Chapter 44
You’ll accept Mercy Villente as your queen. It had always been her destiny to rule by my side. To bless my line with Anomalies. I’ll deal with that bastard she bore at some point.
— LETTER FROM KING ROMERO IV TO HIS COUNCIL
A sneer crossed my stepfather’s face as he stared down at me.
Waves lapped my numb body. My quivering fingers stretched out, grabbing the edges of Glesni’s skirts, her blood already soaking the sand.
Glancing at her, shudders racked through me.
The glint of mischief had already dimmed.
Even if I could get her to Enfys, it would be too late. My sister healed the sick.
Only I raised the dead.
Romero sighed. ‘I should have drowned you when I first set eyes on you.’
My gaze darted up to his. I should move, get up. My chest heaved. I had nothing left.
‘Your mother was supposed to be mine, long, long before she met him.’ His eyes met mine.
Eons of disgust and hatred shone in them.
He went back to examining his sword. ‘I made a mistake the day I allowed your father to live. Should have known he’d steal Mercy again.
’ He snorted, shaking his head. ‘It didn’t do them much good though.
You know he never even laid eyes on you?
Died protecting Mercy as she brought you into the world.
It’s how you got your name. Sorrow. I should have known then what you’d mean to me.
‘You. In that filthy, bloody shawl when I found her. I never gave up on Mercy. It’s not in my nature.
She’d no idea I’d got the hunters to drive the diafol towards her and him.
I was supposed to be the one to save her, but he killed it instead.
’ Romero inhaled sharply as I willed my body to run.
‘It had already bitten him. You should have seen your father fight. He tripped over his own guts to protect you both.’
My fingers dug into the sand. Mama had always hushed me when I’d asked her about my father, her face a quiet mask.
‘Mercy knew she had no choice when I arrived, offering her a place at my side, despite how she… betrayed me. I promised her you’d be left in the care of a kind, childless couple, but damn, that woman was stubborn.
Her one condition of returning to my side was that I’d allow you to live in my castle, within my walls.
But I loved her, Sorrow. I loved her despite how I hated you.
So I took you in. I forbade her from ever revealing his name. And look at you.’
He sneered as I dragged in a shuddering breath, knowing the others must be close to the end on the beach. They may already be dead for all I knew. By the time the sun set today, the beach would be smeared with our blood.
I exhaled through the pain raging within. Romero glared, and for the first time I understood his loathing. Enfys was a mirror to our mother while I looked nothing like either of them. So I must look like him – my unknown, unnamed father.
The sword flashed as he raised it.
‘And as he died never knowing you, so you shall die never knowing his name.’
Unflinching, I watched as the sword flew to end me.
Matthias cried my name, his voice raw with agony, and my soul answered.
The shoreline exploded in a myriad of lights. Romero drew back, the sword clenched in his hands, as Glesni rose from the sand.
‘I’m sorry,’ I whispered to her as her gifts washed through me, swamping my mind, confusing my senses. Violet threads recoiled, terrified by the alien power.
Matthias may have shown my stepfather mercy, but his kindness cost me Glesni. I gritted my teeth, forcing the plum threads back towards my swaying mentor as they battled me, preferring the corpse of a guard.
A powerless guard.
You control them, girl. I gasped as Glesni’s voice echoed in my mind. Control me. Destroy him and live, my girl. Live and love.
Screaming, I held the threads taut and they paused before swirling into Glesni. She rose before Romero, taller than I ever recalled her standing before.
We stood together as my dark hair whipped around my face.
Exhaling, we watched in delight as pure terror crossed his face.
The king of Drufaera whimpered, and we smiled as he floundered, incapable of words.
Glesni stood before me and, as one, our hands rose.
A blaze flared in her hands before fizzling out as I sought the key to controlling us.
A grin flickered across his face. Romero rolled his shoulders.
‘You can’t do it, can you? Failed again.’
He raised the sword. Swallowing deeply, I unspooled my thread. Not silver like my other gift, but a deep shining violet. A ribbon of mortality. The threads were mine and I was them. I sighed, sensing the sparking flint within us; the mentor and her student, a single, shared soul.
