Chapter 46
The darkness whined in Beatryce’s head, murmuring its displeasure at Sparrow’s insults. The fireball had gotten Sparrow’s attention, which was good, because Bea couldn’t sustain it any longer. As it began to sputter, she closed her hand, extinguishing it before it went out on its own.
Sparrow planted her hands on her hips, which put one hand dangerously close to her dagger. “Nice parlor trick. Did you learn that recently? I don’t recall you having an actionable magic when we were at Willow Hall.”
“How dare you speak to me as if I am a commoner?” Bea clenched her hands.
“Beatryce, as I said in my letter, and as I’ve stated here, I’m not playing games.
No magic will be tolerated, either. That includes your little glow ball.
You arrived earlier than you were supposed to, you’ve got your fiancé masquerading as your bodyguard, and one of your supposed lady’s maids is a witch with sylphnoct powers.
” Sparrow shook her head and clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth like Bea’s tutor used to do.
Bea had hated that tutor.
Sparrow went on, sighing deeply. “I am extremely disappointed in you and your lies. I thought—wrongly, I see now—that Tenebrae had been a wakeup call for you.”
Bea frowned. She had no idea what a wakeup call was.
“By that,” Sparrow said. “I mean a warning that might have shocked you into reality. That it might have caused you to see the truth. But it didn’t have that effect, did it?”
The darkness was building inside Bea, crying to be released. Not yet. She needed Sparrow to come closer. But the effort of keeping the darkness at bay was making her hands tremble. Perhaps Sparrow would mistake that for fear. Or weakness.
If so, it would be Sparrow’s mistake.
All the same, Bea clasped her hands behind her back to hide them.
The Radiant queen’s hand came to rest on the hilt of her sword but quickly moved. “I know you meant to hit me with the dagger you threw that day. I can’t imagine how you must have felt watching it sink into your mother’s back.”
Without meaning to, Bea let out a soft sound somewhere between a whimper and a snarl. She pressed her lips together to keep from betraying herself again.
Sparrow nodded. “You nearly killed your mother. The sitting queen. Almost—” Sparrow drew a finger across her throat and made a slicing sound. “By her own daughter.”
Humiliation roasted Beatryce from within. The flames of it heated her skin. She couldn’t bring herself to look at Dren, Merylynn, or Elyra.
“And now you have a chance to make things right. To bring peace to your kingdom. To be the liberator of Malveaux. Instead, you’ve come here to play games. Don’t you care anything for the people in your kingdom?”
Bea seethed, knotting her fingers together behind her. “You’re the one who doesn’t care.”
“Sure, tell yourself that. Well, this was your last chance.” Sparrow’s expression shifted into something hard and angry as she leaned forward, her voice rife with outrage. “And you wasted it.”
For a moment, Beatryce felt sick. For a tick of time no longer than a breath, she contemplated confessing everything and becoming the liberator Sparrow had spoken of.
Then the darkness sank its claws in deeper and woke her up. During her tirade, Sparrow had nearly reached the table that separated them.
That might be the closest she would come.
Bea’s hands were still hidden from Sparrow. In a flash, her fingers slipped inside the cuffs of her gown and reached for the throwing blades. As soon as she had a grip on them, she whispered, “Now.”
Elyra nodded.
Bea expected her to leap forward. Instead, the magician seemed to unfold, shadows scurrying off her like rats leaving a sinking vessel. The air in the great hall condensed, growing heavy, cold, and dark. A low, unnatural hum vibrated out of Elyra—half moan, half hungry growl.
Sparrow blinked, stepping back. The darkness surged inside Bea in response, thrilled to be let loose.
Then Elyra raised both hands, palms outward, and the candles in the chandeliers guttered. Coiling ribbons of pure shadow rose up from the floor, blacker than any night Bea had ever known. They whipped around like serpents, striking at the Radiant delegation with vicious speed.
The first tendril slammed into Professor Cloudtree, catching him across the chest and hurling him backward into one of the marble columns with a sickening crack. He crumpled with a soft cry.
Nightborne roared as he lunged in front of Sparrow, sword flashing. But Elyra was faster. A whip of darkness cracked across his sword arm, wrapping tight. He snarled in pain as the shadow burned through the leather gauntlet around his wrist and into his flesh.
The Radiant magician was already chanting, ancient words rolling from his lips like thunder, golden light blooming between his outstretched hands.
But Elyra laughed, clearly delighted with her work, and slammed a wall of writhing shadows into the old mage. The impact drove him to one knee. The light he was conjuring sputtered but didn’t go out.
And Sparrow finally stood exposed for one perfect heartbeat.
Bea didn’t hesitate.
She whipped both arms forward, the throwing blades balanced between her fingers. A slender knife flew from each hand in quick succession. Two deadly darts aimed straight at the Radiant queen’s heart and throat.
The motion felt clean, and oddly practiced, even though it hadn’t been. The darkness had guided it, Bea knew that.
This was what she had come for. Perhaps what she had been born to do. The darkness roared with pleasure.
Time seemed to slow. Bea watched the blades fly through the air, sparkling in the sputtering light. One of them would land. It had to. With Elyra’s shadows tearing the room apart, Sparrow couldn’t possibly—
A flare of golden light exploded outward from the old wizard, who was back on his feet.
His magic detonated with the raw brilliance of a sunrise breaking over the mountains. It caught Bea’s knives mid-flight and melted them into harmless droplets of metallic vapor before rolling over Bea and her court.
