Chapter 55 Lia
Lia
Arctos’s body bowed, face slack with shock. Blood bubbled from his lips as a gold sword punched clean through his chest.
Lia froze. Her mind refused to understand. Until the scent of incense struck her like a curse.
Co?tin.
He yanked the blade free, holding it aloft as crimson dripped down the gleaming length.
Always him. Always fucking Co?tin.
With a scream, Lia caught Arctos as he fell. “Ah, no, Arctos!” She lowered him gently, palms slick with his blood. Too much. He was still mortal. He couldn’t survive this.
Her friend. Her husband.
“Berserker life suits you, little sister,” Co?tin said lightly. Sweat streaked down his temples, and his right hand was gone. “Once you’re tamed, perhaps I’ll let you drill with my army. But for now, come along. I have a crown fitting. You’ll love what I’ve done with the kingdom.”
“You monster.” Her voice broke with fury. “I’ll kill you for this.” Her promise to herself: I’ll never not fight again.
Arctos rasped her name, lungs rattling.
This time, she didn’t run from her brother. She drew her sword and lunged.
Co?tin barely deflected the strike, tracing out of reach. Teleporting with ease, he reappeared across the den, sword spinning lazily in his grip. Blood spattered the stone walls as he taunted, “Little sister fell for a bear. I’ll break you of that.”
Despite the haze of blood, she detected the queen’s unique scent. Realization hit her like fire. “You’ve been working with Yrsa!”
His grin turned obscene. “Not my fault the queen loses her wits whenever I sink my fangs into her. She quivers like a lovesick whore every time.”
Choking back nausea, Lia demanded, “Whose blood marks you?”
“Before your husband’s? His cousin’s,” Co?tin said with casual malice. “Torben lost his head tonight.”
“You’re lying.” But he couldn’t lie without a burn. “You’re lying!” Dagny. The baby. No.
Arctos groaned, struggling to rise, reaching for his sword—too weak.
“A beautiful cycle, isn’t it?” Co?tin’s voice was oily and victorious. “I drank this one’s parents and brother to the quick. And now I’ve eradicated the last of their line. I try to be thorough when pulling roots.”
“You led that hunting party,” she whispered. “Yrsa spared you.” My brother killed their family, and she covered it up.
Despair clawed at Lia, but she forced it down. I can try to atone. I can end this! She screamed and charged, but he vanished again, reappearing against another wall.
She attacked again, faster. Their blades clashed—sparks flashing, metal singing. Co?tin’s strength dwarfed hers, but she’d learned from the best. She used every trick Arctos had taught her.
“Not bad,” Co?tin said between strikes. “These bears train well. Some of them already fight in my army.” His next strike forced her back toward the fire.
“I don’t want to hurt you.” He grimaced, dragging his severed wrist across his throat.
“Now that was a lie. I don’t want to hurt you—yet.
You’ll come to depend on me first. You’ve no one left in the world but me.
This one’s dead.” He nodded at Arctos, who lay shuddering in a spreading pool.
“And before I came, I beheaded Father and fed your maid to the strigoi. In time, you’ll learn to appreciate me as Yrsa did.
” Lowering his voice to a rasp, he vowed, “You’ll quiver too, little sister. ”
Nadje was dead? Co?tin was a plague that devoured everything he touched. Rot disguised as royalty. She could stop him. Tonight.
Arctos was somehow crawling toward her, Berserkerage shimmering in his eye like molten silver.
She focused on Co?tin, scanning for an opening, and struck. He met her blow with brutal force; her sword juddered in her grip.
“Return with me as my queen. You belong with me. In our home.”
Lia gritted her fangs and held her ground. “I’ll never be your queen. Never. I want you dead. When will your depraved mind accept the truth? I’m not your godsdamned Bride!”
And then she heard it.
Not her pulse.
Not Arctos’s ragged breaths.
A faint, alien rhythm.
“No.” Lia faltered. “Not possible.” Co?tin’s heartbeat had stuttered to life.
He grinned with blood-tinged teeth, as if he’d just told the punchline to a joke. “No one believed me, but I knew.” His shoulders rose as he inhaled deeply, crimson gaze locked on her. “From the first moment, you were mine.”
Mine.
Her stomach twisted. I blooded him.
Dark spittle flecked his lips as he laughed. “It was always you, sor? mea. My sister.” His expression turned lecherous as his heart beat faster, his body awakening. Resurrecting.
She froze, horror flooding her veins.
He slammed her sword from her hand, sending it spinning. He sheathed his own and seized her arm, claws digging into her skin.
She twisted to look at Arctos one last time. He reached for her, his gaze saying something she couldn’t decipher. She’d seen that look before…
And then Co?tin traced her away.
Not to the castle.
Darkness swallowed her. The air hung heavy with old blood, thick enough to taste. Drops ticked from above in a slow, constant cadence.
“The crypt,” she breathed. He’d taken her to this foul place, surrounding her with the very substance she’d sworn never to drink.
Co?tin’s silhouette loomed. “I can trace in and out. You cannot. If you ever want to leave, sister, you’ll give me what I want.”
Her throat tightened. “What?” she whispered, but she knew. He would complete the blooding. Her nightmare was unfolding, step by terrifying step.
His voice went low and intimate. “Come now. Father had a few ideas worth keeping. We’ll start tonight.”
Comprehension settled over her like a cloak of acid. He’d murdered her husband. Beheaded the one vampire royal who might have saved her. And now…he meant to fulfill Neculain’s decree.
Her nightmare of him deepened bloodred. Screams tore from her throat, echoing off stone until her own mind felt flayed open.
Screaming.
Screaming.
One hundred babes in one hundred years.
And Co?tin would father them all.