Page 50 of Curse of Thorns
“You’re wrong about her,” Rev says, and I close my eyes, soaking those words in. I want this to be right. I want so badly not to have to do what comes next.
Because Rev is wrong about me. He believes in me. He cares for me.
And even though I can’t even comprehend it, he’s forgiven me for an unforgivable act.
The king laughs, throwing his head back, his eyes black as the walls around us. “You think you know her, do you? She’s an opportunist, you fool. Nothing more. She uses her beauty to manipulate. Why else do you think she was in your brother’s room the day she killed him? When he rejected her, she turned on him.”
Rev rolls his eyes. “You have no idea what you’re—"
“No, YOU have no idea,” he screams, and everything hushes, even the phantoms above.
My blood runs cold.
“You don’t know who she is, who she works for.” He prowls forward. “That creature—he doesn’t let go of his pets.”
I pull in a breath. He knows about the Night Bringer.
“He keeps them and continues to force them to his will. And he chooses them well. She’s an evil creature’s minion, and you’rein lovewith her.”
I pull my hand from Rev’s and take a shaky step back. He’s wrong. I’m not working for the Night Bringer anymore. But how did he know?
“Do you know how I found her?” the king asks.
Rev can’t take his eyes off of the man he still calls father, even though he knows better. Is he beginning to believe him? Good.
My stomach sinks, pain washing over me. It’s good if he learns to hate me again. It will make all of this easier.
“After she killed your brother, do you know what she did? Shelaughed.”
I suck in a breath.
“She LAUGHED,” he yells through the hushed room. “Hysterically. Over his cold body. That’s the woman you chose to warm your bed.”
Rev freezes. I can’t see his face, because I’m a damn coward still standing behind him, but his muscles tense, and his father’s face calms, smoothing into a smug look like he knows he got to him. My breath comes out shaky.
“She liked it,” the Luminescent Court king says slowly, calmly. “She enjoyed killing him.”
“No,” Rev breathes. “It’s not true.”
“Ask her.”
Slowly, Rev turns to face me and tears well in my eyes. Because his father is right in a way. I did laugh when I killed Reahgan. Not exactly for the reasons he’s implying. I didn’t relish the death of another fae. I didn’t enjoy killing.
But Rev doesn’t know what his brother was really like.
But even though Reahgan was a dick of the worst kind, even that wasn’t why I’d laughed. No, it was because I’d won.
I was stuck in an impossible situation between giving myself away to permanent slavery to a sadistic ancient beast or killing my mate—the sweet and good-hearted Rev. I found a loophole in the bargain. I broke free of his clutches and saved us both by killing Reahgan, a power-hungry fae who enjoyed causing pain.
He threatened to torture me, implied terrible, sick things he’d do to me before he killed me slowly. And when I used the magic given to me by the Night Bringer to turn the tides back on Reahgan, the weak Shadow Court fae he taunted, I won both battles. I killed Reahgan, my tormentor. And beat the Night Bringer, my would-be master.
And it felt good.
I could tell Rev all of this. I could explain it... and maybe he’d believe me. Maybe it would be enough.
Maybe, just maybe, we’d go back to how things were just moments ago.
But what then?
