Page 272 of The Throne Seeker
Within seconds, Roman was at her side, crushing her into his arms. “Are you alright?” He clasped her face with his hands, searching for wounds.
She nodded… then shook her head as she grappled for him, burrowing her face into his shirt as she dragged him closer.
His chest heaved from his heavy breaths. “What the hell happened? Who is he? Where is Lord Barron?”
“ThatwasLord Barron… Or at least pretending to be. He was a siren, Roman. He was in plain sight this whole time.”
His brows scrunched together. “How?”
“He was a shapeshifter.” She lifted her head off of him, looking at the siren’s lifeless body. “I saw it with my own eyes.”
“You can do that?” His eyes widened.
“No, at least I don’t think so.”
He couldn’t speak to me like you either,Onyx added, looking at the body with curious eyes as he sniffed him.
“Onyx couldn’t speak to him… Sirens must have different abilities,” she said as the realization set in.
Roman cautiously approached the body as he looked it over from head to toe. He lifted his arms and checked his pockets, searching down to his shoes.
He swore. “No talisman. I bet my money he was the one who stole it and hid it.”
She wiped her hair from her brow. “He gave the talisman to someone else, who took off with it. He wasn’t working alone.”
“Then there could be more.” His eyes scoured the woods around them.
She remained fixated on the lifeless body, the siren’s final words echoing in her mind. She couldn’t shake the feeling that, in some way, he had been trying to help her.
Her eyes searched his handsome face, still trying to make sense of it all. It was then that she noticed an unfamiliar mark on his right forearm. Her eyes narrowed as she bent down for a closer look, tilting his heavy, limp arm. A large red scar ran the full length of his forearm, tracing the path of his veins… a bindrune—a beautiful dark mark.
“Come on,” Roman said, taking her by the shoulders and guiding her from the siren to her feet. “We should go.”
Rose wanted to go after the man with the talisman, but she had no idea what direction he’d taken. They could try, but her mother?—
Her eyes flickered with horror. “My mother.”
“She’s fine. She’s with Xavier. But… she’s not good,” Roman said as his bloody eye twitched with guilt.
Rose grabbed the small vial from her pocket like a lifeline. “We have this. This may just be enough to save her.”
Roman’s shoulders slumped in pure relief. “Thanks the gods. We’d better hurry, or Tristan will?—”
The devil himself cut him off.
“Tristan will what?” Tristan dismounted his horse and unsheathed his sword. He glanced at the siren, then at Rose, his eyes widening at the sight of blood smeared across her hands. “Are you hurt?”
“I’m fine.” She brushed herself off like she could wipe away the blood. “It was him, Tristan. Everything. Lord Barron wasn’t Lord Barron. He was a siren. He must have been pretending to be him for who knows how long. He stole the talisman and gave it to someone else he was working with. He’s riding onhorseback, but if you hurry, you could catch him. Cut him off before he can leave the woods.”
Tristan’s face contorted with disbelief, his eyes going back to the siren’s body. “No. No, that’s not possible. Lord Barron was father’s most trusted councilman.”
“It’s true, Tristan,” Roman said. “Look at the clothes he wore, the sword he bears—the high council’s sun emblem. The siren was a shapeshifter and he wasn’t working alone.”
Tristan stared down at the body in shock.
“Now, do you see?” Roman asked. “She isn’t safe here.”
“She’s not going anywhere. If all this is true, she needs to be under constant surveillance,” Tristan said.
