“No. You did this, Kallias.” Bitterness edged his laugh. “You couldn’t keep your hands off her. I was actually happy for you, you know? You could’ve taken your son’s bride and left him the throne. It would’ve been his one day, anyway. Instead, you grew as greedy as the rest of us.”
“Radaan was never mine to claim. The gods granted it.”
I never craved the mantle. At times I wondered about a simpler life, a quiet estate or a farm beyond the capital’s reach. But I hadn’t wished for it. Kingship was my lot. I did not spurn what fate placed on my shoulders.
“And the gods stripped it from you. In the end, they will take everything. Just as they did to me.”
Greaves edged closer, sword shifting between his hands as he measured the distance. One lunge could drag the nobleman back from the ledge.
But I didn’t need him alive. Tallon’s path was clear in my mind. I would scour Radaan of Velli without this man’s breath to guide me.
“I reached for everything and gained nothing,” Bac said. “That shall be your story as well. The king who shielded a generation only to watch it burn under his queen.”
“Dragonfire is purging the rot from Radaan,” Nienna answered, her words cracking like a whip. “Phares’ decay and refuse are burning away. New growth will rise from its ashes.”
He laughed and braced himself against a pillar. Greaves tensed.
“The same flame that cleanses also devours.” Bac sneered. “You will be Radaan’s ruin, Draconis.”
A dragon streaked past the tower, scales flashing blue and green through smoke.
I stepped forward, done with his games. He’d spoken his last words. They weren’t repentant, but repentance wouldn’t have saved him. “Face your death, Bac’phares.”
“I already am.”
He pitched himself off the edge. Greaves lunged and caught only cloth, the fabric tearing from his grasp.
Bac, the mayor of Phares, fell from his tower—choosing his fate instead of meeting his end at the point of my spear.
But he didn’t fall far.
Teeth longer than my forearm punched through his rotund belly. His scream cut short as his torso vanished into a sea-green maw.
Tsunami banked hard and climbed, wings hammering the air. Between her scaled lips, his legs kicked once, twice, then stilled. She crested the tower with a satisfied rumble, blood trailing from her jaws.
A chill traced my spine at the ease of it—as if she’d waited for him.
Smoke swallowed the horizon. No sunset broke through the haze. Below us, entire districts blazed, dragonfire clinging to timber and stone. It would burn until nothing remained.
Smothered below the wind’s howl and dragons’ fury, distant screams marked Phares’ terror. The price they paid for their treason.
My jaw locked, teeth grinding. My anger warred with the sight of my kingdom in flames. Radaan could not be allowed to turn against her king. She would not forsake her gods. I hardened my heart against the inferno, guarding the fragile seed of compassion buried deep within.
Grief would come later.
For now, I watched my kingdom burn.
Her coughing dragged me from sleep.
Nienna curled inward, choking on each breath. I bolted upright and reached for her, turning her toward me to see her face in the low light. She drew in a ragged gasp. Another spasm seized her, shoulders tightening beneath my hands.
Greaves was already moving, but still, I swung my legs over the bedside and snatched the cup of water from him.
“Drink.” I dropped to my knees and slid an arm behind her back, trying to lift her enough to sip.
Her eyes squeezed shut. Air rasped in her throat, thin and strained.
“Greaves!”
