Page 11

R.I.O.T

F our lands survived The Tearing; we call them Districts now.

"It's him. The Hero has returned."

The young Queen stands at the palace's threshold, radiant and terrible in her gold. Her crown gleams; a wreath of sharp, glinting metal that seems more like a weapon than an ornament. Her face is a mask of confusion, eyes narrowing as she looks past the crowd, past the shadows, and locks onto me.

The body in my arms shifts slightly as I adjust my grip. I know she smelt it; the coppery tang in the air and the look of dread on her face proves as much before her gaze shifts to the woman in my arms.

I stop just before the step leading up to her castle. Maya stands above me with her imposing stature, and her accusing blue eyes bore into mine.

I gently lay Laila down on the smooth stone path— too gently —and I take a step back.

"What is the meaning of this?" Her voice rings out, sharp and angry.

I don’t answer. My breath mists in the cold air as I take another step back, my boots grinding against the stone path. This wasn't supposed to happen. Not to her.

The gathered onlookers fall silent as I simply stare at the woman lying on the cold ground where I placed her. I met Leila on a hunt a month ago; I saved her from a Nightwalker.

"I warned her. I warned her so many times to leave, to stay away," I say, my voice low, barely more than a growl. "That I'm poison."

There's silence before Maya says, her voice sharp and angry, "What did you do?!"

I growl, the threat clear enough to cause her to step back. For Maya to suggest I murdered my own mate is downright insulting, and I'm fighting the urge to rip her throat out for even voicing such blasphemy.

I told Leila I couldn't love her, and I couldn't be her mate. My beast and I had found our forever, and it wasn't her. It'll never be anyone else. I know. I tried that happy-ever-after shit, and it didn't want me.

It’s fine, because I already found my purpose in life— revenge.

It's unhealthy. It's destructive. It's chaos. But if I cared for the consequences, I wouldn't have enslaved a comet with a butterfly net and thrown her into my fucking dungeon.

But Leila wanted to change me. She underestimated my anger, as everyone seems to do. Leila had hope in us simply because I didn't want to reject her. When really, I didn't reject her because it was painful, and it was cruel.

I hoped she'd return to her home and build a life for herself with someone who could love her, but two days later and a prayer to the Gods, she's in my castle, her bags packed at her feet, and a look of complete and utter shock on her face.

The Gods put her in my castle, and she stayed.

"She hasn't been marked," I reveal, glaring at Maya, "so it's only right that her family buries her."

The silence that follows is suffocating. She takes a step back, a flicker of sadness crossing her face before she smothers it with a Queen's practised poise.

"What happened?" she demands, her voice cracking like a whip.

"A Second-Generation Nightwalker." Her posture stiffens, and for the first time, I see a glimmer of uncertainty in her eyes. "She died trying to save me." She didn't know I didn't need to be saved.

"The one that killed Valadez?" Maya whispers and takes my silence as her answer. Maya grits her teeth, her fingers curling into fists. "Is it dead?"

I debate lying. If she were dead, they wouldn't need to look for her, but perhaps it was a guilty conscience. In the end, Leila was my mate, and she deserved better than me.

"No," I reveal. The Nightwalker is my prisoner, for now. When the times comes to pass judgement, I'll do it without hesitation—for the whole world to watch. "She escaped."

Behind her, the heavy doors to the palace creak open, and another figure emerges.

He is broader and taller as he hurries to the Queen—her General.

His face is shadowed, but I see the lines of his confusion.

His hands rise as if to steady himself before he reaches his Queen's side.

His voice, low and uncertain, breaks the quiet.

"What is this? What's going on?"

The General's face turns to me. The moonlight catches the blood, streaks of it staining my arms and my hands and soaking into my shirt, before his gaze drops to the cold, lifeless body at my feet; all the colour drains from his face.

He steps closer, his movements hesitant and his eyes wide with disbelief.

"No…" His voice cracks, a fragile whisper that seems to fracture the silence. "No, that's not—"

I lower my gaze to Leila. Her face is pale, her blonde hair matted with blood, her fragile frame so incredibly still. I clench my eyes shut and take another step back. My beast whimpers, and a single breath shudders through me. I look up.

"It's her," I say, my voice hollow, "it's your daughter."

The General freezes, the words striking him like a blow. He staggers forward, his knees almost giving out as he stumbles down the steps. His hands tremble, reaching towards the body as if afraid to touch, to confirm what his eyes are telling him.

"N-No," he rasps, shaking his head violently. "This can't… She was with you... She was safe…"

Maya stands motionless, her hands clutched to her chest, her eyes wide but unreadable. Her lips part as if to speak, but no sound comes.

I turn around as memories surface and assault me. Blood. So much fucking blood. Each step down the path feels heavier than the last, the blood on my arms and soaked into my shirt feeling colder, heavier as if the night itself conspired to drag me down.

A scream rips through the silence; a scream so devastating— so fucking familiar —I almost crash to my knees. In that scream, I know this night will haunt him; I know it will shatter him so completely that nothing—no one—will matter.

His world is dead at his feet, and everyone becomes a witness to the devastation as the General screams for his daughter, holds her to his chest, and cradles her close as if she is a newborn baby. His baby.

Reece's words before I left come to mind. 'It isn't your fault, Riot.'

But it is. I invited the Nightwalker into my house—the house that hates Nightwalkers as much as I hate breathing. I was far too busy trying to convince the Gods to let my prisoner stay. I hadn't thought they would throw Eden right into her lap.

Because of my carelessness, Eden is in danger, and Leila is dead.

'I told you, didn't I… You'd regret that.'

I don't usually trap Nightwalkers. They're unpredictable. But trapping the one who killed a King, and now Leila, would mean war. But it's too late to turn back now. I have the Nightwalker in my grasp, and she'll kill Damien—and when she does, I'll kill her .

Lighting a cigar, I inhale and blow the fumes into the sky, closing my eyes like I often do and whisper, "If only I could have loved them, as I loved you."

I tried to chase that feeling. I tried for the sake of my mate. But no matter what I did, or how far I ran to chase happiness, I couldn't forget Her.

She was constantly there, in my head and pulling me back.

I didn't want to leave Her—not again. Despite the pain, regret, anger, and sadness of losing Her, it was Her I wanted to stay beside even when she was gone.

Even when there were women like Leila who chose to stay beside me and love me, I couldn't do the same. I didn't want to do the same.

She was my dream. My happiness.

My everything.

Everything I wanted. Everything I dreamed. It rests wherever she is; it only ever existed because she was supposed to be a part of it.

I stop beyond the gates and glance over my shoulder as Maya pulls the General away from his daughter, and I wonder—does that make me evil? If I loved Leila, she'd be alive, wouldn't she?

As if he can sense my gaze, the General's eyes find mine in the darkness. They shine and glisten with anger—so much anger. Maya releases him and takes a step back as the clouds gather in the sky, thunder grumbling above our heads.

"Wait!" Maya whispers, her voice trembling, "What are you…?"

I stare at the General, not at all surprised at the chaos bleeding from his eyes, promising vengeance, as his eyes focus on me and me alone. "They'll pay for this, Hero!"

I can only watch as he bites into his palm, droplets of his blood falling onto his daughter. "I relinquish my soul to the Gods, and in exchange for their power, I swear on my life… Whoever did this will die."

Lightning strikes, lighting up the night and sealing the General's promise. His blood promise; the most dangerous promise a creature of the night can make.

Nightmare has a new enemy, and from the look in his eyes, she'd do well not to underestimate him—because a scorned father is no one to fuck with.