Page 16 of A Crown of Tears and Treason
Barely a knick. Evie had hesitated to kill him and had seemed terrified when I had. Her lithe body had shivered and her neck had gone taut in a shade of red that would have been delightful in less gruesome circumstances.
I didn’t regret ridding Malhaven of Fabrian’s greed. He’d sealed his fate long before Evie had returned, since he’d sunk three fishing vessels belonging to Blood Brotherhood civilians, off the Coast of the Unforgiven, while he’d been smuggling weapons. I always protected and avenged my own people.
“She was a distraction and we all know it,” Ryker, my second-in-command, said. They called him The Shadow. In this room, he was the Blood Brotherhood’s Commander, the best assassin in the history of Malhaven.
“She was bait,” I said. “The perfect lure, set by someone bold enough to deceive Fabrian and risk our wrath.”
“Whoever attacked the wedding didn’t want any of us getting out alive,” Calyx said. “It’s a miracle we survived.”
I hummed low in my throat. “It’s not a miracle.”
Calyx shook his head. “We were all there to see that cloud of arrows take down hundreds, right?”
“Soryn?” I said.
“Statistically, with our training, weapons, armor, and sheer numbers, at least two of us could have walked off that island alive and taken the reins of the Blood Brotherhood Elite until the crisis passed,” Soryn said. He’d always been better at explaining minutia. “Though the attackers might have been optimistic beyond common sense.”
“Or they had specific targets in mind,” I said.
I’d suspected a Protectorate trap since I’d gotten the anonymous letter informing me of Evie’s reappearance, the same one which had also been received by the Council’smagistrates, who were adamant that blasted arranged marriage contract needed to be upheld. The information hadn’t reached us out of the goodness of someone’s heart.
Only the gods knew mercy, not the Clans.
Not acting would have brought the wrath of the Council on my Clan and my parents, who’d signed it back when I’d been a babe. Contracts were more sacred than gods to the magistrates, and they demanded retribution in blood.
Usually. Now they’d crafted a more cunning punishment for us and the Protectorate after what had happened at the wedding.
Alaric Vegheara, leader of the Protectorate, had been killed. Poisoned dagger straight to the heart, blood turning green from the toxin that had laced the blade.
The Council and Protectorate blamed my Clan. As if I would ever risk the Blood Brotherhood on such a sloppy assassination.
“Does The Huntress know?” Soryn asked, looking at Ryker.
“Not yet,” he said in that unflinching way of his. He was pissed. I would have been too if I’d have to be the one to tell Allegra her father had been murdered.
“Do you think she’ll try to decapitate you before or after you deliver the news?” Calyx asked. “She looked ready to do it at the wedding, before you’d even met.”
Ryker slashed him an unforgiving look that would have terrified any other living man. “I think she’ll be more interested in who tampered with their precious Protectorate magic.”
“It’s unheard of. Which means we’re dealing with a powerful opponent. To find outwhoattacked all of us–” All eyes in the room swiveled toward me, waiting. As the de facto leader of my Clan, I felt all the responsibility crowding on my shoulders. I usually welcomed it. Enjoyed it, even. Not today. “We need to discoverhowthe Protectorate wards failed.”
Nobody said a word. Nobody knew.
The mystery had been haunting me since we’d stepped onto the island. No burns on our skin, no silver tang in the air, no breeze trying to push us back.
Nothing.
Sanctua Sirena had been devoid of all protection. Definitely a trap, but not of Protectorate making.
How. Did. Their. Wards.Fail?
Something was very wrong in the Protectorate, and if I wasn’t careful, whatever blight had taken over them might infect my own Clan.
I fisted my palms. I hated puzzles I couldn’t solve. I should have scorched the entire island and be done with it.
"Until we find out who we’re up against, we don’t trust anyone outside this room," I declared. My Brothers and Sister nodded.
“What about the Lost Daughter?” Ryker leaned forward. His blond hair, cut short to his scalp, caught the light from the ceremonial chandelier.
