Page 32 of The Shard and the Serpent (Shard Daughters #1)

Consequences

Rayze

Present Day

I lean forward, elbows on my knees, legs spread wide against the cold metal chair. I watch the drip of blood against the dungeon floor. Steady. Hypnotic. Chains rattle with every twitch of muscle, every strangled cry behind the gag.

It’s music to my ears.

“Screaming won’t save your city,” I mutter, pulling a knife from my ankle sheath.

I flick it toward my prey with bored precision, and it thunks into the mess of steel already embedded in his gut.

The Serpent jerks. Moans.

I stand, my trench sweeping the floor as I circle Russell Ivor.

I inhale deep. Hold. Then exhale through my teeth as I summon my magic.

It swells in my veins, starlight breaking across my knuckles, and lightning strikes hard above Underground Palace.

The weapons along the back wall rattle, my vision flickering between Fate and mortality.

Threads shimmer in and out of sight, writhing around his throat.

I find the loose ones, the weak ones—“ Stop. Breathing .”— and pull.

He chokes.

I smile. Barely. This was more fun when I wasn’t worried about his Godsdamn son.

I move behind Russell, fingers twitching with starlight. The threads at his throat pulse against my magic like a heartbeat, erratic and bleeding.

Fucking gorgeous.

“You ever wonder,” I murmur, tracing one glowing fingertip just above the base of his skull, “what part of you gave Warrick the good? The defiance. The teeth. The ache to be something more. Not that he uses it much, the coward, but he does have it.” I shrug. “He just needs a little push .”

The Serpent’s eyes go unfocused from a lack of oxygen, and I click my tongue. I unwind some of the knots closing his throat, and he heaves into the gag.

“It definitely wasn’t your heart you gave him,” I say. “You don’t have one. Not your hands, either. You use them to bleed the innocent.” I press my palm to the back of his head. “But your fear—oh, your fear , little snake.”

I dip my smile to his ear. “Maybe all your crawling will make him stand.”

A spasm rocks his shoulders. Threads flare in warning, but I ignore them.

“Time for another game, Serpent,” I whisper. “As always, forget this room. This chair. These blades. Forget magic. Forget me. Forget your mind .”

He thrashes harder, but my magic knots tight.

“Return to Synlon thinking you still have power. That your son’s still yours. That I was never here.”

I grasp his chin and force his gaze toward the mirror on the opposite wall.

The glass shimmers, then plays the memories again. Screaming. Begging. Bodies crumpling in a loop of slaughter.

His gaze locks with mine in the reflection, both of us framed in blood and ghosts.

“You’ll forget this room,” I whisper. “But never that echo in your gut, the one that keeps you up at night, torturing you relentlessly through every miserable second of your life. That’s me .”

His body jerks as the memory replays—again. Again. Again. He can’t look away. He never will.

“You won’t trust anyone,” I continue, voice flat. “Not even yourself.”

Threads cinch, and his mind caves.

My shoulders slump with his submission, my magic pouring into his skull. Then the air shifts.

I still as the Bond howls awake. I snap my gaze to the mirrors. Most still obey my command.

Except one.

Finally .

I pivot my focus to the next mirror. “Come,” I command, and my magic reaches out.

A flash of silver and a weight fills my palm. Gently, I slide the forged scissors into my pocket before I release The Serpent’s chains and gag, ignoring his foul curses.

Grabbing the back of his neck, I plunge us through the third mirror, the penthouse of The Dredge waiting. We rip through the portal, The Serpent dazed as I shove him toward his bed, my boots crunching across shattered glass. Weapons unsheathe at my back, but I’m ready for them.

“You. Saw. Nothing,” I order, my power curling over the threads of three lower level cronies standing guard.

They turn their backs, ignoring my presence. Outside the windows, thunder roars across Synlon.

Russell curls into a fetal position, his arms locking around his shins as he sputters between snot and tears, his eyes staring at nothing and everything.

“Until next time,” I hiss against his ear.

Then I kick glass aside, rain hailing against the outer balcony, and dive back through the portal. I land in the dungeon, sealing my access to The Dredge shut.

Straightening my trench and tucking my hair behind my ears, I turn my attention to where the Bond tugs incessantly.

The first mirror. The one that disobeyed .

Warrick stands among Nowhere, the plane between realms stretching beyond the mirror.

A plane only accessible to those with magic.

My heart pounds as I take him in—the dark circles under his eyes, the tears in his clothes, the way he sees me.

He crashes through the dark, that stunning steel-blue gaze locking with mine, the relief on his face tunneling toward vile, wonderful rage.

I hum and lift a hand, wiggling my fingers in a small wave of hello.

Warrick

A dense fog brushes over my shoulders as I pass through it. My legs shake, but I don’t stop. I run and run, the Bond clawing through me as I crash through the dark. I can’t think straight at the sight of her, anger and grief and— fuck, I’m so hard .

Rayze, Hallie, Mine stands unbothered by the blood streaking her face and palms. She waves at me.