His elbow swung back, rage taking over his eyes. He truly thought he was about to kill us.
‘Stupid man,’ we said.
Confusion flickered across his face.
‘Bitch,’ he hissed. The sword flew towards us, and we grinned at the shock on his face as his weapon burst into flames.
He shrieked as we twisted our hands, the violet urging us on.
We fed the flame, delighting in how Romero fell to the waves, screaming, raw, wild.
He tried to sink beneath the waves, seeking the blessed relief of water.
The flames extinguished where the cool of the water hit his skin, only to spark again the second he met air.
We shook our heads, grinning as we fed the flame.
Trembling, his wide eyes met ours. The king spat curses, spittle flying from his blazing mouth.
We sensed Matthias behind us, but didn’t turn.
We had to finish Romero. The only way he’d leave this beach was as ash on the wind.
‘For Glesni,’ we said as he twitched, mouth open in a silent scream. His skin blistering and popping, decaying and burnt. ‘For Enfys, Pablo, Mama, Papa, my papa. For the years you denied Matthias and me. For Asmar and The Alliance.’
We were the most powerful Deviants to set foot on Eusan soil, and we were desperate to test our gifts.
They hissed, engulfing Romero in flames.
We didn’t hear his screams. We didn’t give him the chance.
We tore through his lungs, his hollow heart.
His corpse fell hissing into the waves, but still we burned through him.
Flesh, bones, his corrupt soul, nothing more than blistering meat.
Resentment flashed through the coils of purple. Still they weren’t sated and they crept forward, slicing across the waves like a long boat, towards the smouldering remains of Romero. A new corpse lay ahead, and they craved its possession.
No, I warned them as Glesni’s body slunk to the waves. Not this.
They pushed forward, and his charred fingers twitched in the water. Gasping, I called them back, but still they prodded, still they hunted.
‘Sorrow.’ Fingers curled through mine. A voice deeper than home called to me. ‘Sorrow. Breathe for me, love. Breathe.’
The chill whisper of the salty breeze on my chapped cheeks brought me back to myself.
My chest ached as though a diafol had torn through me, but a hand squeezed against mine; arms enveloped me.
I heaved in a ragged breath, conscious of the rise and fall of my shoulders.
A hand cupped my cheek, turning my face towards his.
I scoured the green eyes, tears pricking in my own at the worry lurking there.
My forehead creased as other images battled for control, till a name came to me.
‘Matthias?’
A smile, a promise of joy and happiness broke out on his face, and I threw my arms around him. My husband dropped his sword, dragging me into him, kissing my neck, whispering promises of love, a life.
‘I should start with what the fuck,’ he said, stepping back, his gaze tearing over me. ‘But we’ve got all the time in the world for that. You did it, Sorrow.’
A heavy breath escaped me. My body shook. His lips crashed into mine, awash with a mix of blood and salt that could have been honey on those lips of his.
He pulled away quickly, far too quickly, and I became aware of the others. My head hit his shoulder, and Matthias placed his hand gently on the back of my head.
‘You did it,’ he whispered into the shell of my ear, and my hands fisted into his torn shirt. ‘You wonderful creature. You did it.’
I swiped my nose and, peering at my fingers, found nothing but sand.
I laughed into the fabric of his shirt, my eyes closed, ready to collapse into him.
Gods, my body barely had the energy to breathe, but we’d done it.
I’d done it. Romero was gone. Asmar was safe – for the time being anyway.
We may have defeated the king of Drufaera, but we still had to face the—
Asher screamed Matthias’s name and I twisted, expecting to see the scorched form of Romero lunging at us through the waves.
But he was gone. Nothing but charcoal and ashes. No. Romero was no longer our greatest threat.
We all froze as the woman, clapping her pale hands, skipped through the waves towards us, a dark-eyed Ifan stalking next to her, an army at her back and her armada cresting the waves.
She placed a kiss onto Ifan’s cheek as she kicked off her high-heeled boots and danced barefoot towards us.
‘Well,’ she said in a high, childlike voice, ‘is this any way to greet your empress?’