Page 115 of In the Ravenous Dark
Crisea gasps, covers her mouth with a hand. “But I thought… no.” She just shakes her head, and Bethea seizes her other hand in her own.
Alldan’s violet eyes are locked on the body of his betrothed. “I can’t imagine you did this.”
“I can’t imagine you would suggest such a thing and expect to live for much longer,” I say calmly.
Weapons bristle even more, if that’s possible.
Crisea says, choked with tears, “She didn’t do this, you idiots.”
“Hold.” Tumarq raises a hand, and the weapons lower.
Before anyone can ask, I say, “The king killed her. And I killed the king.”
“Then Delphia will be queen,” Alldan says, and it takes everything I have in me not to killhimright then. He’s so quick to move on to the princess he truly loves, apparently with no care for this one—myprincess. Queen of my heart. Now gone.
“Is it done?” Alldan asks, after receiving only silence. He doesn’t realize how close he came to dying. “Did you destroy the anchor point?”
“Yes, but there’s still one on the other side. Down there.”
“So you need to cross over to destroy it, too.”
“Do I?” I say.
Ivrilos seizes my hand, startling my onlookers and causing a few weapons to jump back into the air. “No, she doesn’t.”
“But those aren’t the terms of her agreement with Skyllea,” Alldan insists. “She destroys the link to the underworld, and we allow her cursed existence to continue.”
Tumarq and Penelope look uncertain, but then Crisea snarls, “FuckSkyllea. That’s something for Thanopolis to decide, and I doubt Delphia would approve.”
I’m surprised and heartened that she came to my defense—as surprised and heartened as I can be, with everything that’s happened and what has to happen.
“She’s too dangerous to exist,” Alldan says, and Tumarq and Penelope look half convinced.
I raise a hand. It’s red. “It’s okay. Thank you, Crisea.Nothanks to you, Alldan. But I’m going down there anyway.”
Ivrilos blinks at me. “No. Let me go alone.”
I shake my head. “You need my help. Besides, you’re all I haveleft.” I take his other hand so we’re facing each other. Suddenly, it’s as if only the two of us are in the room. I don’t care about anyone else, I realize. My family is gone. “I couldn’t bear it if you didn’t come back. If you die for good, I will, too, anyway.”
“The only way to come with me is a stake to your heart,” Ivrilos hisses, “and the only way to get back, even if we succeed, is iftheyremove it.” He tosses his head at the crowd in the entry. “That is, if they don’t decide to just burn your body immediately.”
I shrug. “If these will be our last moments before our final death, I’m going to spend them with you.”
“This is exactly where they want you, Rovan!”
No one really argues. Lydea and Japha would have fought for me—foughtme, and then fought others if they had to, to get me back. But they’re both gone now, and I’m not sure there’s anyone else who would do the same.
I smile. “Dead if I do, dead if I don’t.” The stake rests on the ground next to Kadreus’s pile of dust. I summon it to my hand with my favorite sigil.
I hold it out to Crisea. If there’s anyone I would trust to want to ram a stake into my heart, it’s her. Or maybe Bethea. “I imagine you’d like to do the honors?”
Crisea raises her chin and folds her arms in defiance as she stares me down, tears in her eyes. “You think I’d want to?” she asks. “You asshole.”
I don’t have time to apologize.
Bethea looks at me sadly. She seems like she’s about to say something, but only shakes her head.
“I guess the pleasure’s all mine,” I say.
