Page 99 of The Jasad Crown (The Scorched Throne #2)

CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

ARIN

T he third gate of Nizahl fell, and through it, history spilled onto the Citadel’s grounds.

The Ruby Hounds were nothing like what Arin had imagined—nothing like the sorry impression the Urabi had conjured in the woods.

Rising on legs high as his shoulders, they loomed taller than the gates they had crushed beneath their powerful paws.

Jagged coats of raw ruby glinted under the waning moonlight.

The soldiers around Arin held firm, but terror saturated the air. No amount of training prepared you for witnessing a horde of legendary beasts barreling toward you.

What training did was keep their swords aloft and unwavering. It meant when Arin raised a hand, he did not have to glance behind him to know the seventy-three men leaning out of every window and roof of the Citadel had angled their bows in preparation.

Dirt kicked into the air as the Hounds pounded across the lawn. A Hound twice as large as the others cleared the fallen gate in a single leap, and Arin finally saw her.

Sultana Vaida leaned forward on the back of her Hound. A silk ivory dress flowed around her lithe figure, slitted on either side of her legs. A large white flower was woven through the thick braid draped over her shoulder.

That was where the similarities to the Vaida Arin knew ended. The skin of her shoulders had been replaced by glittering ruby shards, winding down her arms like scales. They jutted over her shoulders and along her collarbone. Bloodred eyes scoured the Citadel’s field, searching.

When Vaida saw him, Arin dropped his hand.

Arrows whistled across the courtyard. A normal arrow would have snapped on impact, and it was clear Vaida expected as much.

So when they sank into Vaida’s beasts, cleaving through their coats, Arin had the satisfaction of watching her cringe as the Ruby Hounds reared back with an earth-shaking roar.

Another fleet of arrows flew.

Do you think they will be necessary? Vaun’s voice lingered in Arin’s head for the first time since he had executed the guardsman.

He had been the only witness to Arin’s preparations for this battle, and Arin supposed he should be glad the guardsman had kept at least one secret from Rawain.

One last echo of loyalty, ringing longer than Vaun’s life.

In minutes, the Hounds would be upon them. Arin extracted the wooden splint from his pocket and raised it to one of the torches flaming cheerfully against the Citadel’s walls. Soldiers parted around him as he walked forward.

Vaida saw what Arin meant to do seconds before he did it. She shouted, but Arin had already lowered the burning splint to a line of thin white dust nearly invisible between the tall blades of grass.

The flame caught and erupted, racing over the lines Jeru had meticulously drawn. Together, the lines connected to form the sigil of Vaida’s ring.

The fire surrounded the Ruby Hounds, melting through their rubies like butter placed upon a hot pan. Baira’s relic magic turned against the source of its own power.

Arin heard the first dying scream of a Ruby Hound.

The barricade of fire flashed red as Ruby Hounds leapt through the flames.

The minute the paws of the first Hound landed on the other side of the white lines, hundreds of black-and-violet uniforms swarmed toward the flames.

Ruby and steel met, the sound shrieking to the top of the watchful eaves of the Citadel.

A sword smoothly cut through the flank of a Ruby Hound, and though the Hound ripped the soldier’s throat open with a swipe of its paw, the damage was done. The next soldier slashed her sword across the staggering Hound’s chest, and it dropped to its side.

Despite utilizing every blacksmith in the kingdom, Arin had only been able to secure six hundred and seven swords with Baira’s sigil carved into them.

The arrowheads had been faster to make, and they flew through the carnage as Arin walked, finding a home in the sides of the half-melted beasts bursting through the flames.

Vaida appeared through the carnage, the ash of her white flower dusting her braid. Black scorch marks had devoured the bottom of her ivory gown.

Never in any lifetime would Arin purport to understand the Awaleen, but watching Vaida barrel over burning bodies astride a snarling Ruby Hound, Arin had the sense that in a long line of powerful Sultanas, Vaida would have been Baira’s favorite.

The Sultana drew to a stop in front of Arin, her Hound’s nostrils flaring inches from Arin’s sword. She descended from its back, approaching Arin with her hands spread. Rubies studded her knuckles.

“Darling.” The musical cadence of Vaida’s voice had roughed, as though her throat had shed layers since the last time they met. “What a pleasure to see you.”

“I wish I could say the same.” The Mirayah might have used the relic magic from Baira’s ring to produce the Ruby Hounds, but it had exacted its own price from Vaida.

