Page 115 of Curse of Darkness
“Where are you going?”
“Somewhere I should have gone years ago.” I take another step, until we’re almost brushing against each other. “Move.”
His jaw clenches. “You’re going after Adaia.”
This all starts and ends with her. If I’d only killed her all those years ago, then Vi wouldn’t have had to suffer so much pain. Amaya wouldn’t flinch when I enter a room. Evernight wouldn’t be watching three fucking armies march toward it.
I wouldn’t have died. I wouldn’t be fighting tooth and nail against this force inside me.
And my father wouldn’t have had the chance to strike Vi down.
“Get out of the way.” Rage burns within me, deep as an underground river. “I won’t ask again.”
Finn crosses his arms over his chest. “You want to move me, then you move me. But know this…. You hurt me, and it might wrench my bond from Vi’s mind. I don’t know what that will do to her right now.”
My fingers curl into a fist. “I’m not going to hurt you. But you swore to serve me—”
“I swore to protect you,” Finn retorts, right in my face. His voice softens. “Even against yourself.”
“What the fuck does that mean?”
“It means—I don’t know who’s talking right now. You. Or that thing inside you. You’ve had ample chance to go after Adaia in the past, but you’ve always pulled back. Because you know that if the two of you go to war—one on one—then the damage would be catastrophic. You’d tear Hawthorne Castle to pieces, obliterate the entire town around it, all of the fae within it—”
“Right now, I’m not sure I see the problem.”
He sets a hand to my chest as I lean into taking another step. “Like I said, I’m not sure which one of you is talking right now. Because that’s not myfriendtalking.”
“You’re defendingAdaia?”
“I’m defending all the fae in Hawthorne Castle, Thiago—”
“Asturians.”
“You’re right.Asturians. Vi’s people. Vi’s friends.”
“If they were her friends, they wouldn’t have let her suffer all those years.”
“Or maybe,” he points out, in a mocking drawl, “they weren’t in a position of power to speak against their queen. You know Adaia. You think she’d have allowed it? You’re a warrior, Thiago. You’re a prince. You’re Darkyn. You haveneverstood in the shoes of the powerless—”
Rage roars through me, obliterating all good sense. What does he know of my life?You want to know what fucking powerless feels like? Try growing up in a hut with dozens of starving children and being forced to use your murderous gifts to hunt for them.I slam him against the wall. “And you have?”
Finn grabs my wrists, his eyes flashing warning. “You’re the one that took the fucking collar off my throat, you prick. You know who I am. You know where I’ve come from. The ability to kill almost anything in my path doesn’t mean that I held power. I’ve been there in the mud and the blood while you fucking kings and queens tore the world apart and crushed us commoners beneath your heels.”
“I wasneverone of those rulers.” That’s not who I wanted to be. When I took the throne, that wasn’t what I wanted to create.
His gaze darkens. “Not to me, maybe. But if you do this, then there’s a little girl sitting in Hawthorne Castle who doesn’t know that the roof is going to come crashing down upon her. There’s a young lad in the training yards with no idea his world is about to be set on fire. There’s a baker in the kitchens, a youth into her first flush of training within the Asturian guards, a fucking farmer on his way to market….Noneof them deserve this. If you do this, Thiago, then you are no better than Adaia.”
A frigid tremor runs down my spine. He’s wrong. I’m nothing like that bitch. But I push away from him, breathing out a half sob. “My wife nearlydied.”
Finn cups the back of my neck, drawing me against him so our foreheads touch. “You listen to me…, you are my best friend—my brother by choice—my prince. I would diefor you. I have always believed in you, in what you fought for. But not this. The Thiago I knew wouldn’t take this step.”
And there it is.
The crux of the problem.
“The Thiago you knew died back at the Black Keep.”
I can end this.
