Page 77 of Merciless Is My Crown

“Conquest…means little to me.” I licked my chapped lips and gazed out over the barren desolation. Nothing but emptiness, a dead, silent landscape of shadow and light, but somehow I found the sight achingly beautiful.

It made me wonder if the world was watching me right back.

“My family is the only thing that matters. I would do anything to save them.”

“Yet you’ve shunned your mother, the only true family you have. Strange that you would choose the company of strangers over your own flesh and blood.”

“My reasons are…complicated.”

How could I ever explain to this stranger the ancient bonds that tied us together? The dangers we’d faced, survived, and had still yet to endure?

“Still…the crown is yours. Earned through combat and blood spilled.” Those eyes, once again, flashed with questions. “Do you stand by your decision to give up the red throne?”

Something in her tone sent the hair standing up on the back of my neck, and only now did I realize how far away I was from Dane, already moving toward us, his sword sliding free from its scabbard.

“I don’t care about power.”

I went to step toward Tristan when Raven’s hand snapped out, snatching my arm hard enough to bruise.

“And that is what makes you utterly worthless,” she snarled, then she heaved us both over the wall.

29

ANARIA

Wind tore the scream from my lips as we plummeted, so fast and uncontrolled, my arms and legs flailing, tangling with the witch’s, her snarling face right up against mine as if she wanted that to be the last thing I saw when we hit the ground.

Think, think, think.

I fumbled for my magic, tried to unsnarl my dark power from blind panic, but the iron bands were tightly wedged beneath my coat, and I was so trapped by the wind and my own fear, I could only hiss a foul curse into Raven’s gloating face.

I was not going to survive this.

Never going to see Zorander again.

Never telling Raz and Tavion goodbye.

The regrets came so fast they were blips across my brain, every muscle in my body braced for the explosion of pain when we slammed into the stones below.

Any second now. One…two…three…

The world tilted then heaved, my stomach leaping into my throat, and instead of plummeting, we were flying up, the sheer cliff nothing but a blur of gray. The only thing that was real—the only thing I saw clearly—was the scaly, taloned foot wrapped tightly around my arm, talons carefully positioned to not draw blood.

I blinked the tears out of my eyes and peered at the iridescent, golden-red scales on the undulating belly above me.

The witch hung beside me in Tristan’s claws, blood flowing from her shoulder where he’d punctured clean through muscle. She kept fighting, nails shredding futilely at the wyvern’s talons, trying to rip herself free, her furious gaze clashing with mine.

When we crested the parapet, Dane charged toward me, shouting, but I couldn’t hear him above the roaring wind and my heart slamming against my ribcage.

Tristan set me down carefully, then Dane was there, dragging me away as Tristan dropped the witch hard enough for bones to crack like dry kindling wood.

“Stop, Dane, stop.”

He obeyed, both of us panting as the golden wyvern wove its sinuous body around the injured witch like a burning lash of pure flame, talons crushing the burnished rock, spiked tail thrashing back and forth, head held low and baring teeth as long as knives.

“Please,” the witch begged, barely able to push up to her elbows on the cracked stone. “Please, stop him.”

Tristan looked over at me and blinked once, a low, keening growl coming out of his mouth along with a burst of golden flames, so hot they were edged with blue.

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