Page 113 of Princess Redeemed

For one heartbeat, my magic quakes.

He feels it.Smiles wider.

But I recover and twist the tendrils of magic harder.Just enough to make him gasp.

“I’m not her,” I whisper.“And if ending you costs me my mother, so be it.”

I tighten the pressure again.

And this time, I don’t let go.

68

As the pressure builds,fear finally creeps into Richard’s eyes.A low, pathetic whimper escapes from his mouth.It’s a sound so unlike anything he’s ever made before, it almost takes me aback.

But I don’t let up.

“Say it,” I command, my voice cold.

“Say what?”he chokes out.

“You know what.Say you’re sorry.Not just for what you did to Larissa and me, but for everything.Your subjects hate you, you know.They want this to happen.”

He gags on his words.“I...”He gasps for air again.“I’m...sorry.”

Liar.

He’s not sorry.Not really.But that doesn’t matter now.

Beneath me, he writhes and squirms, his form flickering in the air like a dying candle.The proud demon king is reduced to nothing more than a battered shell of his former self, held up by my will alone.

“I don’t believe you,” I spit back.

I tighten the magic around him further, a smile curling over my lips.

The thought of killing the demon king…

The man who cost me my mother?

Tighter…

Tighter…

Tighter still…

I have him.

Pinned, helpless, broken beneath the weight of my magic.I twitch my fingers, and the force around his throat intensifies.His eyes are bloodshot, lips cracked, but he still smirks at me like he hasn’t already lost.

“I knew you didn’t have it in you,” he rasps.“You’re just like your mother.Soft.Sentimental.”

Wrong.

I lean in closer, my voice like ice.“I’m nothing like her.”

The air hums around me, my magic straining at the edges.One final push, and his spine will snap like a twig.One flick of my wrist, and the demon king will be nothing but a bloodstain on the ground.

But then the atmosphere shifts, sudden and suffocating.The magic around me thins.Pulls.Recoils.