I learned she was actually my aunt. Her former Blood, Greyson, had been determined to be Blood again—though he killed her when he tried to resurrect that bond.
Llewellyn gave me a small shrug, his lips quirked. “Weaker-willed Blood than those called by House Isador to serve. Thank the goddess, your mother didn’t call her blood back before she sent us away. Knowing I still carried Isador blood helped me hold on until you came to the tower and set me free.”
“What happened to the rest of her Blood?”
His head cocked, his eyes sharp like a hawk. “Keisha Skye told me they’d all turned thrall and died, but I never believed it. Your mother whispered orders to each of us before she broke the bonds. They may have died in the years since she passed but I believe they’re still out there waiting.”
“Where? Waiting for what?”
He blinked, the falling stars in his eyes burning out into complete darkness. “For you, my queen.”
2
LLEWELLYN
I couldn’t say her name. All I could do was bring up my former queen’s face in my mind. Her image forever etched in countless memories held in my internal databases. “I understand now.”
