Father stood and backed beneath Argos, giving Kalepsi space.
Mother’s hand found mine. Her grip crushed my knuckles, but it wasn’t enough to match the pain splitting me apart when Kallias turned my way.
Love wasn’t easy. It was a horrible, spiteful thing. It shattered kingdoms. Cleaved souls in two. It ripped everything from me. I had nothing else. No power, no future. Just this moment—and the Queen of Dragons.
Those sky-blue eyes saw me—my soul. And he knew.
I couldn’t watch. I was weak. They would kill each other for me, and I would break beneath their fury.
“Rise.” I choked, the word a sob, selfish and small.
But love made monsters of us all.
He smiled. A quiet, terrible grace.
I shuddered with a cry, my tears hitting the cold stone. No, he couldn’t give me permission, couldn’t forgive me for this. I wouldn’t let him. It was a twitch, nothing more.
He moved, pushing to his feet. Blood slicked the floor. He dropped his sword with surrender, a sharp, ringing clang as he turned his back on me, facing Kalepsi.
Greaves howled his torment, thrashing against Ronan and Mikal’s hold. A sound of rage. Despair. Pure, unfiltered heartbreak.
“Purge him in dragonfire.”
And there the King of Radaan stood alone, facing his death.
Kalepsi’s maw opened, spreading wide as sparks sprayed from her throat. Then, in a torrent of blinding heat, a deluge of flame swallowed him whole.
Chapter Fifteen
Kallias
Everything ached, but the sharpest wound came from the torment in Nienna’s eyes. Grief twisted her face. Tears streamed down her cheeks, soaking the front of her dress. Still, she asked this of me.
For her, I would move the sun. I would trade my life for hers. So, I turned to the dark maw stretched wide before me.
And dropped my sword.
For Nienna, I would surrender. She needed my death—asking me to spare her.
I did not fear dragonfire.
A bitter smile tugged at my lips as I watched the dragon’s rough tongue scrape the roof of its mouth, flinging sparks that crackled in the air.
Fluid dripped from the glands at the corners of its jaw, and for one breath, I wondered if it only meant to scare me.
Then the flames came.
I clenched my teeth, shut my eyes. Heat slammed into me, a wave of flame wrapping my limbs. My skin blistered under the lick of scorched fabric.
But death didn’t take me.
The air scalded my lungs when I tried to breathe, the throne room glowing orange behind my eyelids.
When I cracked them open, heat surged up, circling me in a column of light. The purple dragon exhaled fire—tight spirals rising to the cavern ceiling. Within the blaze, silhouettes twisted, draconic and wild.
I smiled, chest swelling with the burn.
Elohios be praised… and Nienna’s dragons.
