Nothing happened.
No magie.
He was a fool to think he’d be able to pull something like this off with so little—
The Souverain’s face melted away like watercolors in the rain. As her smile drooped and eyes faded, a series of letters and numbers took over, followed by his father’s swirled signature at the bottom.
All at once, the winged creatures unfolded and floated down to the crowd. Some landed in the bloody streets, but most were caught by bruised fists.
Nik’s heart twisted with pride.
“This,” he said, “is what Lafontaine plans for the city. A magie-stealing poison.”
Gasps. Curses. Disbelief. Officer, Reste, or rebel, they all turned their suspicious gazes up to the banner.
“Rousseau tried to show you where he’d hidden it.” Nik pointed at their mess. “In the very food he’d promised you.”
Behind them, a building collapsed in a cough of flame and smoke.
“To save the city from people like her!” Lafontaine snarled. “Her ideas and power would destroy us all! She tried to divide us!”
“You divided us when you killed Corinne Rousseau!” Nik shot back.
Outrage turned to cries for justice.
Fernand, who held Elara’s trembling body, added, “Souverains, he let you eat your fill because he was willing to let you pay the price, with your magie or your lives.”
Tremblay’s eyes sharpened on Lafontaine. Gabriel remained hidden behind his throne.
“What’s to stop him from using this on anyone who stands in his way?” he added.
Elara seized once more.
The world watched.
Nik jumped from the station and approached the caravan. For once, he didn’t have to fight his way forward. People parted for him, and not out of disgust.
He stroked a tendril of Elara’s hair back from her sweaty gray forehead.
“I used to stare at my mother’s painting, wishing she’d walk right out of the frame and back to me.” Nik glanced up at his father. “I imagined you felt the same.”
Lafontaine said nothing.
Because he knew how thoroughly he’d ruined both their lives.
“Nothing about her death ever made sense,” he continued. “She betrayed the people who needed her most, yet the bomb still went off. People still died.Shedied.”
Nik had tried to bury the truth the winter his father had abandoned him. First with violence, then with alcohol. Finally, he’d covered it in denial so deep it poisoned the rest of his life.
“You killed her,” he said. “Her and everyone else at the Senate that day. To start a war.”
“To bring peace!” Lafontaine hissed.
For all his spitting and rage, he was every bit the broken old man he’d always been. He was a murderer who’d chosen his position over the people who adored him.
It washisfault Nik had grown up without his mother.
It washisfault any of this had started in the first place.
