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“What happened?” The entire party was seated. None of them looked to be in distress. Not that a skeleton can look distressed. But someone had either killed them while they sat there or rearranged them after.
My stomach flipped.
Usually grim scenes didn’t have an impact on me but this was more than I was used to.
“They crossed her,” Justine said.
“So she invited them here to her creepy dungeon and they accepted?” I asked, skeptical.
“This was their lair,” Justine said. “If you continue down that hallway behind us, you’ll find the coffin chamber and rooms full of things that would make your toes curl.”
“Like demon princesses?” I asked.
“No, she’s in the dungeon,” Justine said.
I grabbed her upper arms. “She’s here? Clara?”
Justine nodded and shrugged away from my grip. “She’s here and she’s safe. For now. She’s part of all of this.”
“Explain.”
“You mentioned Marcella’s mate,” Justine said.
“Don’t tell me.” I took a breath, bracing for what was coming. “Are you saying Clara and Marcella?”
Justine nodded.
“What happened?” I asked.
“Clara was promised to the leader of the Knights but when she met Marcella, it was instant chemistry. They both felt the bond. Clara wanted to ignore it, to go through with the political marriage. She wanted to honor her promise. Marcella couldn’t stand the thought of her mate with anyone else.” Justine looked down and I could tell she was struggling to collect herself.
How hard must that have been for her? Justine made it sound like she wasn’t happy with the choices Marcella had made for a long time, but she had loved her enough to give up her humanity. She might not have been turned to a vampire, but a magically immortal human wasn’t the same thing as a normal human.
“She didn’t kill them for power.” It seemed insane that the whole thing was for love. Well, a bond at least. I wasn’t sure the queen was capable of love from what I’ve heard.
“She killed them for spite,” Marcella said. “After they were killed, I found out that the leader of the Knights agreed to forgo the marriage. She didn’t have to do it.”
“What about her maker? I heard they killed Marcella’s maker.” It was the excuse we’d been given and I had to guess it was what vampires who knew about the Knights were told.
“I killed her maker,” Justine said. “A hundred years ago.”
“What?” Vampire politics was far too much. I thought humans were complicated.
“She told me that if I loved her, I’d end her bond with her maker. Set her free. So I did.”
I didn’t know all the details, but I knew that vampires had some level of control over their progeny but I didn’t know the details. Vampires didn’t like others to know too much. I also knew they couldn’t kill their makers. I thought that might have been a rumor, but after this story, it seemed like it was accurate.
“What does any of this have to do with Clara or the stone?” I asked.
“Clara refused to be with Marcella once she found out what happened,” Justine said.
“And the stone?” I prompted.
“Clara is a shifter,” Justine said. “Compulsion didn’t work. The stone did.”
“All of this is an attempt to control a mate who rejected her?” I was stunned. “Why bother with the other shifters? With me? With any of it?”
“Because Marcella wants two things in life. She wants Clara and she wants power. With that stone, she thinks she can get both.”
