Garden of Serpents (The Demon Queen Trials #3)(57)

Three hunters stood to my right, blood covering all of them.

A fraction of a breath later, I loosed a stream of fire that engulfed those three men, setting them ablaze.

Jack was too close to Orion to risk the flames, and he started running as soon as he caught sight of my fire. The pungent stench of Jack’s fear filled the air.

I’d be going after him, but I’d be healing Orion first. What was better than one ferocious Lilu hell-bent on vengeance?

Two Lilu hell-bent on vengeance.

But when I looked back at Orion, sadness welled in me, along with panic. They’d ripped him apart.

Was he even breathing? I rushed over to him, shaking with horror. They’d carved the word matricide into his chest in vicious slashes. What the fuck?

And it was a merciful thing that my sorrow for him dampened my fury at Jack, or everything around me would be tiny flecks of ash.

They’d carved swirls that looked like snakes…

I cupped the back of his head, and when his eyes fluttered open, relief swelled in my chest. Oh, thank the gods.

“Rowan,” he murmured. “You need to go.”

“Fuck, no.” I lifted the antidote to his lips. “Drink this.”

He’d lost so much blood, he was struggling to keep his head up, and he looked like he was going to be sick. But he managed to close his lips on the edge of the cup. I tipped it, and the earthy liquid slid onto his tongue.

At first, he nearly choked on it. He was barely swallowing, but then he closed his mouth, and I watched his Adam’s apple bob.

“Open, love,” I whispered. “It will make you feel better.” Mirroring Mom’s words, and Kas’s.

One tiny sip at a time, I let the potion slide into his open mouth. And when his eyes started widening to that ethereal blue—almost focused on me—joy lit me up.

“Orion,” I whispered. “Come back to me.”

I tilted the rest of the antidote into his mouth, and he swallowed it, stronger now. His eyes closed as he drank it down, and my gaze swept over his skin. As he finished the potion, his body was already starting to heal. The brutal carvings were disappearing as his demon strength and magic returned to him.

His head tilted down, and he stared at me, a fierce look in his eyes. “You came back for me.”

“Of course I did. I always will.” I slipped behind him. Gritting my teeth, I ripped through the chains that bound him. He slumped forward a little, resting his forearms on his knees. Blood still dripped from his arms onto the floor.

I knelt in front of him, peering up at his face. I’d never seen him look so exhausted. “Orion, I need to know this now.” I gripped his thighs. “If we can bring the Lilu back into the City of Thorns, do you promise that will be enough for you? Or at least that you won’t launch any preemptive attacks on the mortals to satisfy a centuries-old blood oath?”

He looked up at me, weary, a smile flickering over his lips. “I think I like your interrogation better than theirs, although you’re somehow more terrifying.”

“Do you promise?” I pressed.

“Yes, Rowan. I can restrain myself from launching preemptive attacks. I never promised Ashur specifics about how I’d get revenge. And the return of the Lilu is certainly revenge.” He cocked his head, raising an eyebrow. “If we can’t find them, we could always make more Lilu.”

I ignored the flush of heat in my cheeks at his comment, trying to stay focused before I lost my chance to hunt down Jack.

I shoved the grimoire at him. “Good. Take this home.”

He rose, handing it back to me. “You take it home. You return and take the crown.”

I gripped him by the elbow, and helped him to his feet. “I’m going after Jack to see what he knows about Shai. She never showed up where she was supposed to be, and I don’t know if she was the leak, or if she’s locked in here, or what the fuck happened. And I want the book of names back.”

I breathed in deeply, smelling the air for sweat, listening for heartbeats. My heightened senses told me the whole place was empty. Jack—and every other hunter—had fled.

I touched the side of Orion’s face. “I need to go. Take the grimoire. Bring it back to the City of Thorns.”

He leaned down, resting his forehead on mine. “I think this means you trust me now.”

“I do. And when I get back, you and I will figure out how to rule together.” I turned to run for Jack, but Orion grabbed my bicep.

When I turned to him, his eyes were burning with a strange intensity. “Wait, wait. You need to know what I did before you decide that you trust me.”

I cupped his face. “Tell me now, then. Quickly.”

His face was so close to mine, and he pulled my hands from cheeks. Pain etched his face, and his shoulders slumped.

“I condemned my mother to death,” he said quietly.

That wasn’t what I’d expected, and my gaze slid down to the words carved on his chest, now healed over into angry scars. Matricide.

“I don’t understand,” I said. “How is that possible?”

“Molor died defending her, Rowan. Molor was a hero. But only a few months after they locked me in prison with her, I was brought to another cell. She was highborn, and they wanted a crime on the record books. So they asked me to say she wanted to kill the king, and I did. All they had to do was scare me, and I told them whatever they wanted to hear.”