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I approved of this threat.
The soldier stared up at him, clearly trembling but with a proud glint in his beady eyes that spoke of an arrogance that likely meant I’d be wearing his blood in several more minutes. His bulbous, misshapen nose sat in the middle of a weathered, pockmarked face that looked like doughy leather.
He’s not going to break, the broken one murmured, rising so close to the surface in my mind now, it was as if he was riding just behind my eyes, on the verge of returning.
I cracked my neck and ground my teeth, fighting him. He was the broken one. He wasn’t strong enough to protect the princess. I needed to stay in control.
Nearby, I caught sight of the furred beast. His eyes went from me to the soldiers and back as if watching both to see what we’d do.
I ignored him. In a contest between us, I had no doubt I would win. The beast would be a fool if he attacked something like me.
Dex stepped closer to the soldier with the round nose. His eyes ran over the man, pausing on the emblem embossed on the breastplate over his heart. “You’re a general in the queen’s forces. Did she send you here?”
The man spat at Dex. The spittle fell far short of him, a pointless gesture, but still I snarled while angry murmurs passed through the giants around me.
Dex didn’t react in the slightest. “Surrender and answer our questions, General, and I swear by the crown and the apple I’ll have these men spare you.”
I did not approve of that.
The general sneered. “I know what you are, stoneskin. You’re no soldier of Aneira. Save your false oaths.”
Dex’s brow arched. “I stood beneath the royal tree and offered my lifeblood to the sword of the king at the start of the Erenlian war. I serve the rightful ruler of Aneira still.”
Contempt twisted the man’s face, but the piss-covered soldier next to him glanced between Dex and the general with growing doubt and confusion in his eyes.
Ah, I understood now. Divide and conquer. Perhaps I did approve of this plan.
Assuming I could still kill the bastards in the end.
“The rightful ruler of Aneira is Queen Melisandre,” the general retorted, “and she will make all you disgusting stoneskins burn for your?—”
He cut off with a strangled gasp as my clawed fingers wrapped around his throat.
“Demon.”
I looked at Dex, incredulous at the interruption. “He offers nothing but insults. I will kill him so the other one may speak.”
“Demon guy’s got a point,” Clay commented.
I grinned. I liked this twin.
“We don’t kill people for insulting us,” his brother replied.
An irritated sound escaped me. I did not like that twin as much.
“Niko is missing,” the annoying twin continued. “What if it turns out we need this guy to find him?”
My fingers tightened on the general’s throat. “We do not need one who offers filth, only one who offers information.”
“Enough,” Dex cut in before the others could respond. “We don’t kill him… yet.”
A rustling sound came from behind us, and I glanced back to see my treluria standing with the vampire king and the redheaded giant. The wound I’d carved on the vampire’s chest glimmered to my eyes, my power laced through it.
But it was irrelevant compared to how my treluria stood with one hand clutched to her middle as if the injury the soldiers had given her still caused pain.
Choking sounds came from the general. His fingers clawed at my own, trying to liberate his throat from my grip.
“Release him,” my treluria said to me.
