Page 149 of Deadly Maiden

Ignore me at your peril.I make Jennae take a step. She blurts outMotherin a deep, ghastly voice that would not convince me, but her parents look, with equal parts horror and pride on their faces.

The barest gout of flame appears at Rorsyd’s mouth. Scales sketch upon his cheeks and neck, upon his thick arms, on his muscle-ripped stomach. The wounds have gone. The scales, the flame, they flicker and die.

We need more time.

I let Jennae tumble to the floor. One partly frozen arm cracks off her body at the shoulder to roll across the floor.Eek. Nasty.

There is a way, a path. I see it now.

Jennae died the day after the battle, from a mortal, festering wound.

I have seen within her thawing body, seen the darkness, the deadness the ice has kept in limbo. I plunge within and tear loose the frozen darkthing matter that festered long ago. It comes to me in black, wormlike threads. With no time to craft them, I throw them at Ruelle and wrap her into a head-to-toe cocoon.

Screeching, flailing, she staggers backward, sprawling against the stairs. The threads tighten and begin to cut.

Callously, I pull on the ends of each thread, wrap her in knots, and pull and pull. Her skin splits. Her muscles are diced to an inch deep, then deeper. Her bones grate against the darkthing threads. Her screams echo off the stone walls, and Madlin recoils. Then I yank on them and cut her into a millionpieces that skitter wetly across the floor in splotches, gobbets, and blood.

Her scimitar evaporates, as does Anathema’s cage.

King Madlin bellows as Rorsyd rips his sword from his quivering grasp and backhands him halfway across the room. He lands on his back, winded, and is soon whimpering and pleading for mercy, his arms up to shield his face.

I stalk to him, bare my teeth, and realize how angry I am. Asher will be no more, soon, and this, today, is a piece of chaos unnecessary for any sane reason, for any sane person.

“I kept this for you.” I poise the last piece of darkthing above him, sharp, deadly. It will easily pierce his throat.

He grins up at me. “Do that and then you will be trapped inside this tomb and surrounded by my army. You cannot defeat them all. Spare me, and I promise you will go free.” He nods at his daughter’s corpse. “I can see you told the truth. She is no longer Jennae.”

I cannot trust him. I move the shard back a tad, thinking.

“Wyntre?” Rorsyd holds my shoulder. “He is right. Though perhaps I can fly us out.”

The sister speaks. “I will not stop you, though I would rather he die. Truthfully, there will be mages out there. Flying out will be perilous.”

“And so we kill him and martyr ourselves?” My hand is shaking. She does not answer me. Perhaps being a martyr appeals to her.

I have an idea. Another idea, really. Do I normally have this many?

Thander’s semi-prophecy predicted something important might happen to me if I kept Rorsyd. I wonder if that covered today. In the small print, maybe?

Asher still twitches—he is partly still unalive and undead. I’m not sure there is a word to describe what he is. I haven’t said goodbye to him. Instead, I’m hesitating over killing this asshole.

Then Kroll shows he’s alive and opens a hand to fumble at his axe. Rorsyd looks at him then me. “Want me to fix that?”

“Yes.”

He ambles over, lifts one foot. Without again examining what his foot is doing, he slowly crushes Kroll’s throat until he ceases to flail about.

“See that?” I tell Madlin. “We aren’t squeamish about removing the assholes from the world.”

“Do that to me, and you won’t survive.” The king’s grin widens. He sees our weakness.

I thrust the shard into the very top layer of his brain, and I do what no one has ever tried to do. His pupils blow out to all all-encompassing blackness as I cajole the invasion of the most miniscule strands of the matter. The sliver-thick filaments are thinner than an eyebrow, barely more than nothing, and slowly I track down his thoughts. I find his memories, the worn paths of his actions. I draw them out, fishing for everything that made Madlin into Madlin. Then I ruthlessly obliterate each one I find.

Simple.

It’s only brain surgery I tell myself.

When I judge I am done, I pull my mind from his and I take that small TOD darkthing ball from my pocket. I let it roll across my palm.

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