“You are the only witness, Aveen. I need you to come with me. We will be with you the entire time.” Tadhg, his dog, and I wouldn’t let anything happen to her. When I took her cold hand, she didn’t try to pull away. She laced our fingers together and clutched my arm with her free hand. I opened the door but kept myself between Aveen and Muireann.
Tadhg used his magic to restrain her, although she didn’t try to leave. She just kept smiling. Unease prickled the hair at the back of my neck.
Ruairi escorted Madden into the great room. Once they’d crossed the threshold, I warded the room to prevent evanescing.
“Ah, Madden. Muireann. Nice of you to join us,” I greeted.
Madden pointed at Muireann, his face contorting. “The bitch made me do it. She made me.”
I always loved that excuse. “Made me.” The Queenmademe do things. She controlled me like a puppet on a string. The merrow may have persuaded him. Convinced him. She certainly didn’tmakehim.
“Made you do what, Madden?” I asked, icy darkness collecting at my fingertips.
“Take the human to the Forest.”
“Liar!” Muireann hissed.
“And which human is that?” I asked, just so there were no lingering questions when I finally ended him.
Madden pointed at my soulmate.
His fingers would be first to go.
“And how did she ‘make’ you, Madden?”
“She . . . I . . . You see—”
“I don’t see.” I shifted my dagger and caught his hand with magic, stretching it toward the wall. “I canmakeyou cut off your own fingers.” Look at that. Just a spark of magic, and his little finger was gone. I bathed in his screams. Delighted in his terror. “See there? That’s memakingyou do something. Do you know what else I could do?”
“P-please . . .” Madden begged.
“I could do it myself.” Blood sprayed as I sawed off the rest of his digits. He’d better get used to the pain because, by the time today was over, he’d be begging for death.
Madden whimpered, tears and snot dripping down the bow of his thin lips. I slammed a hand to his chin, forcing his pain-dulled black eyes to mine. “Did Muireannmakeyou take my hostage? Because I find it hard to believe a strapping lad such as yourself could be so easily coerced by a rotting fish.”
“No, no, Prince Rían,” he cried. “She—she told me if I helped her . . . I’d be gettin’ back at ye fer lettin’ that bitch off without so much as a feckin’ day in the dungeon.”
He must have been talking about Anwen. Why the hell did he care so much about that witch?
“So, this is aboutmethen,” I said. “You thought it’d be a good idea to take something fromme?” The merrow had the gall to sneer. “That was a silly thing to do, wasn’t it?”
“I’m sorry—”
“Are you, now? Brilliant. I suppose I should let you go, then.” Wouldn’t that be kind of me? To forgive and forget. Unfortunately for the pitiful man sniveling against the wall, I wasn’t the feckin’ hero. “Or I could bring you downstairs.”
I ignored Madden’s pathetic protests, collecting his digits from the floor and tucking them into his waistcoat pocket. No sense in leaving a mess for Oscar to clean up later. “I’ll see you soon.”
I disbanded the ward and sent the bastard down to the dungeon.
Muireann met my level gaze with a defiant tilt to her chin. “We both know it’s only a matter of time before she comes to take your plaything away. Do you really think—”
Before she could say another feckin’ word, I dragged my blade across her traitorous throat. She crumpled to the ground like a rag doll. I knelt, inhaling her lifeforce before it could return to the earth. The warmth of magic swelled in my veins.
Ruairi and Tadhg had created a wall between my human and the spot where I knelt. I rose slowly, wrestling with bloodlust. I wanted to kill everyone. Every last being who drew breath. I wanted them all to die. To tear off their toenails, slice their skin with a serrated blade, roll them in salt, then melt their bones with acid.
I shifted a clean shirt, not wanting Aveen to see the blood on me. I should have stayed back in case I’d terrified her, but I was too weak to stay away. “Aveen, I’m so—”
“I do hope I’m not interrupting,” a familiar voice said from the doorway.