Dark defiance smoldered in her eyes. A spark of winter fury.
She lowered her chin, slowly, until the top of her helmet faced me.
A smart woman. More practical, in the end, than Liora. But I’d never be free of her malice; I’d never stop having to watch the border of our lands.
If it meant I didn’t have to kill her, I’d take that. Because while it felt fucking wonderful to cut through Liora’s skin, muscle, bone, I’d already broken the wheel. I didn’t need to deprive two other courts of their queens.
Behind Maeronyx, Iseris went on crying. Until, finally, the winter queen snarled: “Bend the knee, you fucking ninny, lest she sees fit to end your whimpering for good.”
Maeronyx’s words must have penetrated; Iseris’s cries stopped.Her gaze flicked to the winter queen, then me, then Liora’s dangling head.
Iseris should never have been crowned; one like her was never meant to rule. Perhaps she had the most power in the spring court, but she didn’t have the disposition. Only by the wheel’s turning had she ever managed to rise.
At least Liora had died a queen. Now, before me, Iseris bent her head like a scared child.
I stepped up to the two of them, until I knew Maeronyx could see the toes of my boots even with her eyes on the ground.
“The queen trials are done. Now, in a hundred years—forever. No longer will young fae be slaughtered for queens. No longer will queens ascend on the backs of others.”
Beneath me, Maeronyx hissed. “You defy the gods’ law.”
“Then I welcome the gods’ intervention.”
Around us, the rain went on falling. The ground went on steaming. No cry from the dawn hawk. No thundering of stag hooves. No flapping of pegasus wings or padding of panther paws. Nothing but acid rain and three queens under it—and only one on her feet.
“Until then, I declare a new law.”
Maeronyx didn’t speak. Iseris went on softly crying.
“A queen rises or falls by her own power.” I dropped the Dawnmaker’s head in front of the two of them. It rolled once and stopped, face up to the sky. “She meets the fate she deserves.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX
Dorian
The world had becomeas small and faraway as a distant star. So small, I had almost forgotten its shape. I floated farther and farther and cared less and less.
Then that star grew—large, bright.
Rain. All around me, it rained.
I opened my eyes to a strange, half-lit vista of rising steam and golden droplets. Before me lay my legs, boots pointed at the sky. I couldn’t move them. Couldn’t move my hands, either. The constant thrum of magic I’d felt all my life was gone, like a missing organ.
I was emptied out.
No—one drop remained.
Above me stood a figure wreathed in golden light, a dagger in one hand. She might have been ten feet tall. Behind her lay a severed head and two armored women kneeling in the grass.
She dropped to both knees in front of me, so close her perfect bare head came level with mine. A splatter of fresh blood painted her face, and she wore a hardness in her eyes and mouth. Impenetrable, sharp as diamond—like Rhiannon but actually terrifying.
Yet that only served to make her eyes bluer, to outline her lips. The rabbit, the pettifey, the queen.
I couldn’t speak. But I could stare at her face forever.
The hardness melted away, and Eurydice emerged through it. Eyes softer, lips parting. Her hand came out to my chest. I saw it more than felt it, a vibration more than touch. Her eyes shut, and warmth ebbed from her fingers through my leathers. Magic, but not like I’d ever felt inside my body.
This wasn’t Seelie or Unseelie. It wasn’t death or life. It was… both. Both at the same time.