Page 99 of Revealing Fate

“I take it back,” she rasped, voice breaking. “I don’t want the truth. I want for you to be a thief, and me to be a liar.”

There was such sadness in Kal’s face that Felíne couldn’t bear to look at him. “So do I, Kitty. So do I.”

Chapter 36

SNARE

DOMITAN DESCENDED INTO THE STRONGHOLD’S bowels with vengeance upon his brow.

Meridia Albright Kaine. The last Bladesinger of Ilistaar. That pretentious bitch from Brightsea who’d stood as imperiously as a sandstone cliff in his throne room all those years ago with her overprotective husband and his younger brother. The brother whom their Goddess had chosen to serve as the Prima’s prophesied partner.

How in the fuck did a blade of Albright’s find its way into the hands of a petty thief? And shortly thereafter, buried in the eye socket of one of Domitan’s soldiers?

It was an impossible throw.

He remembered that night, standing in the smoking shadow of Brune’s destroyed barn. He recalled Corstow’s trepidation, his own tumultuous rage. The kill had been clean, not a sloppy accident. Not a petty thief. Someone with enough skill to throw that dagger and execute a precise kill. Someone who knew the blade’s design. Knew it would fragment upon entering the skull.

Domitan had destroyed the Albright line. Reclusive Meridia had been Magnus Albright’s only child, and Meridia and Kallen Kaine never produced an heir. The only remaining tie to that family was chained to the stone beneath Domitan’s boots.

Karrick Kaine. The Primordial Male.

The Bladesinger’s legacy, their family’s weapons proficiency, had been a closely guarded secret. No one but a descendant would understand the mechanism of such a blade.

Then again, Corstow had found the records keeper. Who’s to say there weren’t additional documents detailing its make?

But the training. Knowledge of the weapon was one thing. But to wield it?

Domitan stepped into another winding stairwell. The air below him was dank, stale, and unmoving. It suffocated, thick and sluggish. Quite the contrast to his racing thoughts, yet very much in line with the elucidation he sought.

“Your Majesty?”

The guard behind him stalled. Domitan glared, and the soldier paled beneath his helm.

“The slave is this way.” He indicated an adjacent hall.

“Who authorized him to be moved?” Domitan demanded.

“M-mender Vulgren, sire.”

Domitan stalked down the hall. “You can tell Vulgren that I’ll be having words with him when he’s finished pandering to my wife. Lest he wishes to occupy the male’s recently vacated cell himself.”

“Yes, sire. Of course.”

The soldiers guarding the iron gate at the end of the stone hall scurried like roaches to allow the king passage. Domitan stepped over a threshold and into a cramped room no bigger than one of his servants’ closets. It was extravagant compared to the cell in which the man before him had recently been interred.

Karrick Kaine sat before the King of Asteros with enough murderous hatred burning in his dark eyes to give Domitan an enticing little thrill.

“You should be on your belly before me, you arrogant pissant.”

The Primordial Male’s gaze blackened further, but his voice remained mild. “I must have accomplished something truly auspicious to be rewarded with your vile company, pretender king.”

Domitan wanted to stuff the peacock’s mouth with something truly vile. But he wasn’t here to trade barbs. He tossed the dagger’s hilt to the floor between them. It landed with a clatter.

The Primordial Male’s gaze fell to the simple hilt, his expression betraying nothing. But he stared a moment too long.

“Gifting me a worthless blade? Come, now, Faelstrom. If you wanted to test my resourcefulness, you should have brought a chamber pot. I should like to teach you what it’s like to be pissed on before I drown you in it.”

Domitan smiled. “I know you recognize the blade, Kaine. Would you like to know where I found it?”