Page 47 of The Sun God’s Prize (Child of Scale and Fire #3)

Why is he here personally? I don’t care to wait for the answer, a fleeting question in my mind, though he plans to answer it while I swing the staff that is my only weapon into position.

We’re surrounded quickly, ten more guards falling in behind us. I need blades, and I am already planning to liberate two from the soldier who holds his with sloppy fear.

“Brother.” Sheelan pushes past me before I can stop her, again with the bold moves and uncaring for her own safety. She’s going to get herself killed at this rate, or me, though she gives me no time to get in front of her again, confronting Theille and his guards, who stare at her in terror.

It’s clear they’re unsure, confused and concerned, while the Sun God reincarnated gestures at his sister with a short, golden sword of his own.

The armor he wears is the same ridiculous design that I fought him in so recently, though it’s even more elaborate now, no doubt more befitting a ruler rather than an heir, at least in his mind.

“Traitor,” he says. “Kill the false child of the Sun and her filthy foreign companions.”

“Here to finish what you started, Theille?” I snarl that at him over his sister’s head. “Killing your own father wasn’t enough for you?”

The guards flinch in surprise. Wait, they don’t know? They’re looking at him with shocked expressions, Theille’s fury at being challenged turning to anxious command.

“I said kill them.” He pushes one of the soldiers by the shoulder, shoving him toward us. “Your God commands you.”

They’re going to do it. I feel their decision before they make it. I can’t defend Sheelan and Aurous from them, though, not alone.

I’m going to do my best to try.

“Stand down.” I recognize the voice, pivoting, looking up.

The black-armored warrior stands on the roof of the shed, and she’s brought her sisters, the members of her dark order melting out of the shadows, surrounding the soldiers.

The gold-clad guards immediately obey, even more terrified now, and I know why.

This is not a good place to find themselves caught.

“Hepha,” Sheelan says in a calm, confident voice as though this was the plan all along.

“Most Divine,” the warrior says, leaping down to the dock to salute her princess. “Forgive my late arrival. I’ve been tracking your journey but only just caught up.” Someone did note our return, then. Of course, she would have.

Theille shakes in rage. “Why are you all just standing there?” He tries to draw his own sword but it’s so long, the tip gets caught in the sheath and he’s spinning in a ridiculous half-circle, trying to free it.

The guards stare at him in open horror now, but when one of them tries to help him, he slaps the man’s hands away.

Theille is panting as he finally jerks the sword loose, leveling the blade that trembles from the weight and his lack of control at his sister. “I’ll finish it myself.”

“My God,” one of the guards gasps, “we’re to return Her Holiness to the temple.”

His fellow guards seem as distraught as he is at this change of plan. Which means Theille lied to them. Has he maintained so little control that he’s been forced to do so? They’re not treating him like their new ruler, but still like their prince. A sudden power shift can do that.

Only then do I note that these guards were not among the archers who watched him murder his father, I’m sure of it. But do they know what really happened, or are the stares they give me accusing as well as afraid?

“You question your God?” Theille spins on the guard who spoke up, slapping him across the face with one golden gauntlet. It’s not a hard blow, but he turns his head on impact, a line of blood appearing on his cheekbone from the metal’s pressure. “Do as I say at once.”

The guard bows his head to him, teeth gritted, fury on his face that Theille doesn’t see when the soldier steps forward. “You murdered our God,” he tells me. And now I know what lie the Sun God’s son told, “and now you will die for it.”

“I did,” I say before any can refute it, before the black-armored warrior can step in, or even Sheelan can speak up.

“I, unarmed and alone, with archers covering me from all angles. I murdered Isthisahaloun.” I look down at myself, then back at her again.

“I appear miraculously unharmed for one who should be threaded through with arrows.”

Theille’s guards still hesitate, and now I know why. They’re questioning it, too. “You slew the archers,” their leader says in a voice filled with doubt.

“All of your archers,” I say. “Without weapons, while stabbing your God in the throat from six seats away.” The man is quivering, scowling, while I shrug. “Yes, a task easily accomplished, don’t you agree?”

“She used magic!” Theille’s accusation isn’t helping him, only making his guards more afraid. I’m ready to attack again when a soft hand touches my shoulder, Aurous holding me still.

While the warrior Hepha stares into my eyes with her dark gaze still. “Kill her, now!”

