Page 64 of Insurrection
Except when I imagined stripping her bare and devouring every inch of her. But sure,calm.
“But do you know who I never considered?” She offered a tight smile to Runes and Sin. “Both of your houses, and surprisingly, it's not because of your open hatred of me. No, it's because, while you preach about purity, you dirty your hands every day. You are the ones who can’t earn anything fairly, always cheating or scheming your way into positions of power. Just like you did when you became additional houses to this realm. You were never meant to be, and you know it.”
Her eyes flashed to me, and I nodded. The words had an obvious impact, and the entire room seemed to freeze. Then Nico shifted to stare at his parents in confusion. Finias seemed unsurprised, but I could tell Damien, Drayven, and Colt were all startled by this revelation. I had made a promise to my parents to never reveal the truth, but this had been the right time. It proved one of many of the motivations for what they had done.
“Last night,” she breathed out and chuckled humorlessly, “I had thought something was off at the ball. As you know, your sons are reasonable and level-headed men, but last night, everyone’s emotions were heightened and messy because King Marcelo was trying to play all of us. Trying to make all of us look bad.”
The man didn’t deny it, which was essentially a confirmation. In fact, his smile almost made me think he was proud of his actions, and it filled me with a blood lust that had nothing to do with his magic.
“Then,” Ama pointed out, “the greatest cheat of all. The House of Runes tried to have me killed.” She reached up and pulled her dark hair behind her, completely revealing the ugly mottled bruising that showed a clear attempt at strangulation. My mother’s gasp rang in my ears, and I squeezed her shoulder in comfort, keeping my eyes on Ama.
Finias’ father stood, but Ama put up her hand, silencing him. “Clearly, the House of Sin and House of Runes have been working together, and they managed to get me alone, away from everyone else, so that an assassin could attack me in my own bedroom. All because you couldn’t stomach the idea of me winning this vote.”
Finias’ father scoffed, so nonchalant that I was absolutely baffled when he said, “You have no proof of that.”
Why weren’t they freaking out more about this coming to light?
“The assassin was from our house,” Finias countered. With a snarl, his mother grabbed his hair, yanking hard and causing him to grunt. I stood, feeling disgusted at the clear act of abuse and intending to defend Finias, but Ama beat me to it.
She was across the room, throwing Queen Ava off Finias. The woman hit the wall and slid down, offering a careless laugh.
“Do not touch him,” Ama growled. “You abusive fuck head.”
“So what?” King Roarke retorted.
“So what?” Ama hissed.
“You don’t deserve to be alive. You are not natural. You’re sick and disgusting.”
“And how, exactly, did you plan to explain how I had been killed, when your house is known for having assassins? Did you think you would escape suspicion?” Ama demanded, looking furious.
Queen Ava stood and stepped forward, bleeding from the head as she sneered. “No, you foolish girl. We just didn’t care if they suspected us. Do you want to know why?”
“Enlighten me, bitch.”
“Because no one who opposed us was going to leave this room alive in the first place.” The woman’s smile grew wider as King Roarke shouted a command. Suddenly, glass shattered and doors were thrown open.
Fuck.They had planned on killing all of us. We had read the situation entirely wrong, and now we were going to pay for it.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Ama
Ever have one of those moments where everything seems to slow almost to a stop while happening in a blink of an eye? I was there. I was completely in one of those moments.
The sound of glass shattering and doors being thrown open echoed through the room, alongside the screams of some of the people within. I immediately ducked down, feeling glass pelt and bounce off me, my wings defensively shooting out to shield me as my magic roared to life. I could hear shouting around me, and for a split second, I considered dipping out.
It was absolutely a selfish desire, but after everything I'd been through, the urge to flee instead of fighting was a steady pulse. After a moment, though, it was gone, and I snapped my head up when Drayven shouted my name. The panicked outbursts and sudden crashing of chairs as people tried to move away from the edges of the room seemed to fade into the background as I met Drayven's dark gaze, noting the green magic already pulsing in his eyes. The massive Reaper leapt over the table, landing next to me. One large hand wrapped around my waist and tugged me against him as his scythe appeared in the other.
I found myself caught off guard by the tension and quiet, lethal energy running through him. I didn't find many things scary, but Drayven right now was truly terrifying— and that, I found, really turned me on.So not the time, Ama.
"I'm fine," I assured him, keeping my voice firm as I placed a hand on his chest in order to step back. As sexy as I found it, now was absolutely not the time or place for him to go all caveman on my ass and not allow me to fight. We had bigger fish to fry, and by that, I meant absolutely destroying the obvious traitors to the realm who had ordered this attack.
Swarms of Dark Elves, outfitted in all black, surrounded us from all sides, silently stepping over broken glass as they watched us with a quiet intensity. There was an edge in the air, and I could practically hear them waiting for a command from their master like a pack of dogs. Some had daggers in their hands, while others were surrounded by various forms of magic that seemed to pulse and jump from their fingers like dangerous electric storms. All of them had tattooed runes, but I noticed once again that no one had as many as Finias. Thinking back to my tutoring session with Otto, I gathered that this meant Finias was the most powerful of his house.
The full extent of the situation hit me then.Holy shit.The Dark Elves really had betrayed us. Not just me either...literally everyone. I swallowed, feeling completely lost for the first time., My gaze searched the rest of the room, seeking the men who had become so important to me in such a short period of time.
Adrien had pushed his parents behind him, shadows wrapping around them as King Victor kept his arms around Queen Adira, tucking her into his chest protectively. His gaze met mine momentarily, all previous emotion gone and fear and fury now dancing in his icy eyes instead. I wasn't naive enough to think the fear was for himself—I knew it was for his parents, and possibly even for me. The fury though, that one was far more dangerous. It was one that spelled death for everyone in this room.
