House of Pounding Hearts (The Kingdom of Crows #2)(35)

Wiping my eyes on my sodden shirtsleeves, I turn to find another winged legionnaire suspended amongst the raindrops behind us and Tavo’s vessel rocking at the junction between the canal cinching Tarelexo and the narrower one over which we stand.

Phoebus drapes his arm around my shoulders. “Let’s go before we make Diotto’s day by perishing of pneumonia.”

“You’re a pureling, Pheebs. Human diseases cannot touch you.”

As he guides me back down the road, I glimpse the faintest streak of black in the eaves of the sunflower-hued house beside us.

I dart my gaze away before I can draw attention to the darkness. Is someone following us, Lore?

Many people follow you. You gather quite the crowd.

I don’t mean Fae; I mean Crows. Are you having us followed?

What do you think?

I think Lorcan Reebyaw didn’t listen to me when I told him to leave me be. And I think I’m grateful for his protection, even if it only lasts until Meriam is brought to justice.

I’m still terribly angry with you for keeping me in the dark, Lore.

Because the light has revealed such agreeable things?

You’re right. It hasn’t. But I prefer to see than stay blind. I prefer to know than be made a fool of.

When have I ever made a fool of you?

Really, Lore? Really?

I think of all the times I traipsed around in the buff before his eyes.

I think of all the relics I brought back to life believing they were just that—relics.

I think of how I called him Your Highness because I assumed it was his name, and he never set me right. Yes, it was to protect his identity, but I gave him everything, and he gave me nothing but evasions and lies.

I’ve given you back your freedom, Fallon.

And he has, but now I wonder if he returned it to me only because he knew my homecoming would be pitiful.

No, Behach ?an. I set you free because I understood that, although you were not a block of stone, you felt trapped, and there is no worse feeling in the world.

The return of my nickname breaks through the cloud cover of my mood, and apparently of Lorcan’s because patches of blue appear overhead.





Eighteen





My front door gapes, but that isn’t what roots my soles to the cobbles and my heart to my ribs. What makes me freeze are the swoops of red paint that have dried in drips.

Swoops that read: King Killer.

Fury suffuses me.

Fury against the Fae who desecrated my home.

Fury against Dante who’s yet to set his people straight. Yes, I brought about his brother’s downfall but the dying was all him.

On stiffened joints, I lunge forward and shove my door wide.

Phoebus calls out my name, calls out the words, “Stop! Don’t!”

But I don’t stop.

My blood becomes as pressurized as the water Nonna would boil in the kettle that sits askew by our disemboweled couch.

Our kitchen has been gouged with more profane language, the windows cracked, the frescoed walls smeared with more cruel words painted in what looks like blood.

Crimson whore.

Crow wench.

Shabbin bitch.

Murderess.

Traitress.

Noxious puddles haloed by flies dapple the honeycomb tiles, and the stench of piss punches up my flaring nostrils.

“Welcome home, Fallon Rossi.” Tavo’s voice rises over the gentle slap of water and wends through the shattered glass into my throbbing ears.

My gaze cuts to the fiery depths of his irises that sparkle with a smug smile.

“Who is behind this, Diotto?” Phoebus’s jaw tics.

“Purelings. Halflings. Underlings. Overlings. I even heard some humans came to pay tribute to the girl who revived the Crimson Crow and his army of obsidian butchers.”

Phoebus’s tendons strain against his long, slender neck like stretched twine. “Were they punished? Tell me they were punished.”

“We believe in freedom of expression in Luce now.”

Fucking really? The words stay lodged in my cramping throat.

“You call hate speech freedom of expression!” Phoebus flings his arms in a wide circle while I whirl on myself to take in the very worst of Faekind.

I’m struck by something of greater importance than debating the crude application of this new law. “Were my grandmother and mother—were they still here when the vandals visited?”

“I wouldn’t know, Fallon, for I was in Tarespagia.”

Liar. He was in the south with Dante.

With me.

With Marco’s severed head.

“Perhaps you could use your spanking new clout to enquire on my behalf?”

My snide comment is met with a sneer. “You’d be wise not to address me in that tone.”

“Or what, General?”

The twinkling amethysts he wears along his peaked ears refract the nascent sunlight.

“You’ll brand those monikers into my flesh with your Fae-fire?”

His eyes grow slitted. “Don’t mistake me for your savages, Fallon. We neither ink nor score our skin to display what we are.”

I don’t bother with a retort for my breath is wasted on this man who believes me a demon. I turn on my heels, sidestep an ochre puddle, and climb the creaking stairs. Every bedroom door hangs off its hinges, giving me an unobstructed view of the chaos inside.