Chapter 14
Allie
All I could hear was my own heartbeat clamoring in my chest.
Too loud, too fast.
I gripped the door as ugly memories of the masked attackers hidden in the ash invaded my mind.
My power roared inside me, ready to burst out, as my senses sharpened.
No breathing in the darkness.
No glint of a weapon.
I narrowed my eyes, stepping inside my bedroom as tall and ready as The Huntress would have to be.
Anything could be waiting under that duvet.
Anything that wanted me dead.
The lump in my bed was certainly not a person. It didn’t move, so no venomous creature; Evie had almost died from a hidden snake bite, anything was possible.
But if Dax’s odd friend had managed to create a flying contraption and Ryker’s Brother could make leaves explode, any deadly machinery was possible. A dangerous rune, like the ones Dara had been playing with since infancy, could always be slipped in a pocket or underneath a pillow.
Worse still, whatever hid under my blankets had left in a position I couldn’t ignore.
A message.
Small enough to be a head.
A severed one.
Images of Orion slicing his own throat slashed through me, chilling.
Bloody flashes of my family invaded my mind.
Dax’s smile sliced to his ears.
Evie’s cheeks stained with blood.
Clara’s blonde hair ripped from her skull.
Dara’s runes carved into her forehead.
Nadya and Geryll’s tongues ripped out.
Ryker’s blue eyes staring up at me lifelessly.
I sniffed the air. No metallic hint of blood, at least.
But my mind couldn’t stop picturing a massacre on my pillow.
Slow and tense, I stepped forward.
By the time I’d reached the foot of the bed, my tendrils were already coiled around my wrists.
The blue light cast eerie shadows on the invader in my bed.
I gritted my teeth and in one move fast enough to rival Ryker’s, I yanked the duvet to the side.
The view before me knocked the air out of me.
Sitting there on my pillow, where my head should have been, was the Protectorate crown.
The tendrils vanished at the same time I let go of the duvet.
“Dax,” I groaned and pinched the bridge of my nose.
That’s why he’d kept asking about my room, not out of some misplaced fear. I turned to look at the balcony doors–closed and untainted. No marks left in the plush carpet, either.
He’d come inside and left without a trace, like the ghost he was, always flitting undetected between places.
Heart beating faster, I gazed down at the crown sitting there. Perfectly motionless, perfectly defiant.
Waiting.
Daring me to do something.
Anything.
I remembered those sharp spires rising from Grandpa Constantine’s head, veiling him in an otherworldly air as he’d towered over all. Not through brute force or viciousness, but with real power that demanded respect.
Still high off the dread, I didn’t hesitate this time.
No doubts.
No reconsidering or questioning.
I grabbed the crown as if it had mocked me.
The second my skin touched the metal, shame flooded me.
It wasn’t its fault I didn’t feel worthy of wearing it–or that it had ended up in my room in such a sneaky, unceremonious way.
I thumped my foot against the floor. If Dax heard, he didn’t say anything. Not even a snicker.
The crown caught the moon’s light, glinting.
Beckoning.
I cradled it against my still damp chest, back bowed.
A moment of silence for my Clan, for which so many of my ancestors had fought and endured.
We’d birthed our magic out of thin air, scraps of energy, and our own stubbornness to survive, yet here we were, with an usurper at its helm, on the brink of collapse.
As for me, I’d been cast aside and the people of Aquila only remembered my name to curse it.
I had the crown, but my throne had been stolen.
But what if I could reclaim it?
The question was so sudden, so foreign, it felt like the crown itself had whispered it to me.
I stared down at it. The middle spire, the tallest and most fearsome, encased my reflection, elongating it until the sharp tip.
I’d expected to see fear and apprehension.
I only saw determination.
The murmur of something more.
I hated how much I yearned for it to be true.
Were the hidden runes calling me to duty?
Warning me?
Perhaps they sensed the impending war. Could detect the slither of the snakes and the schemes crafted in the shadows against us. My thumb traced the cold rim, wanting and wary all at once.
Whoever held the crown could lead the Protectorate army. The Blood Brotherhood had the fiercest warriors in Malhaven, but thousands of more weapons could sway the war in our favor faster, before more of those monster snakes had a chance to hatch.
Dax was right, we needed any advantage–and this was one the Serpents couldn’t even dream of buying with their overflowing vaults.
Silas could keep the throne. For now.
I held the true Protectorate power in my hands.
In a flurry, I rushed to the mirror, possibility drumming through me.
Grandpa Constantine had always said there were no coincidences. Dax falling from the sky to bring me the crown before a war read like a legend leaped off ancient pages.
I stared at myself in the mirror for the longest time, now caressing the metal like an old friend, finally reunited.
Doubts drummed through me.
None of my cousins–except Evie, perhaps; Grandpa Constantine had been nothing but thorough in his love and lessons to her before she’d vanished–knew about the secret hidden in the crown.
Grandpa Constantine had been unwavering in his wisdom. The crown had been carved from a cannon barrel used in battle, but beneath its iron weight, hidden runes had been melted into it, to temper power with wit.
I was the only person alive, except for Uncle Maksim, who’d seen the veiled symbols light up when my father had placed the crown on his own head.
The symbols had turned silver, then. Uncle Maksim had whispered to me that Grandpa Constantine’s had always been blue.
Harmony versus courage.
No symbols, no leading the Protectorate army.
No true heir.
Would they accept me?
I raised the crown above my head slowly, a knot constricting my throat. It felt heavier than any weapon I’d ever held.
Here, in the darkness of the fortress, nobody would know if I failed.
You would.
I gritted my teeth, closed my eyes and lowered the crown. The moment the metal circled my head felt momentous.
Inevitable.
My powers stirred deep in my chest.
I’d been born for this.
No.
I’d been trained for this.
Hope renewed flowing through my veins, I opened my eyes.
My smile, which I hadn’t even noticed taking shape, collapsed as my own fear reflected back at me.
No symbols, blue or silver, shone on the central spire.
Despite Dax’s hopes and my own jab at Silas, back when I thought myself invincible, the Protectorate crown didn’t sense I was worthy of it.