Last Stand (The Black Mage #4)(73)

I couldn’t breathe. My heart thumped heavily and my lungs rose and fell, but nothing was coming. I was numb.

Darren was king.

I had never even considered a future in which his brother was gone. I’d been so convinced Blayne would survive.

And now.

I remembered his words that night: “You took… everything.”

“After the war, he’ll hunt the rest of the rebels down. Make no mistake.”

I could barely process her words. “After the war? But—”

“What? You thought he wouldn’t continue where his brother left off?” Mira sneered as she drew close. “Your beloved never believed a word you said. He sent the Crown’s Army to march on Caltoth not two days after he was crowned.”

But this couldn’t be. Darren wasn’t the enemy. The enemy was dead.

But he still believes in Blayne’s cause.

“I’m sure they’re almost to the border by now. They should reach Caltoth any day.”

“But I…” I’d been hiding out in the forest for days, slowly making my way north, remaining miles off the main road except for today. It was possible.

No.

Darren wouldn’t do this. “You are lying.” She had to be; I couldn’t believe the alternative.

“Am I?” Mira chortled. “Well, you will see soon enough.”

The pressure of the blade was enough to draw blood. Little rivulets slid down my neck, slick and warm. The cut was a building sting, but it was nothing thanks to the panic in my lungs.

If Darren was almost to the border, had he passed the keep? Had he found Alex and Ella? Had he figured out who the rebels were?

There were a thousand questions, and the worst one was burning a hole in my chest. I couldn’t even process its implications.

What have I done?

Mira’s eyes narrowed to slits as she took a step forward, manacles in hand. “You try anything,” she warned, “and I’ll break both your legs. The king might want you alive, but he never said you had to be pristine.”

One more step. Then another. I waited until the woman was six yards away.

She must have forgotten how long it took to bring me to my knees, to drain all of the stamina I had spent so many years building. She had grown too accustomed to winning with ten regiment mages at her side in the dungeon.

Only now it was just the two of us. And right now, I might have been beaten and bruised, but this was far from my worst, even with her blade at my neck.

And so my muscles relaxed.

I watched as a bit of tension fell from Mira’s shoulders, her casting wavering just enough. She thought I wasn’t going to put up a fight, and she had unconsciously allowed herself to mirror her opponent’s stance.

You never were as good as your brother. Marius would never make that mistake.

My right hand shot up to grasp the hilt of her dagger, and then I jerked it away. The cords of my muscles bunched under the strain, my arm was shaking just to keep the blade at a distance, but it was enough. My casting had strengthened my grip.

I overcame her hold. Her eyes flared in panic.

I’m second only to Darren. You never stood a chance.

My second casting took off. The projection struck against the core of my magic like flint against steel.

There was an explosion of light, so bright the entire square was nothing but white, and then a bolt of lightning shot out of the cloudless sky, striking the woman in the center of her chest.

The same casting she had used on my brother.

I watched the woman fall.

Mira’s blade disintegrated into the air like ash. I ripped yet another scrap of cloth to serve as a bandage around my neck.

I should feel something.

The woman was just lying there, sputtering on her last shaky breath, coughing up blood.

Her ribs were rising and falling, but she couldn’t even speak. She was dying.

She had killed Derrick. She had been Blayne’s right hand. She was responsible for the deaths of hundreds, and thousands to come. I had dreamt about this moment for months, watching her in the palace, suffering in the dungeons, wanting to be the one to lock hands around her neck.

I wanted to feel elation or justice, something to make this moment different, something to make the act momentous.

Her eyelids fluttered shut as her chest stopped moving.

My brother’s murderer was dead. I had killed for the first time with intention, and what did I have to show for it?

Shards like a vine of thorns closed in around my throat. It made no sense. I didn’t understand why I was so numb, why I felt nothing when someone so vile was dead.

I wondered if I had lost too much to care, or if the glory of revenge belied the truth that nothing could take back what we had lost. This was but a small stitch in a wound that wouldn’t heal.

And then my boot caught on one of the villagers’ outstretched arms.

I had forgotten. Mira had stolen from them, too.

I knelt down, swallowing past bile and guilt as I pushed the limb to the side.

Heat rose in my chest and there was a roaring in my ears.

So you do feel something.

I could have stopped her. They had only been following the Crown’s orders.

But you thought she was him.

I had been so overwhelmed with the possibility of Darren, that I had been too afraid to lift a finger in my defense. I had let the woman slaughter a small village because I thought Darren had come after me.