Page 71

Chosen sacrifices

Iryen

The moment my power answered me fully, violently, I knew Adrian was here.

The bond hissed to life like a blade drawn from its sheath, thrumming with his presence, steady and sharp in the chaos clawing through my skull.

He was close. I felt him prowling the edge of the hall, his heartbeat pulsing in time with mine, his emotions slipping through the cracks in our connection like smoke: sharp, conflicted, tainted with guilt.

And then I saw him.

Tall. Unyielding. A predator cloaked in beauty. That dark blue tail, rippling behind him with effortless menace, like he owned every inch of ocean he moved through. Gods help the fool who mistook him for anything but lethal.

Our eyes met, and in that heartbeat, I tasted his guilt. Bitter. Raw. A wound that hadn’t closed. But it wasn’t his to carry. It had never been. I was the one who walked away. I left him behind in a storm I should’ve faced with him. And he came for me.

Adrian stepped into this chaos with blood in his mouth and vengeance in his veins, not just for me, but for what was mine. For my court. For my family. And for the pieces of me, I hadn’t realized I’d scattered behind.

He didn’t hesitate. Didn’t falter. He stood in front of me like a wall of fury, unmovable, relentless. And the monster in me admired him for it. Wanted him for it.

His claim should’ve enraged me.

But gods, the way he snarled at Draven, as if daring the bastard to even breathe wrong, while letting me deliver the finishing blow? It didn’t unnerve me. It thrilled me. Adrian didn’t cage me. He stood beside me and fed the fire .

And for a moment—just a fleeting, cruel breath—he made me forget what I’d lost.

Almost.

“Ronan,” I said, my voice a blade honed on grief and wrath, “chain her to the table.”

It wasn’t a request.

“Yes, my Queen.”

The title landed with a violent crack inside me, part crown, part curse.

It echoed with the ghosts of those who had borne it before me…

and it fit . Oh, how it fits. The throne wasn’t just mine now.

It owed me. This wasn’t justice. This was a correction .

Reclamation . This was me rewriting the story with blood and ice.

Thalor was rotting in whatever void his pathetic manipulation slithered into, and Ithra… Ithra would shatter so beautifully.

But Draven? He would suffer. He would watch as everything he schemed for dissolved into dust, drowned in the very power he tried to possess.

I was the reckoning.

I was the monster they made.

And I’m done asking for permission.

“Adrian,” I murmured, my voice velvet over blades, “would you be a dear and get a chair for this traitorous snake?”

He smiled like sin and violence. “Of course, princess. Anything for you.”

I turned back to Draven, and there he was, still clinging to that arrogant glint, running calculations in those cold, twitching eyes. So sure he could outmaneuver me. Pathetic.

He was already losing.

I could smell it on him—the sweat of desperation masked behind composure.

Too late.

I slipped into his mind like poison through a vein, sinking my claws in with surgical cruelty. I didn’t need full control, just enough to paralyze . Just enough to hurt . He struggled, of course. He always struggled. But I’m done playing fair.

I locked him in place.

The fear in his eyes when his limbs refused to obey. That was the moment I felt alive again.

“You will sit still,” I whispered, every syllable dripping acid, “and watch .”

I stepped closer, slow and deliberate, the promise of agony coiling around me like smoke.

“Watch,” I repeated, “as I return every bruise, every shattered breath, every scar your filthy bloodline carved into my grandmother.”

His pupils dilated. His chest heaved. He wanted to fight. Good.

“And when I’m done with them…” I leaned in, my lips nearly brushing his ear, my voice a whisper carved in frost, “I’ll unmake you, Draven. Tear you down to every worthless molecule. Reduce you to the pile of filth you’ve always been.”

I pulled back, meeting his gaze, eyes wide, chained, helpless.

“No gods. No mercy. Just me.”

His rage quaked through the air, thick and bitter. His muscles strained beneath the pressure of the restrains, trembling like a beast caught in a snare. But the only thing he could manage… was the pathetic clench of his fists.

And, gods, it thrilled me.

That helplessness. That beautiful, delicious futility. It curled inside me like a flame fed on gasoline, and I drank it in with the hunger of a starving soul.

I turned my back on him slowly, purposefully, dismissing him like the pitiful insect he was. Not worth even a second more of my direct attention. Let him seethe. Let him stew in his own impotent rage.

I kneeled beside Elora. Her skin was too pale, her breaths shallow and thin, but she was still breathing. Still alive. The agony must’ve stolen her consciousness, and in some cruel way, I was glad. She deserved peace. Even if only for a moment.

