When she’s settled in the saddle, she takes a few breaths to compose herself, and then she looks down at me. “I have wanted no man but you from the moment I laid eyes on you. My heart has not beaten once in my life without whispering your name, but that is not good enough for you. I know what you want. What every Alpha wants. A precious, perfect little Omega who will melt in your arms and take your knot. But I am as good as any Omega, Stesha. EvenyourOmega. In fact, I’m better because I am real, and she is not.”
Minta raises her wings with a pained cry for her rider, and then she takes to the skies, carrying Zenevieve far away from me.
If anyone has noticedthat Zenevieve appeared on the dragongrounds as a hollow-eyed, walking skeleton, they do not say it to me. I go about my duties without conscious thought, until I overhear something a few hours later that pulls me out of my funk.
Shar has been sighted.
I approach a group of dragonriders discussing the matter, and they tell me that a wingrunner landed not long ago at the eyrie and ran to the king and queen with the news. If Shar is in the skies, that could mean Emmeric is out in the open.
Which means I can kill him.
But before I can even mount Nilak, a terrible scream pierces the spring air. A woman’s scream, filled with fear and pain. It emanated from within the castle, and before I can think twice, I’ve turned and am running across the dragon bridge and up into the castle. I know that scream. It was the queen herself.
Inside, everything is in a state of confusion. People are standing in doorways, blocking soldiers who are trying to ascend staircases. At this time of day, the king and queen are usually taking a walk in one of the gardens. I know a quick way there, and I race along a deserted corridor, up one staircase, down another, and burst into the garden.
The scent of blood is all around me. Red droplets spatter the stones, and the queen is lying on the ground in a tumble of blue brocade and petticoats, the front of her bodice soaked in blood. There is a cut across her throat, and more cuts on her arms where she must have held them up to protect herself.
Cherry blossoms float down, only to be drowned in her blood.
Not far away is the king, as dead and bloodied as his mate. The way her body is heaped in front of him… She defended him.Shedefendedhim. Bitter anger floods my veins as I picture the small, frightened Omega protecting the Alpha who should have died saving her life.
Wingrunner Ashton is standing a few feet from the bodies, his face chalk white with horror and disbelief.
I seize him by the shoulders. “What happened?”
“Emmeric. He—he appeared out of nowhere. I meannowhere. He stepped out of an invisible door and attacked the king and queen. She fell first. It was a terrible sight. Then he disappeared again.”
I look up, searching for any sign of Shar, but I doubt the dragon is close if Emmeric used magic to gain entrance to the castle. Soon there are dozens of soldiers in the garden, and I make my way back to the dragongrounds, knowing that when orders come to hunt Emmeric down, I will be the first among them.
When I reach Nilak, I brace my hand on her scales. For Emmeric to kill his father, I can almost understand it. There wasno love lost between the two Alphas. But to kill his mother, a defenseless Omega who only ever loved him, is unfathomable. There is no end to Emmeric’s cruelty. I must make sure that Zenevieve is somewhere safe before I set off to hunt him down…but gods, where is Zenevieve?
I look around for her, hoping that she has returned. I hunt the flare and then the skies for Minta. They’re nowhere in sight, and Emmeric could be anywhere. He could have found them, and Zenevieve is in no state to defend herself from the fallen prince.
Before I can climb atop Nilak and fly off in search of them, Prince Zabriel strides onto the dragongrounds and addresses all the gathering dragonriders, rage and despair burning in his eyes.
“The king and queen have been slaughtered by the man I once called brother. He has taken my whole family from me, and I will not rest until I have his head. Emmeric and Shar have been sighted in the Bodan Mountains. I want every dragonrider, wingrunner, soldier, spellbreaker, all the women of the Flame Temple. fighters, scouts, and healers. We will create an army, the likes of which has not been raised in Lenhale in three hundred years, to battle a mage of formidable power.”
I can’t believe what I’m hearing. The prince is ordering Lenhale’s entire force out of the capital, leaving the people and city without protection as we pursue his parents’ killer. This is surely madness. I should argue with him, but there’s a dull ache in my body that has drained my will to speak. I care not for his revenge right now. I want to know that Zenevieve is safe.
I look toward the snow-covered mountains. If Emmeric is there, then maybe the best chance I have at keeping her safe is pursuing him. I would rather pursue Zenevieve, but I cannot leave and go elsewhere now that Maledin’s heir has given me and every other soldier in the dragon army an order.
I will just trust for now that Zenevieve did not fly into the mountains as well, as it was never somewhere she liked to go.
We’re ordered to mount up, and Sundra calls out to Zabriel by his title of prince.
“I am not Prince Zabriel,” Zabriel shouts, staring hard at all of us. “My brother stole that name from me when he murdered my father. Until I am crowned, I am Commander Zabriel, and we are at war.”
Wingrunner scouts lead us into the Bodan Mountains. As we are flying, I hunt among the dragons in the sky for any sign of Zenevieve and Minta. When she returns to Lenhale, she will hopefully not pursue us. She’s too weak to go into battle. No doubt she and Minta took a short flight around the countryside and are already safely back at the dragongrounds.
Please let them be safely back at the dragongrounds.
Our flight through the mountains proves fruitless, and Zabriel signals for us all to land on the shallow slope of a mountain pass. I keep my distance, watching him pace back and forth, resenting his futile anger and his useless father. Hating them. Hating myself. What are Alphas good for if we can’t protect those who look to us for protection and guidance? We are all fools with tempers and knots.
A figure appears on a rock above us. The sun is behind him, but I can see that he is tall and strong, and he wears his hair long. There’s a flash of black dragon wings behind him.
I open my mouth to shout a warning to the others, but he lifts a hand, and I can no longer speak. The world grows blindingly bright, and I feel myself sinking down, down into the earth.
The last thing I see before everything fades into darkness is Prince Emmeric walking among us, searching for someone.