The Sultana approached, and Arin stayed still as she brought her fingers close to his mouth. One of them was not of flesh—a sliver of ruby had pierced through the socket where Vaida’s severed finger had grown.

“What have you done to yourself, Vaida?” Revulsion and dismay joined forces to boil over the peaks of Arin’s control.

“The Mirayah would only extract Baira’s magic from the ring if I gave up what I held most dear,” Vaida said offhandedly. “I fed it my beauty. Oh, don’t look so aghast, Arin. I knew the price when I entered.”

In a strange turn, she appeared thoughtful.

Wistful, even. “The Mirayah could have glutted itself on your beauty. Your frightful, frustrating beauty. If I had been planted among flowers instead of thorns, I might never have known to guard myself against dark and hungry things—not if they had a face like yours. I might have let you consume me whole.”

Another arrow whistled close to Vaida, missing her head by inches. She stepped toward Arin, equal parts ploy and playfulness. An arrow could not find her without finding Arin, too.

Arin gazed into her red-streaked eyes. “Am I a dark and hungry thing?”

“The darkest.” Vaida leaned in, arching her toes to whisper in his ear. “The hungriest.”

Screams rang out as the Ruby Hounds converged on the first of the recruit compounds housed within the Citadel’s acres. Arin did not turn.

“I didn’t think you would be here with the hive of Jasadis marching toward their kingdom.

I spotted a couple of her kitmers on the trade routes—marvelous, isn’t it?

So many of our kingdoms’ storied creatures returning again.

” Vaida patted Arin’s vest, observing Arin with an emotion she almost passed off as worry.

“You know she will kill you if you don’t kill her first.”

Arin’s voice remained cool. “Worried she would come for you next?”

Vaida trilled a laugh. “My dear, I am positively terrified of that girl. The most volatile power is the kind that doesn’t recognize itself, and Essiya of Jasad could crouch over her own corpse without knowing its face. Without realizing she is her own killer.”

A chill went through Arin’s spine.

Around them, Vaida’s Hounds were slowly overrunning Arin’s soldiers. For every dead Hound there were a dozen felled Nizahl soldiers.

“You can still end this, Vaida.”

The rubies glittering in place of the Sultana’s eyes were as haughty as her real ones. “End it? My dear, I am only just beginning.”

Before Arin could react, Vaida stepped back through the flames and disappeared.

For the thousandth time, Arin reminded himself what waited on the other side of this battle.

By now, Jeru would have gathered Ehal and his own horse. They would be fed and rested, prepared to ride straight for Sirauk Bridge as soon as the Citadel was secure. Nuzret Kamel was tomorrow, and Arin would need to ride through the night for any hope of reaching her in time.

Essiya wouldn’t need the fortress if she had Nizahl, and Arin was Nizahl. Commander and Supreme; sword and crown.

I am the weapon of the Malika, and it is her alone I pledge myself to.

Arin pushed his sword through the maw of a Ruby Hound, using both hands to twist through its skull. Around him, Lukubi soldiers wove between the Ruby Hounds to clash against the Nizahl soldiers, their atrocious battle skills bolstered by the beasts at their sides.

If their ranks flagged, if the flames died down, if the Hounds managed to tear through their formation and flood into the towns beyond the Citadel, if he didn’t reach Essiya before the mist fell… the possibilities balanced like a scythe on the back of his neck.

By the time he found Vaida again, blood had molded his sleeves to his arms, and his vest lay in tatters.

Vaida stood on the perimeter of the dying flames, her gaze fixed on the Citadel.

As Arin peeled off his right glove, dropping it to the grass, he wished he had had a chance to understand. Why dedicate her life to violating the accords drafted by her ancestors to prevent this very carnage? What was it about the Citadel—about Nizahl—that Vaida had so desired?

Foolish questions, his father would say. The answer was one and the same.

Power.

What Vaida specialized in was an art even Rawain could never master.

Comfort wrapped in barbed wire. Luxury and decadence dressing a hollow kingdom, consigning its people to a poverty of any genuine pursuit, any true passion.

Gutted by generations of rulers who cared more about presentation than purpose, who suffocated scholarship, led by the whim of the day.

Arin couldn’t deny how masterfully Vaida had turned Lukub into the perfect illusion. No rebellions, no dissent—just quiet disappearances and a Champion striking a bargain for his sister’s life; spies and empty libraries and skinned faces pinned to the inside of the Ivory Palace.