Page 130 of Fractured
A gasp somewhere behind me.
My eyes opened a split second before it happened, and I realized I’d gone almost to the dais. I realized both men were still on top of it, except they were no longer a blur.
Instead, the Midnight King with those wide shoulders and that mad look in his wide eyes wasfrozenfor real, a layer of that silvery white magic covering his arms and legs, and the darkness he stood on—his own shadow.
He was looking at Rune who was wounded and bleeding, swinging his arm back with all his strength, his teeth gritted and his focus unwavering.
In Rune’s hand was a dagger. The silver of the blade flashed as it caught light.
Then it buried in the Midnight King’s chest, right in his heart.
At the same second, my legs let go of me.
The room was perfectly silent for a heartbeat. Everything stopped—the whole realm. My heart.
For a moment, I thought it wasmyend, that I’d see my own life flashing before my eyes, but…
Thenthe Midnight King fell.
I was on my knees, unable to move, unable to do anything but watch him hit the stairs of the dais—which was moving again. God, it moved so fast.
The four stairs that had collapsed when the fight began rose in the air, one after the other, as if they were coming from the very floor. When they did, the throne chair rose at the very top. Black, made entirely out of shadows.
Right behind Rune.
The look on his face.
The sound of metal against metal as the soldiers moved.
Every inch of my body was shaking, so I didn’t even bother to try to scream, to try to warn him in case he didn’t see, while the king slid another stair lower, his eyes open and on me.
He was looking atme.
Whispering.
And the soldiers bowed.
I would never forget that moment because of how much I understood. The soldiers were by the dais, not to attack, but to hold up their swords and to kneel and to bow their heads—to Rune.
Because he had won. The throne had accepted its new king. It had offered itself to him.
Just like that throne chair had sprouted from the dais in the Ice Palace in the Frozen Court.
“My king,” said someone—a soldier, perhaps. Perhaps Raja.
My king, they said to Rune, with all that blood on him and all those wounds, and with his eyes on me…
The moment they widened, my heart jumped.
When he called my name, I was already too far gone.
“Nilah, move!”
The entire kingdom must have heard his scream.
His father slid down the last stair of the dais, bleeding, eyes dark and deadly and on me.
The last whisper fell from his lips, and even though I didn’t hear the word, I felt it all the way in my soul.
