Cleo watched with horror as half the wedding guests stood up from their seats and charged the rebels.
The lack of guards inside the temple was only an illusion. They’d been pretending to be witnesses to the wedding—they were the faces she didn’t recognize. And they attacked the nowoutnumbered rebels with full strength.
Taking advantage of the distraction, Magnus knocked the sword from Jonas’s grip. Then Magnus grabbed the front of Jonas’s cloak and threw him up against a marble pillar hard enough that the back of Jonas’s head cracked against the hard surface.
Cleo was shoved forward as a rebel and a guard fight came too close. She scrambled out of their way, fighting to move against the heavy, binding skirts of her gown, which made it feel as if she was moving through mud. She missed the swipe of a dagger by mere inches.
“You killed my mother, you son of a bitch,” Magnus snarled at Jonas. “I’m going to tear out your heart and shove it down your throat.”
Jonas blocked the prince’s clenched fist. A nearby rebel took a sword to his chest and he staggered back, slamming into Magnus, knocking the prince’s grip free from Jonas.
The blood of the fallen pooled on the marble floors—so red against the white. Cleo stared at it, unable to process how quickly everything had fallen to chaos.
At that second the temple began to shake, trembling at first and then more and more violently. The floor cracked open with an enormous splintering sound, and several guards fell screaming into the jagged, gaping chasm. The massive statue of Cleiona toppled over and crashed to the ground, crushing three people . Everyone standing was knocked off their feet. Cleo, still crouched on the floor, threw her arms defensively over her head.
King Gaius shakily rose to his feet though the ground was still shaking horribly, his furious gaze searching the temple until it landed on Cleo.
He didn’t notice what was right behind him.
A marble pillar had dislodged from the broken roof and was falling. The king was directly in its path.
But before he was crushed, Magnus launched himself toward the king and knocked him out of the way. The heavy pillar crashed, shattering into hundreds of pieces on the still shaking ground.
Prince Ashur rose to his feet, his voice booming. “Everyone, out of the temple. Now.”
The hundreds of wedding guests tried desperately to flee the violent and bloody battleground, running for the exits as fast as they could. Several were crushed by more pillars falling in their path.
The world was ending right before Cleo’s eyes.
An arm came around her waist, pulling her back behind the altar as the violent quake finally eased and the world stopped shaking.
“Do you know you almost got killed?” Nic snapped.
“Nic!” She grabbed him into a tight hug. “Thank the goddess you’re all right!”
“All right? I’d say we’re as far from all right as we can get.”
Cleo crawled to the side of the stone altar to look at the destruction before her. Jonas lay dead on the floor of the temple.
No, please no. It cannot be!
No, wait. Two guards rushed past his still body. When they had moved out of view, though, Jonas began to stir. Cleo watched him come back to consciousness and push himself up to a sitting, then a standing position, a hand clamped over his wounded side where he had been injured by a blade. His face, too, was bloody. His gaze went from unfocused to grim and moved through the temple, over his fallen rebels, until he finally locked eyes with Cleo.
He held his hand out to her, as if beckoning her to join him. To flee with him while there was still time to escape unseen with rest of the guests.
She shook her head.
They couldn’t both escape this, not with him injured and her in this weighted gown. She had to stay—for Nic. For Auranos.
But he could still save himself. And if he wanted half a chance at that, he had to leave now while he was out of sight of the guards. Go! she mouthed. Go now!
He hesitated only another moment before he shed his red robes, turned, and fled the temple, joining the cluster of the escaping guests as they emerged into full daylight.
“Cleo,” Nic whispered, clenching her hand so tightly it hurt. “This is bad. So bad.”
Truer words had never been spoken.
The rebels had lost. And, oh, how they’d lost.