Fucking waves. I can’t make out the room she’s in, just the rack of weapons glinting on the wall at her back.

She moves her hand to her nose, wiping away red leaking from it.

The rest covering her doesn’t appear to be hers, but it does little to relieve me.

My veins burn. My lungs squeeze. My cock jerks.

I’m close. So fucking—

The Bond shivers with dark satisfaction as I slam through a mirror.

It shatters around me, darkness and stars ripping past with shards of glass, and I fall against hard stone with a grunt, my cheek cracking against the floor.

I lift onto my palms, eyes wild as I stare at white sparks shivering over my knuckles in between blinks. They disappear, but they were definitely there.

Then a hand fists the back of my jacket and hauls me up.

“Took you long enough. I was beginning to think you let Nowhere swallow you,” Rayze says, her voice everything I’ve wanted to hear and Hallie’s voice . Older but her. I don’t know how I didn’t notice it before. The little dips in her voice that were so uniquely Hal.

I grab her face. “You’re real.” I slide my thumbs through the mess of blood on her cheeks, my gaze flicking over her and then toward two metal chairs facing each other in the center of— Is this a dungeon?

I don’t care.

“Hallie,” I breathe, tugging her mouth toward mine.

But she rips back and crunches her forehead into my nose.

“Motherfucker.” I cover my face and stumble back, her glare burning into me.

“Don’t call me that. Hallie is dead.” Rayze prowls after me. Those eyes. That mouth. Her rage . For blood. For games. The bow and arrows.

My fucking arrows.

They’ve been reinforced, but their Serpent crests along the shafts are chipped from age.

“You’re alive,” I croak and drop my hands, pain radiating from my nose.

“Is that what you call this?” she bites out, and gestures to the dungeon. “Life?”

“You’re alive ,” I say again, the full force of the realization overtaking me. “You’ve been alive all these years, and you never once thought to tell me? To tell Ruel?”

I choke, the Bond pounding forward.

Rayze wavers, trying to withstand the pull, too.

“You killed my mother in front of me. Called her a bitch as she drew her last breath. Ruel—” Her jaw clenches, and she glances away. “A necessary sacrifice. If he knew the truth, he’d understand why I’ve hidden myself.”

She rakes in a shallow breath, a deep blush fanning across her chest. “Dammit,” she mutters.

“I know,” I answer. “I need to touch you.”

She points at me, shaking her head and taking several steps back. “This is a fight. We’re fighting .”

“I killed your mother because they were going to rig her,” I spit. “The Serpent and The Kraken wanted to sell her half-dead to be fucked simply because a Boss’s Heir once resided in her womb.”

Her eyes narrow. “I know.”

“Oh, you know.” I throw my hands up. “Well, that’s just great, angel. Really fucking wonderful. If you know I only did what had to be done, then please, will you enlighten me as to why you fucked me and locked me in a Godsdamn temple ?”

She bats her lashes. “Aw, is the snake mad there are consequences to leading children to the slaughter?”

“I wanted to tell Ruel,” I insist. “I couldn’t. I would’ve been killed.”

“Ah,” she mutters and presses a hand over her heart. “What a man. Choosing himself over the lives of small girls.”

“ I was sixteen, Hallie. ”

“Rayze!” she shouts. “My name is Rayze.”

“Hallie, Rayze, angel—it doesn’t matter. We’re still Bonded, I still hate my father, and for fuck’s sake, vicious, you could’ve just asked me to help you take him down. In fact, I thought I was helping you after our agreement in the stables,” I shout back. “Now will you fucking kiss me hello?”

She stares at me a long moment, her lips rolling together as her fingers curl into tight fists. Her chest heaves. Then she throws her head back—and screams .

Sparks flare off her knuckles, and cracks sprout across the mirrors. Somewhere above, lightning strikes, thunder vibrating beneath my boots.

Oh fuck, my woman is scary.

“Rayze,” I say cautiously.

She strides to that damn wall of weapons.

“Baby, we can talk this out.”

She snatches a dagger.

“Ray—”

And chucks it at my face.

I drop into a low crouch. “ Angel .”

“Fuck you,” she screams. “Fuck you and your fucking ego and the—”

Sharp steel slices.

“—fucking Bond and your inability to—”

A scalpel cuts into my bicep.

“Shut—”

A knife nicks my hip. Chains whack into my stomach.

“—the fuck—”

Metal berates me, one after another.

“ UP ,” Rayze growls, the weapons wall empty—thank fuck. “Shut up, Warrick. Sit down and fucking listen.”

I study her, but her glare holds. I swear on every God that it’s burning me, and how should I know if she can’t burn me with her eyes? I pat my cheeks to make sure.

“What are you doing?” she spits.

I clear my throat and straighten, jutting my chin toward one of the metal chairs. “I think the better question is what you’ve been doing, vicious. Whose blood is that?”

Her eyes dart to the chair, and a dark grin creeps over that wicked mouth. “Daddy says hi.”