Page 180 of Feed Your Fiends

“I didn’t know who you really were when I advocated for you to ascend the throne,” I say, beginning my speech to our new king. “My brother. I wish I’d known sooner, but then again, I don’t. I think, if you were always my blood, I would’ve loved you, tolerated you, but as my friend, I chose to love you.”

Hale’s eyes glimmer.

“Beautiful,” Bae mutters.

“Bold,” Zedd agrees.

“Bedazzling,” Etienne adds.

“I chose to keep you in my life and at my side. Even knowing I have no choice now, I’d still choose you a million times over,” I say, and Hale’s smile broadens.

And I hate you all,I think as I turn to the crowd.

“Hail King Hale,” I say, lifting my goblet, and everyone follows suit.

‘Hail King Hale!’

‘Hail King Hale!’

‘What’s wrong, dovey?”

She looks from the cup up to me in that beautiful way, the whites at the bottom of those perfect green irises exposed.

“It looks like…” she trails

“Blood?” I smile. “It’s just juice. Right, Zedd?”

Zedd grins wider. “Just juice. Right.”

She looks like she’s about to vomit.

“You trust me, don’t you?”

“Unfortunately.” She nods.

“So drink your drink, baby.”

She hesitates, then tosses it back. “It’s cranberry.”

I kiss her. “Of course it is.”

But it doesn’t take long.

The first scream is sharp, piercing, followed by guttural grunts and panic-laced squeals. Then comes the splashes as goblets are dropped. They rattle off tables and across the tiles, where they shatter. Blood-red liquid soaks everything as it spills over the edges of cups, drips, spews from stained lips, and stains everything and everyone in its path.

‘It burns!’

‘It fucking burns!’

Then comes the babyish cries and whimpers. Glass shatters as people fight over water glasses, desperate to get the liquid off their skin. It hadn’t touched their throats. The dribble glasses made that nearly impossible. I want them burnt, stained, not in the hospital. How could I torture them regularly from there?

“Someone made my baby bleed,” I say, the words laced with venom, slipping across the hall like an icy embrace as the cries pause. “They’re hiding amongst us, and until I find out who, everyone bleeds. Everyone suffers.”

I watch their wild, wide eyes search each other for a clue, but they know it’s too late. We’reallplaying now, and this isn’t just some petty game. It’s war.

“What the fuck is this?” Rin hisses. She’s bent double, afraid to touch her dripping chin with her bare fingers. Instead, she grabs the table’s runner and pats at her sensitive skin.

“A food-grade acid,” Zedd says calmly. “Nothing fatal, even if you managed to ingest a drop. The colour will fade over a few days.”

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