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“Daisy. Please stand up.”
I look at Orshana and shake my head. They don’t trust me. These monsters think I betrayed the kingdom. She arches an eyebrow and nods in encouragement. Slowly, I push away from the table and stand, noticing how much shorter I am compared to her. I try not to think about everyone else who might be thinking the same thing, who might be realizing how much I don’t fit.
“Daisy fought to keep you safe, did you know that?”
“But my queen, she gave up your—” Lara begins, but Orshana cuts her off.
“Did you know she went directly to the furies herself, knowing how dangerous it might be?”
Lara scowls. “I heard.”
“Then you also heard what my husband, yourking,was willing to sacrifice to save himself.” Orshana’s hand lands on my shoulder. “Daisy fought for this kingdom while you pranced around court happy as a songbird. Daisy protected our monsters. Daisy is the reason we still have a place to call home.” Her voice goes violently soft. “And youwillbow to her.”
“The king—” one of the harpies starts, but Orshana is faster.
“The kingdidn’t give a shit about this kingdom. He would have traded you to save himself.”
The harpies glance at each other.
“It’s true,” Orlena says. “My father didn’t care about anyone but himself.”
“And if not for Daisy,” Oretta chimes in, “your pretty wings would’ve been ripped from your bodies before the vampires bled you dry.” She flashes a vicious smile and takes a sip of her wine.
Orshana places her palms on the table and leans forward. “Now bow before I do worse than what my son threatened.”
Damn, Orshana. I bite back a smile and fight to keep my face as neutral as possible. Lara catches a twitch of a smile and shakes her head in refusal even as her friends dip down into low bows.
“She’s not fit to be queen.”
“Right, well, I’ve had ’bout enough of that,” Harald says seconds before a knife embeds in her thigh.
The screech that emits from Lara matches the pitch of my own scream. She falls to her knees, and I slap my hands to my mouth as blood pours out of the wound. Her friends scramble away, the harpies flapping their wings to carry them half-way across the room and the centaur clopping to the side. The trull hops onto the royal table and marches down it, kicking over goblets on his way. Lagertha is hot on his heels. Together, they’re the world’s tiniest army, and I’m more terrified of the two of them than I was of the furies.
“Sorry, Orshana,” Harald says. “She was yappin’ and insultin’ my queen.”
Orshana gives him a warm smile. “No apologies needed.”
Harald stops before me on the table, and he and his mother bow to me. “Should I flay her?” he asks.
I choke on my own spit as I imagine the demented grin on his face while he rips her skin from her body. Shuddering, I shake my head. “No.”
His eyebrows snap together. “No?”
Clearing my throat, I say it again, this time louder. “No.”
“My knives are freshly sharpened and if those don’t work, I’ve got a spare toenail in my back pocket. Let me at least take an eye.”
“Two. I want one as well,” Lagertha drawls, grinning at a now wide-eyed Lara. “Might make a necklace out of it.”
Trulls.
“NO.” I narrow my eyes on them. “Lara can keep her eyes.” I lift my gaze to meet hers. Her face is scrunched in pain but that hate is still there. “And she can keep her life.”
“My queen is merciful,” Harald mutters, sounding down right put out about that. He vaults off the table and races toward Lara. She yelps as he rips his knife from her leg and sucks in a ragged breath.
“If I had my way, I’d turn ya into a dress for my queen.” He flips the knife into the air and runs up her leg in a flash, pushing off her thigh and landing on her chest in the next instant, dagger in one hand and a fist full of her dress in the other. The tip of the blade stops centimeters from her right eye which she barely manages to pinch shut. “Insult her again.”
“Harald,” I warn.
