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The armory.
I lurched forward—then yelped as a fist grabbed my hair and launched me backward. My spine rammed into a wall, and the toxic scent of brine defiled my senses. A male figure gripped me in a chokehold, and although I could not see him, that unmistakable voice crackled like burned paper.
“Little Royal bitch,” Rhys snarled in my face, his fingers curling around my throat. “Filthy sympathizing whore.” His grip vaulted my head forward and slammed me once more into the facade, my scalp exploding with pain. “I told you this wasn’t over,” the king spat through his teeth. “Did you think I was lying?”
Bandages encased one of his palms, where Poet had stabbed him during the roundtable, though the dressings did nothing to inhibit the king’s movements. With his fingers locked on my windpipe, my thoughts swam. Lightheadedness overwhelmed me, and I gagged for air. Summoning the last vestiges of willpower, I thrashed my body against his, fighting to break free.
“Wanted to end me with flames, then with humiliation? Where’s your lover now, eh? Not here to save his beloved slut?” Rhys taunted. “I warned that heathen jester when he failed the first time. Summer doesn’t submit to fire. We have the power to create or snuff it out.”
“Why?” I croaked. “Why are you … doing this?”
Offense warped the king’s features—right before his palm crashed against my cheek, the impact lashing my head sideways. The tang of blood clotted my tongue, and my temple throbbed.
With each restrained breath, my energy gave, and my arms flopped. And that was when my fingers caught onto a sharp object stashed under the skirt of my gown.
“Prudent Autumn. You should know the answer by now.” Summer mashed me deeper into the wall. “I’m a superior of the Seasons.”
My fingers flitted, bunching up my gown and slipping beneath the hem.
“I will not be overrun by abominations.”
My digits snatched the hidden object from a garter around my thigh.
“I will not be undermined!”
My hand strapped around the hilt.
“This is my continent!”
And with a growl, I swung my arm, stabbing the thorn quill into his right ear. The king howled and staggered back, globs of crimson spurting from the side of his face. He released me so that I stumbled forward, air whooshing from my lips. I hacked, sucking oxygen down my throat while Rhys struck the same wall.
Against the king’s hold, I hadn’t been able to reach the cache of weapons in my hair. Thankfully, my gown had supplied me with additional places to store them. Whirling, I ripped out another quill just as the king bellowed and catapulted my way.
Swinging from his fist, I hurled a thorn at his chest, but the king ducked. I veered in the opposite direction while flinging another projectile, which only grazed his arm on account of the limited light. And before Summer could tackle me once more, I rolled and surged upright on my haunches, dispatching another quill, which rent the air above his head.
Curse him! The king’s silhouette swiped my limbs from under me. I cried out and smacked the ground, my molars clattering. At the last second, the flash of a curved knife appeared from his mantle and aimed for my skull. With a yelp, I flung myself sideways and tumbled, snatching a mahogany chair by the legs and hauling it in front of me like a shield.
Rhys’s knife punctured the seat. As he tore it free, I released the furnishing and scrambled backward like a crab, one hand fumbling for another quill.
The bleeding king charged at me, then skidded in place. He halted as a roaring figure catapulted over my body and landed in front of me. The male silhouette hit the ground on his knees, with one palm braced on the ground and the other clutching a staff in a protective stance.
43
Briar
The jester’s form hunched forward like an alpha guarding his mate. “If you touch her,” Poet growled, “I’ll bleed you out until you’re nothing but a husk.” The last word ended on a feral hiss. “Fucking try me.”
In the meager slash of window light, Rhys hesitated. But then another door flew open, and a team of bodies swarmed the room. I counted, identifying them as the ones who’d almost caught me before.
At their arrival, the king sneered and bolted toward the group. The coward melted into their outlines, guarded by them as they shot in our direction.
With a snarl, Poet sprang at the group. He pounced on them, whisking his staff and adding a surplus of daggers to the clamor. Bodies launched backward as he tore through the mass, and then another large form swooped into the battle while brandishing a pair of broadswords. The jester and knight cleaved through their opponents while I staggered to my feet. Doing my utmost to spot the assailants in this void, I released a thorn quill, the projectile shearing toward a figure who screeched and crashed to the floor.
In moments, the final attacker crashed in a heap. Silence descended, other than the gales of breath sawing through our lungs.
Poet’s outline whirled my way. I felt, more than saw, his eyes crash into mine.
He dropped the staff. I dropped the next quill.
