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The rest of her sentence was cut off as the double doors flew open and slammed against the walls. Queen Fiadh’s mouth snapped shut, and she closed her eyes. A tear rolled down her bronzed cheek.
Colin strolled into the room, smiling widely as his guards entered behind him. Beneath reddish-brown hair, his hazel gaze met mine. Despite the smile, there was nothing friendly in his expression.
“Wonderful. I was hoping you’d accompany the human,” he said.
Angela gasped, gripping the staff until her knuckles turned translucent, but she didn’t make a move to stop him. She simply hadn’t had enough training to act from instinct yet.
Fuck!
I grabbed Angela’s arm and realm walked us out of there.
Except our feet slammed back onto the same ornate floor, and we pitched forward, catching ourselves just before we fell. I glared at the fae traitor. “What did you do?”
Colin gestured to the walls and ceiling as he stepped toward the queen, stopping at her side. “The smallest amount of iron goes a long way. This room desperately needed a new paint job, and it was such an efficient way of keeping Fee from doing anything she’d regret.” He stroked her cheek with the back of his hand.
Undisguised anger lashed out with his question, and the queen flinched away from his touch in a telling way. He’d hurt her before, recently.
My nostrils flared as I tried to control my outrage. However long it took, he would pay dearly for his poor choices.
“We’ve put the past behind us. Isn’t that right, my dear?” Sliding his arm around Fiadh’s waist, he drew her to him and kissed her tear-streaked cheek.
Her chin jerked up and down, but humiliation and fury blazed from her eyes. He was controlling her movements.
Edric stumbled through the door flailing his arms, pushed from behind by a fae guard. The prince’s mouth was swollen and bleeding, but he wasn’t restrained.
I narrowed my eyes at him. “You betrayed us?”
“I had to,” he snapped, kicking at the guard as he righted himself. He missed and almost went sprawling again. “It was the only way he’d let her go.”
White-hot fury sliced through me, and I clenched my jaw tight. I knew it had been wrong to trust Xavier and a fae, and they’d used our desperation against us.
Terror clawed at my heart, every muscle in my body tensing. Xavier fought beside Veronica now, and she might not know of their betrayal yet. I glanced at the glass wall but saw only dark clouds outside. We were too high to see the battle below.
I slid my thumb over the scythe’s activation switch. I had to get to her, to warn her before it was too late.
Edric glared at Colin, looking every bit the spoiled child not getting his way. “You promised.”
“So I did.” Colin removed his arm from Fiadh’s waist and lifted her hand to his lips. “Goodbye, my love.”
As he let her hand drop, her eyes flicked from Edric to Colin, widening with surprise and hope. Then her face contorted with pain. Dark shadows spread beneath the skin and veins of her hand, expanding up her arms.
“What are you doing?” Edric shouted.
Two guards grabbed his arms before he could run to her aid.
“What I promised. I’m letting her go,” Colin said, watching as she backed away, shaking her head with horror.
The queen dug her nails into her skin, scratching until she bled, ripping at the ink-like magic overtaking her limbs. As the tainted spell worked its way up her neck and face, trickling into and replacing the whites of her eyes, she grabbed at her throat, gasping as if she were choking.
With a final raspy breath, she fell to her knees and collapsed sideways, dead. An oily black substance dripped onto the floor from her mouth, open forever in a silent scream.
Angela covered her mouth with a hand, her shoulders shaking as she sobbed. Edric’s anguished cries and yells echoed through the room, and a deadly chill seeped deep into my bones.
I’d seen a great deal of evil in my day, both before I died and during my years as a grim reaper. I thought I’d seen the worst with Octavia and William.
I was wrong.
27