Elyra crumpled to the floor in a heap. Merylynn and Dren looked terrified. Bea’s stomach dropped and a wash of nausea filled her. The darkness howled, its frustration matching her own.
Sparrow’s eyes snapped to Bea. Her gaze was furious, full of betrayal, and blazing with power. For the first time since the meeting began, the Radiant queen looked every inch a ruler.
Bea understood she had made a mistake.
“How dare you,” Sparrow snarled, voice carrying over the chaos.
Nightborne wrenched free of the shadow binding his arm, blood streaking his sleeve, and placed himself between Sparrow and Beatryce again.
The Radiant magician stayed up, shaking but still threatening.
A golden aura danced across his skin. Even Cloudtree was pushing himself up, coughing but alive, a thin line of blood trailing from the corner of his mouth.
The darkness inside Bea hissed in fury. Beside her, Elyra climbed to her feet.
Her voice slithered through the chamber, as terrible as the shadows she’d unleased. “You underestimate me, old wizard. And you.” She pointed at Sparrow. “You should have gotten on your knees and begged for mercy, your highness. Now you will die wishing you had.”
More shadows erupted, reaching for the four of them at once. The temperature in the hall plummeted. Bea could feel the cold in her bones, it came on so suddenly.
Her hands were empty and her heart hammered against her ribs, but the moment of doubt she’d felt earlier was gone, burned away by the darkness’s approval. This was right. This was necessary. She reached for her mother’s dagger.
But as Sparrow freed the sword at her side with both hands, more golden light gathered slowly between the old wizard’s palms like a second sun. Another strike was coming.
And Beatryce realized something cold and sharp: the Radiant queen was not as distracted as she had hoped. Bea threw the dagger.
The Grym bodyguard deflected it with his sword.
Dren stood rigid beside Bea, sword half-drawn, eyes wide with the same feral hunger she felt. Merylynn cowered, obviously scared and unsure what to do.
“Do something,” Bea bellowed.
Elyra gestured, directing the shadows like a conductor. They answered with savage joy.
Tendrils slammed into Gabriel’s body and tried to wrench him away from Sparrow. One shadow coiled around his injured arm again, squeezing until fresh blood dripped from the leather. He grunted but held his ground, arm trembling as he hacked at the living darkness with a dagger in his free hand.
Uldamar’s chanting grew louder, the words ancient and low, each syllable striking against Elyra’s onslaught like hammer strikes on an anvil. The golden light between his hands swelled, spinning faster, brighter, until it hurt to look at it directly.
Bea’s eyes watered at the intensity. The darkness inside her recoiled, screeching like a cornered animal.
Outside, thunder boomed.
“No!” Bea tried to shout, but the word came out a hoarse whisper. She lunged sideways, grabbing for the dagger at her calf, desperate for anything that might buy them a moment. Her fingers brushed the hilt as Uldamar roared and thrust both hands forward.
The sphere of light shot from his palms like a comet. It streaked across the chamber in a blazing arc, trailing ribbons of enchanted fire.
Bea watched its approach, frozen in that terrible half-second of realization. The ball struck the space between their two groups at the same time that thunder cracked open the sky. Golden light detonated outward in a blinding shockwave that washed over everything and shattered the table.
With just her fingers on the dagger’s hilt, Bea cried out as the radiance slammed into her. It wasn’t heat. It was worse. Weight.
A crushing, immobilizing pressure that seized control of every muscle and joint. Her limbs locked mid-motion. One foot remained lifted from her desperate lunge, her body a statue of living stone.
The blade she’d almost grasped clattered uselessly to the floor.
Beside her, Dren was caught with his sword halfway drawn, mouth open in a silent snarl of defiance. Merylynn had been mid-step toward the door; now, she teetered, frozen at an awkward angle, terror etched permanently across her face.
Even Elyra, the powerful sylphnoct, was trapped. Her shadowy tendrils hung suspended in the air like black icicles, writhing weakly against the golden prison that encased all four of them in a dome of searing light.
The cold vanished. In its place came a relentless, burning force that pressed the darkness down, down, down until it could only whimper inside Bea’s skull. She tried to scream. Tried to move a single finger. She could do nothing.
Her lungs still worked, barely, each breath shallow and labored. Her heart thundered so hard she was sure it would burst, but even that frantic rhythm felt muffled, distant. Was this how she died?
Lightning flashed beyond the windows as the rain pelted harder.
Across the ruined table, Sparrow lowered her sword. She looked exhausted, strands of silver-streaked hair sticking to her sweat-dampened forehead, but her posture remained regal.
Gabriel stepped forward, blood dripping from his wounded arm, sword raised and ready. Uldamar sighed heavily, chest heaving, but the old mage’s eyes burned with triumph. Cloudtree wiped blood from his mouth as he returned to the mage’s side, his expression murderous.
“You chose this path,” Sparrow said quietly, her voice cutting through the ringing silence left by the explosion. She sheathed her sword with deliberate care. “I offered peace. I offered understanding. And you answered with lies and treachery.”
Bea wanted to spit defiance. She wanted to unleash every ounce of the darkness still clawing at the edges of her mind. But the golden light held her fast. All she could do was glare, eyes burning with tears of helpless rage.
Deep down, she felt the first cold threads of real fear.
The darkness whispered promises of future revenge, of shadows that would one day swallow this kingdom whole. If Bea could have shaken her head, she would have. Those promises felt very far away.