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“He knew. He had a location. We could’ve been here weeks ago. Before Moros fucking—” I choked on the word. Blinded. He’d blinded her.

Fury tilted the world, my vision darkening as the sound of combat faded ahead. We passed cell after cell. Only… those were Paladins lying on the ground.

“Orion!” Freya barked, kneeling beside him, fingers to his neck. Her eyes flicked to mine as she said, “Breathing.”

Weapons raised, my lightning drawn like a bow, we rounded the corner.

“Hello, king of kings.”

We rooted to the spot. Standing in the center of an intersection of halls was Adrastos, one sword down his back, wearing plain black clothes save for the leather sheath strapped across his chest. His empty hands hung limply to his sides. A gold sword—the twin to the blade down his spine—laid across the floor in front of a metal door, a grinding, churning sound coming from within.

Slowly, he lifted bloodshot eyes to mine. “Tell her to read it.”

The time for words was long over.

I loosed the lightning bolt I’d drawn as we stepped around the corner. Drew another⁠—

But the first struck him square in the chest.

NINETY-THREE

THE LAST OF HER LINE

BLYTHE

There was a godsdamned drumline beating against my ribs, sweat stinging my skin, my eyes, my breath coming faster as I tried to control it—quiet it.

The palace kept trembling, bursts of magic sending waves rippling through the ground. A swirl of shadow rushed past me, and I held my breath, eyes wide as I pressed into an alcove as though it could conceal me.

After many protests, I’d left Fletcher in the passageway, demanding he run no matter what in ten minutes. I tucked the envelope into his pocket but kept the ring. Slipped it on. Told him to look for the Paladin with long blond hair, a man called Cyrus. Tell him I sent him.

It was the best I could pray for as the window across from me shattered, a plume of dust showering from the ceiling.

But it wasn’t the attack that had my heart in my throat.

Not entirely anyway.

It was Cora. Cora, on her knees beside another girl her age. Corralled into a hallway. Three Renown stood over them, snarling epithets.

Fuck.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Hadriana whore. Useless little bitch. Each insult was worse than the last, all the while she cried.

Just a kid. An innocent little girl who happened to carry Hadriana blood in her veins.

The last of her line. Had their hatred truly blinded them so completely that a millennia-old grudge overrode common decency?

What had kept her safe this long? Adrastos and his men? An enchantment? Something darker unfurled inside my mind, winding like the cold scales of a serpent. Moros needing leverage over half the hierarchy? Or enjoying the sadistic pleasure of forcing the Hadriana line to bend a knee?

“We should end it before she breeds,” one of the men decided. My stomach twisted, eyes flicking from the back of one uniform to the other. “It’s not like anybody would know.”

I would, motherfuckers.

“Get it over with,” the second one agreed.

I crept around the corner, my back pressed to the stone. The movement caught her eyes, brows pinching, tears falling, lip wobbling. I shook my head, gaze darting to the men drawing weapons—weapons to execute children. Blowing out a steadying breath, I let my magic creep forward. Held my hand up to my chest—lifted my fingers, one, two, three.