“Do not,” she says. “For it was Theille who murdered our God in cold blood and tried to take the life of your true heir, Sheelan, the first Sun Goddess.”

They stare at her, no one moving, stunned by this reveal.

When the first guard lowers his weapon, dropping to one knee at Sheelan’s feet, he’s not alone for long, the contingent of guards doing the same automatically, obeying her where they should be following their Sun God’s commands.

They know the truth, then. Already knew it.

Theille’s coup only succeeded without Sheelan to challenge it.

She hasn’t even said a word, and she’s already won. Though her silence has ended.

“My brother is infected with a madness that corrupts him,” Sheelan says, so much sorrow in her voice that I have to fight the impulse to reach for her.

But she is their ruler’s daughter and clearly far more respected than Theille.

I have to give her the chance to let this play out.

“He murdered my mother the day he was born and did the same to our father with a blade he wielded himself.” She’s weeping, I can hear it in her voice, even if I can’t see her face.

“As he would have killed me then and there. Most likely, he had the archers slain so they couldn’t share the truth.

” Her head bows. “Your Sun God is dead by the hand of his heir.”

Hepha speaks next. “You must rule us, Daughter of the Sun.” Her voice throbs with passion that her veil hides from view, her sisters immediately crying out in agreement.

“Lead us, Sun Goddess,” they shout as one.

Theille vibrates in rage so powerful that it’s smothered his ability to speak, this mutiny not at all what he expected.

But his denial is thin and pathetic as he stomps one foot on the dock. “I WEAR THE SUNBURST,” he screams into the dawn. “I AM THE SUN GOD.”

Sheelan’s hands twitch on her skirt, the only sign she makes of her anxiety. Not that she can hide it from me. I feel it through the kinspark. “You came to find me personally,” she says to the guards. “And brought him with you. Didn’t you think that odd?”

If there is any doubt remaining, it’s washed clean by her question. “Against our better judgment,” the guard nods. “And yes, I did. As the story he told of the war queen’s daughter. She is impressive,” he bows his head to me, “but she is not immortal.”

“Theille needs your Goddess dead before she can spread the truth of what he did,” I say, interrupting without apology. “Are you going to allow him to destroy you and finish what he started?”

“Company,” Hepha says, the black-armored warrior’s voice thundering in challenge. “Guard the Sun God. Sisters of the Order of Dominae.” They all salute. “Attend your Goddess.” She takes a single step as she turns, placing herself between Theille and Sheelan.

As her fellow order assassins close in around us, and the guards do the same.

“Divine One,” Hepha says over her shoulder. “Your orders?”

Sheelan doesn’t hesitate. “Seize the murderer.”

They move at last, the guards of the Sun God, stepping in around Theille, now holding him under threat of their weapons.

He’s spluttering, face twisting in hate, when they disarm him, Theille clawing at his own armor as though he’s been possessed by something that’s trying to fight its way out of him.

Which he has. I can finally pity this child, who is no match for the tainted power that drove him to kill his own father. I wonder, if he survives, if he’ll live to regret what he’s done.

The guard commander ignores Theille, turning to salute Sheelan. “Most Divine,” he says, “forgive us our doubt.” My kinspark waves that off. “Allow us the honor of escorting you back to your temple before you have us slain for our misdeeds, as is your right.”

“No one else is dying today,” Sheelan says in a soft, sad voice.

“And I’m not going back. Hepha.” The warrior woman turns to Sheelan, who is already spinning around to look up at me, cheeks free of tears, but an aching sadness in her eyes that I feel clearly through the connection that binds us.

“I can’t kill him.” Is she telling me so?

Or does she mean that for the black-clad assassin?

No. She’s asking my permission to let Theille live. “He’s not my brother,” I say. “He didn’t kill my father.”

She nods, a small motion, before turning back to him. “Where is the Overkingdom Chancellor, Hallick?”

Theille’s still spitting and spluttering, so Hepha speaks for him.

“Fled, Most Divine,” she says.

“And the princesses of the northern lands?” I shouldn’t care about them. They’ve never cared about me. But I feel an odd sort of responsibility for them that’s as ridiculous as it is real. None of them orchestrated a bit of this, only following orders, what they were taught, how they were raised.

“Remain,” Hepha says.

“Send them back to the north,” Sheelan says. “Safe to their families.” She stares at her brother.