Chapter Thirty-Three #2
“It took you longer than I anticipated,” Killian said. Now that she knew it existed, she could feel the magic in his voice drawing her closer. Nothing more than a small nudge. A suggestion. Solana pulled away from it. “Have you reconsidered my offer?”
A tremble had begun in her hands and she clenched her dagger tighter to quell it. “Remind me again what you want from me. It’s hard to keep up.”
Killian took two steps forward, and the others behind him followed, their steps like a drumbeat over the patter of rain against glass. “Rule the underworld and all of Auquis with me.”
He kept giving her so many opportunities to reject him.
Almost as if he was begging. She was beginning to think …
“You need me, don’t you?” Solana whispered, the pieces shifting together.
The gash on her hand throbbed. She thought of the ships in the cove behind her, his plan to leave Supay and use his demon army to kill and conquer.
“Our power has its limits. Is the himaya not working the way you had hoped?”
The twitch of his lips gave him away. “This doesn’t need to be more difficult than it already is. I don’t want to hurt the people of Supay, your friends, your people. All of this is for them.”
“This is for you,” Solana said. “This is to feed your ego and your greed. But don’t you remember what happened when the gods tried to feed theirs?
” She took a step forward also, ignoring the shiver that worked down her spine with the weight of Reyes’s eyes on her.
“They fell, Killian. They failed. They were tossed to earth and cursed for all eternity. It’s not too late to avoid that fate. ”
“IT’S KING KILLIAN!” The force of his voice made her flinch back, but nobody else moved.
Their fixed presence made her skin crawl.
She wondered if the servants wore the king’s collars too, but she couldn’t see anything underneath their cloaks.
It was possible they were simply under his thrall and exactly where they wanted to be.
Imitations of the muki they devoutly worshipped.
“And I will not fail as the gods did. Join me and see victory, or deny me and face misery. The choice is yours.”
Solana glanced back at Reyes again. At the horrible hollowness throughout him.
“Let him go, and I’ll join you,” she said, the words leaving her lips too easily to be a lie.
Killian shook his head, disbelief carved into the lines of his pursed lips.
“Misery it is, then.” He lifted a hand into the air and snapped.
A muki appeared to his left with a thin metal circle in its grotesque hand.
It was smaller than the one Reyes and the muki wore.
Dainty, with an intricate design she couldn’t see clearly from where she stood, and deceiving how closely it resembled an innocent piece of jewelry.
Already, she could feel the way it would close around her throat and choke her.
“You don’t want to rule beside me; you want to use me. Just as you did my father.”
“Masimu was weak. But you are not. This collar won’t cage you.
It will free you from everything that is holding you back.
” The strength of his words was clear in the clench of his jaw.
He truly believed that this would free her of choice and burden, of obligation and morality.
There would be nothing left of her except what he carved out of her.
Solana glanced again at Reyes, at his beautifully blank face, at the eyes that stared back, unseeing like the muki that lost their humanity.
But not all of it. Deep beneath their cursed souls, she had been able to find that tether of want.
The desperation to be released. She wondered if she was strong enough to find it in Reyes.
“Others don’t understand what needs to be done in order to protect their people. But you do. You did anything, became anyone, to free them. We are the same in that way.”
The breadth of his delusions was almost impressive, but the fact that he had gotten this far was more terrifying than she liked to admit. There was no part of him that would rule justly. There was no hope to be had underneath his thumb. It was clear there was only one option for her, for him.
The smile she gave him was sharper than any sword, and she saw the moment he understood that she couldn’t be convinced. “I would cut out my own heart before I let you make a monster of me.”
The king nodded solemnly and looked down at the circlet in his hand.
“I understand. But you must understand that you leave me no choice.” At his side, Reyes stepped forward.
She was not afraid of him, but Solana took a step back all the same.
“Fortunately, I don’t need all of you.” Killian swept a hand through the air, and Reyes surged forward again, eyes wild, chest heaving, hands shaking as they reached for the dagger at his side.
A tear rolled from the corner of his eye, down his cheek, carving a glittering path through tanned skin.
“Reyes,” she whispered, heart cracking with every breath he exhaled. She held her ground, waiting for the moment he got close enough to touch.
“He can’t hear you anymore,” Killian said. “My son only answers to me. Bring me her heart, Reyes.”