Page 142 of Obsidian Throne
I could almost have respected him, if I didn’t so deeply despise him.
Looking back out at the crowd, I raised my voice loud enough to break through the clashing steel and cries of pain.
“Enough!” I yelled. “We have the king.”
Slowly, the sounds of battle died down as the soldiers realized I had their king.
Iiro lay silent as a stone, staring mutely ahead while I spoke to the crowd.
“The fight is over,” I said in a more moderate tone. “Hand over your weapons now, and you will suffer no further repercussions.”
The soldiers all looked around suspiciously before dropping their swords at the feet of the Unclanned.
Backing away, I allowed Iiro to stand, though I didn’t lower my blades.
I opened my mouth to speak again when motion caught my attention. Arès gave a brief, curt nod to one of his soldiers, just as the man hurled a throwing knife.
“No!” I ordered, but it was too late.
The blade sailed toward Iiro, toward the part of his chest where his heart would have been, if he had one. It was everything I had wanted for years, to see this man bleed out in front of me.
But I had made a promise to Korhonan that his brother would live. I had sworn it. I refused to be no better than the man I was currently de-throning.
That was the only excuse I had for what I did next.
I leapt in front of Iiro, just in time for a sharp, stabbing pain to bite into my chest. I fell to the floor, unable to bear the weight of it. Pain was nothing new to me, but this a new level of intensity.
It radiated from my chest, through my shoulder and back, spreading out like tendrils of fire.
I distantly registered a mass of scarlet curls and an ominous crack of thunder before the world went black.
CHAPTER EIGHTY-SIX
ROWAN
Two heartbeats.
That was all it took for Evander to fall after the knife pierced his chest.
Time slowed down, like I was wading through mud, trying to get to him. Iiro stood, stunned, and Theo was already on his knees beside my husband.
I finally made it to Evander’s side, in time to see crimson blooming across his pristine coat. I had the illogical thought that he would hate that, the mess it was making.
His face was so, so pale, his eyes wide.
Like Andrei’s had been, just as he—
No.
No, no, no.
Distantly, I heard myself shout for a healer.
Panic surged in my chest, and wind battered the windows around us until one of them shattered, spilling shards of glass like jagged raindrops all around us.
I tried not to read into that, tried to ignore the macabre feeling that fate was toying with us, showing me that Evander and I began and ended with broken glass.
No.