A smile curved on my lips. “I’d like to see you try.”
Liquid anger pooled in the depths of her unusual eyes. “If you think you’re the only Sealed Pendaran here, you’re mistaken. So is my father. And he taught me well.”
Her father was Sealed?
That stopped me cold. No Sealed Lirien in my lifetime had ever left, except for …
“Wait …”
Ragnall.
I should have heard it sooner—when that Viori bastard had called out Seren’s family. The last name wasn’t uncommon but now the pieces clicked.
A slick feeling of disgust coiled through my gut.
Smite me. No. Of all the people to find me in the Dreadwood.
Her skill in fighting me when the vuk had attacked. The way her sister had brought that carcass back from the forest. Her mother’s beauty—a priestess. It all made too much sense.
“Your father is Brogan Ragnall.”
She stepped back, worry lighting her face. “You’ve heard of him?”
Fierce, visceral hatred shot through me, tightening my chest like a vise. My pulse pounded in my ears, drowning out everything else. Heard of him?
The son of a bitch killed my mother.
And now his daughter was bound to me?
The cruel, laughing twist of fate threatened my temper as cold sweat broke out on my neck. But I’d already shown a lack of restraint earlier that wouldn’t help me here.
I had to be careful with what I said and how much passion I displayed. An ordinary man from Pendara wouldn’t react the way I desired to. Revenge could be so easy.
“The only Sealed child who didn’t cry at a Sealing. Commander of the King’s Royal Guard and the king’s closest adviser in the Sealed Council—until one day, when he murdered the queen and vanished. Yeah. I’ve heard of him. Every Lirien has.”
A flicker of something—uncertainty, perhaps—crossed her face. “He was blamed for murdering the queen, but he was innocent.”
“Innocent men don’t run.”
“And yet, he was innocent. He and my mother both loved Lirien and were prepared to live there forever, despite your kingdom’s oppressive laws. Even if my father hadn’t been falsely accused, my mother gave birth to twins, and my parents had to flee to save them.”
Twins.
The word sent an uneasy ripple down my spine.
I wasn’t superstitious. I barely believed in any of the old gods, let alone Solric—the so-called “most important” surviving god after the others had fallen a millennium ago. Supposedly. Yet there had to be something out there, considering the presence of magic in our world.
But I’d never met twins before. She may as well have said her siblings were unicorns.
The news that Brogan Ragnall had sired twins chilled me. “You do realize that twins are killed for the safety of everyone in Lirien? The prophesies—” I stopped short. Now I sounded like my father.
Wait. Was Tara one of the twins?
And if so, which one was she?
Her eyes flashed with irritation. “Neither my sister nor my brother is evil. They’re not going to resurrect one of the dead gods. Infanticide isn’t a way to stop ridiculous myths.”
“Maybe not the best, but certainly the easiest.”
