The word rang through Nesta. She had to keep moving.
On shaking hands, as lightning cracked and the snow swirled, Nesta pushed up off the rock. Her legs trembled, begging her to sit, to stop, to just fucking die already.
Bellius advanced, his powerful body sinking into a fighting position. The wild hatred in his gaze seared her.
Her friends had made it … but she did not want to die.
She wanted to live, and live well, and live happily.
Wanted to do it with—
Nesta braced her feet apart. Settled her aching, battered body.
Bellius snorted. “You really think you can beat me in hand-to-hand combat?”
Blood flowed from her mouth, her nose. But Nesta smiled anyway, its tang coating her tongue. “I do.”
Bellius threw his first punch, putting the entire force of his powerful body into it. Nesta blocked it, driving her fist into his nose. Bone crunched. Bellius howled, falling back a step.
And Nesta hissed, “Because my mate taught me well.”
CHAPTER
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Mate.
The word was a shooting star through Nesta as she and Bellius launched at each other, punching, kicking, dodging. As if voicing the word had given her this final surge of strength—
Bellius slammed his fist into Nesta’s jaw, so hard she rocked back a few steps.
She ducked his next move, landing a blow on his ribs. But he kept herding her toward the archway, the line.
Wearing her down. Outlasting her.
She’d keep going. Until the end, she’d fight him.
Bellius’s fist connected with her left cheek. Pain cracked through her. Nesta’s feet went out from under her. She flew backward, and time slowed.
She landed on the other side of the line in the earth, and could have sworn the mountain shuddered.
Nesta crawled. She didn’t care how pathetic it made her appear. She crawled away from Bellius, through the arch, destroying the line she’d drawn.
He advanced, bloodied and sneering. “I’m going to enjoy this.”
She’d claimed it would be fine to die for her friends, that it was fine because they had made it, they had won, but to be killed by this nobody—
Nesta snarled. She had nothing left. Her body had given up on her. Like so many others had.
Bellius drew a knife from his boot. “I think I’d rather slit your throat.”
She was alone.
She had been born alone, and would die alone, and this awful male would be the one to kill her—
Thunder cracked, and the entire mountain shook with its impact. Bellius took one step toward her, knife lifting.
Blood sprayed.
At first, she thought it was lightning that flashed across his throat, opening it so wide that his blood showered the snowy air.
But then she saw the wings. The other set of wings.
And when Bellius slumped to the earth, choking on his lifeblood, revealing Cassian standing there, teeth bared, blade in hand, she wondered if the thunder rocking the mountain had been his rage.
Cassian stepped over Bellius’s dying body and offered her a hand. Not to sweep her into his arms, but to help her rise. As he had always done.
Nesta gripped his hand and stood, her body bleating in protest.
But she forgot her pain, the death around them, as he folded her into his chest and held her tightly, whispering tenderly into her bloody hair, “And now I’m going to slit your pretty little throat.”
Cassian’s words were not his own. His hands were not his own as Nesta—as his mate—tried to pull away and he clamped his arms around her. Hard enough that her bones shifted against his hands.
He was screaming. Silently, endlessly. Screaming at her to fight him, to run. Screaming at himself to stop it.
But he couldn’t. No matter what he did, he could not stop it.
“Cassian,” Nesta said, struggling.
Kill me, he silently begged her. Kill me before I have to do this.
“Cassian.” Nesta shoved against his chest. But his arms held firm. Squeezed her tighter.
“He can’t obey you, Nesta Archeron,” rasped an old, withered voice from behind Nesta. “He’s mine now.”
Cassian could not even widen his eyes in warning. His arms loosened on the queen’s silent command, allowing Nesta to turn in his embrace.
Presenting her to Briallyn, who wore the Crown atop her thin, white hair.
CHAPTER
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Satisfaction flashed in Briallyn’s dark eyes, and the three simple spikes of the golden Crown glowed as she lifted a hand.
The storm halted. Cleared away to reveal the pale gray sky before dawn, the last of the stars winking out.
Even nature could be influenced by the Crown.
Horror coiled through Nesta as Cassian’s arms slackened. She launched herself a few steps away, whirling, but knew what she’d find. Cassian stood still as a statue. As if he’d been turned to stone. His eyes, normally so bright and alive, had become glassy. Empty.
Briallyn had willed him that way. Had moved people around like chess pieces to ensure that Nesta arrived here. “Why?” Nesta said.
Briallyn’s thick fur cloak ruffled in the mountain wind. “Your power is too strong—throwing you into this primitive spectacle wore you down.”
“You had the Illyrians bring me here?”
“My intent was to grab the maimed one.” Nesta’s blood boiled at the mention of Emerie. “Bellius fed me the information about your friendship and I saw how much she meant to you when we were linked through the Harp and the Crown. I knew that if I captured her, brought her here, you’d follow, law or no law. You’re reckless and conceited enough to think you could save her. But you made it easy for me: you went right to her house in Windhaven. Spared me the trouble of luring you. I let those witless Illyrians take her and the half-breed as an amusing bonus.”
Nesta didn’t dare look up at Cassian. “All to wear me down?”
“Yes. And without your magic—”
Nesta cut in, demanding, “I was worn down days ago. Why hold off until now?”
Briallyn glowered at the interruption. “I was waiting for him.” She nodded toward Cassian, who was bristling with rage—something like loathing and fear now pushing through the cloudiness in his eyes. “Days and days, I waited for him to get close enough for me to use the Crown to ensnare him. I had to use that brash princeling Eris to draw him in.” A soft laugh. “Eris tried to help his soldiers when they surrounded him during his hunt. Help those wretches. He rode right up to them, rather than gallop away as any wise person would. They grabbed him with minimal fuss. Even those infernal hounds of his could do nothing as Koschei winnowed him away.”
Was Eris dead? Or now her slave? Cassian’s face revealed nothing.
But Briallyn smiled at him. “I was getting worried you’d never approach. Poor Eris would have met a very sorry end if that had been the case. His fire wouldn’t have withstood Koschei’s lake, I don’t think.”
She glanced toward Bellius’s corpse. “He’s a hateful brute—just like you, Cassian. Arrogant and brash. He wandered off from his scouting unit to look for fun in my lands. So I showed him my idea of fun.” Her thin lips twisted in a mockery of a smile.
Briallyn chuckled. “I told him to hunt you down, not kill you, but it seems I wasn’t precise enough in my wording. And it’s rather satisfying to watch someone kill, especially with tools you’ve provided for them. I knew the Rite would be so much more entertaining with weapons. I suppose I could have ordered Bellius to stand down, but I was rather enjoying the sight.”