Page 77 of Horns of Wicked Ebony (Deathcaller Duet #2)

***

Bloody footprints marred the marble halls of Gyor Palace as the future Kral rushed along them.

Overhead, the barest sliver of a moon stalked him through the windows like a judgmental God, weighing his actions and deeming his worthiness.

For this night would irrevocably alter the course of his life—and the lives of millions around the world.

Pools of ruby thickened as he closed the remaining distance to the royal wing.

The place he’d been birthed, where he’d spent his youngest years, and where now, his fate awaited him.

A tumultuous storm of excitement and dread rushed his steps along.

He had to know what had happened. If their plan had succeeded. If his cousin still lived.

At the choke point of the hall, a dozen Kral’s Guard lay scattered, bent, and broken on the ground. Easing toward them, he studied their forms. Their lifeless eyes stared at nothing. Hope soared in the male’s chest.

As nimbly as he could, he leaped over the puddle, not wanting to stain his shoes.

The door to the Kral’s chambers was cracked, yet no sounds came from within. On tiptoes, the future Kral approached, his heart hammering in his chest. Flattening his palm against the wood, he pressed. It swung inward on silent hinges.

The scene it revealed to him left him rooted in place.

The back of a tattooed head greeted him, broad shoulders heaving beneath fitted metal armor.

He didn’t tremble, didn’t weep. Merely stood like the eye of a storm, rage and fury twisting around him.

At his cousin’s side, a longsword dripped garnet onto the ground.

His other hand, though, boasted a spiked glove, bits of gore decorating the tips of it.

Bile rose in the male’s throat, and he pressed his lips together to seal it inside him.

Because that wasn’t the worst of the scene.

Beyond his cousin, three more bodies lay crumpled—if they could still be called that.

Heads removed from their place atop necks.

Fingers twisted at unnatural angles. Bones fractured out of the skin that should have held them inside.

The scene was carnage beyond anything he’d witnessed during his time at the military academy with his cousin.

Yet one corpse bore the signs of a special type of cruelty—his cousin’s father.

Missing an eye entirely, jaw hanging open, spine permanently torqued, he wondered at what point his uncle had finally died.

The sheer brutality of his murder sent an icy chill through his veins.

He knew his cousin had a temper. Fates, he knew that he was the most lethal killer in all of Keleti, if not all of Ravasz.

But this, this was beyond excessive. This went beyond vengeance.

For the first time, he feared his cousin. Feared his prowess. Feared his anger.

Despite his rising nausea, he seared the scene into his memory. The blood. The gore. The twisted bodies. The heaving of his cousin’s chest. The blade with the skull in the pommel, reflecting his terror back to him through rivulets of ruby.

Because deep down, he knew that Rokath had far more power than he did—than he ever would. His future was a glass throne. One misstep, one moment of angering his cousin, and it would shatter beneath him.

Tentatively, he stepped deeper into the room, regarding his cousin with more than a hint of wariness.

Only then did Rokath tilt his head over his shoulder and acknowledge his presence.

Burgundy eyes burned with hatred still, even after their tormentors lay dead at his feet.

The darkness in them sent a shiver down his spine.

Yes, his cousin was someone to fear. His cousin was a potential threat. The moonlight caught on a fractured mirror, reflecting back to him an undeniable truth: his own blood was merely waiting to be spilled.

He swallowed hard and met his cousin’s gaze. Then, in his deep, gravelly tone, Rokath spoke the words he’d been dying to hear for decades.

“Congratulations, Xannirin,” he rasped, his voice like gravel. “You’re now the Kral of all the Demons.”