But he would know none.

“You know, Draven,” I said, not bothering to look back, my voice a silk thread wrapped around a dagger, “I’ve waited so long for this.”

I ran a hand gently over Elora’s cheek, a touch soft with fury buried underneath.

“It would be such a waste ,” I continued, letting each word slither, “to rush through it. Don’t you think? After everything you’ve done? After what you did, what your family stole from mine?”

I rose, letting the pleasure of the moment steep through my bones.

“And more importantly,” I said, slowly pivoting toward him, “why deny my court the joy of vengeance? Of watching me avenge their queen and king?”

His jaw twitched. His silence was louder than any scream could have been.

Satisfied, I moved toward Sienna. Her lavender eyes locked on Thalor like twin blades honed in frost, sharp and resolute.

“Can you fight?” I asked her .

“He shoved poison down my throat.” Voice steady despite the frustration beneath it.

“It blocked my powers and severed my connection to the goddess.” Her gaze flicked to Kieran, then back to me.

“I can feel my power humming under my skin, but I can’t access it.

” Her eyes narrowed as she looked at our friend. “I assume they did the same to El.”

“After this is done,” I said, my voice hard as iron, “we’ll see the royal healer. She’ll know how to reverse whatever poison those damned witches brewed for him.”

She nodded.

And I turned my attention to Ithra.

“You poisoned her. Marked her. Despite that, still wasn’t enough for you—you sent your dog to finish the job.”

My words slithered through the chamber, each syllable a lash of barbed steel. They echoed with venom, thick and suffocating. I didn’t raise my voice. It didn’t need to. The weight was far more lethal than any scream.

My hands trembled, not from fear, not from weakness, but from the raw, volcanic rage surging through every vein. It wasn’t just anger. It was grief sharpened into a blade. Wrath honed by loss. All of it— all of it—was ready to explode from the cage of my ribs.

“You contributed to her death,” I snarled, stepping closer to Ithra, each movement slow, deliberate. My fury burned behind my eyes, wild and untamed. “And now, you might as well crawl to Hades and beg for a spot beside the wretched corpses that spawned you.”

She kept her chin raised, some fool’s pride still clinging to her posture, but her body betrayed her. The trembling was subtle, but it was there. Fragile. Weak. The venomous serpent was now reduced to a quivering husk beneath the weight of my gaze.

I slid into her mind like a blade through flesh.

Not forcefully, no, that would’ve been merciful .

I lingered there, whispering promises of terror into the fragile fabric of her sanity. I didn’t need to destroy her mind. Not yet. I needed her to know she was breakable. That I could ruin her with a thought.

I possessed her brain as if it were mine by birthright. Because it was. Every flicker of muscle, every stuttered breath, mine . I could crush her where she stood, reduce her to a breathing corpse, but I didn’t.

The anticipation… gods, the anticipation was sweeter than any scream.

I tasted her fear. Let it melt across my tongue like the finest wine. I savored the tremor in her jaw, the tears that rimmed her lashes but refused to fall. She wasn’t crying yet, but she would. She would .

I pulled back slowly, not because I was done, but because I was enjoying this far too much to rush. Her fear still hung between us like incense, heady and thick. Her mind was a web I could unravel at a whim, and she knew it.

She knew .

She sealed her fate the moment she dared to lay a finger on my grandmother. Now, she would pay for every scream, every bruise, every drop of blood drawn in silence. Justice ? No, this wasn’t justice. This was punishment . This was retribution . And I would be its priestess.

A slow smile spread across my lips. It wasn’t kind. Wasn’t sane. It was a grin stitched from darkness and stitched with vengeance. I was not a savior.

I was not their light. I was the storm that would unmake them.

She was my first offering to Erinys, the goddess who had always lived inside me, clawing her way to the surface. And I would deliver .

Her ragged gasps grew louder. Her sobs stuttered like a rusted cog in a broken machine. She shook like a child caught in winter, and yet, somehow, defiance still sparked in those fading eyes. It was pitiful. A final ember, trying to defy the flood.

Perfect. I wanted Draven to choke on the sound of her agony.

I leaned in, voice glacial. “You had a chance,” I whispered. “But now? You’re nothing but a lesson .”

With a flick of thought, I seized control once more. Ronan released her chains on my unspoken command, and I forced her to stand, marionette strings dragging her upright with sharp jerks and spasms.

Her limbs were no longer hers.