King of Battle and Blood (Adrian X Isolde #1)(101)

I shook my head. “That book will take as much from you as you ask of it,” I said. “Is that what you want?”

“I want power,” she said, and her voice shook.

Suddenly, the case exploded, and I covered my head as I was showered in glass. Pieces of it bit into my skin, but I did not have time to react, because as I rose from the shelter of my arm, I saw that the book was gone, and in its place was a bubbling, red mist.

“Fuck!” I yelled and turned to run just as Killian and Ana caught up with me. “To the west tower! Now!”

We raced through hallway after hallway until I rounded the corner and came face-to-face with the mist. Killian reached for me and jerked me back. It had filled most of the hallway in front of us, completely barring us from the other side of the castle.

“Fuck!” I said again.

“Isolde!” Ana called, turning to run down the opposite hallway. I knew where she was going, and I caught up with her as she was pulling open a near-invisible door—the secret corridors.

It was quieter in the passageway. Our breaths were ragged, our hearts pounding. I kept my hands pressed against either side of the wall as I followed Ana in the darkness. When we emerged on the other side, the mist was behind us, but it roiled and built, gathering like a wall of cloud and following.

“We have to get to Sorin,” I said.

I wasn’t even sure he would still be atop the tower. It was possible he had gotten my father to safety and left to find us. What if we did not cross paths? What if he got caught in the mist? I pushed my worry away. Sorin could fly; if anything, he had the best chance of escape of any of us.

I was in the lead, my legs burning as I tried to carry myself faster and faster to my father. As I crested the top of the stairs and ran down the center of the hall of mirrors, the mist roiled behind me, cutting off Killian and Ana’s pursuit.

“No!” I screamed and turned back for them, but the mist was already up to Killian’s waist. I stared at both of them, wide-eyed and fearful.

“Don’t let it consume you,” I said. “Get to safety.”

“We can’t leave you!” he said.

“You can. Get to safety!”

I watched him hesitate, and I knew he was assessing whether he could make it if he ran toward me.

“By the fucking goddess, leave, Killian! Get Ana out of here! That is an order!”

His jaw ticked, but he relented, and a wave of relief washed over me as I saw them retreat before the mist filled the end of the hall.

I turned and sprinted to the stairwell which was plunged into darkness, only to be hit hard in the chest as I reached the top. I tried to grip something—anything—but there was nothing. I tumbled backward, falling and rolling until I came to a stop at the bottom of the stairs.

I couldn’t breathe, my ribs hurt so badly. I groaned, rolling onto my back as I attempted to catch my breath, confused, when the blurry image of my father walked into view.

“Father?” I asked.

“I’m sorry, Isolde,” he said, and he lifted his blade. “But this is the sacrifice of a queen.”

“Father!”

I rolled as his sword came down, grazing my side, and hit the stone floor beneath me. He continued toward me and tried once more to bring the blade down upon my bruised body. I tried to scramble to my feet, but a harsh push sent me to the ground again, and as I began to crawl away from my father, I sobbed.

“What are you doing?”

I was so weak and so tired. My chest burned, my ribs sent an echoing pain through my whole body, and I was more dizzy than I’d ever been.

“What you should have done the moment you discovered you were his weakness!” my father yelled and placed his booted foot against my side, sending me to my back.

“You wanted me to kill myself?” I asked, disgusted. “For whom? For a kingdom of people who turned their backs on me for my sacrifice?”

“It is for the greater good!” he said. “Not just your people but the whole of Cordova.”

“Even my mother’s people?” I asked, my voice quiet, calm. “Because you left them enslaved, and that does not sound like the greater good.”

The mist was gaining on us. I had never been this close to it, but now I could feel its magic. It tingled with an electric pulse that raised the hair on my arms, and it reminded me of who I was and where I had come from.

I was Yesenia of Aroth.

As my father thrust the end of his blade toward my chest, I caught it between my hands. It cut into my palms, and blood dripped onto my skin.

“Father,” I said, tears spilling down my face. “Please don’t.”

“Were you not prepared before to do whatever it took to save your people? What has changed? Love?”

Everything had changed.

It wasn’t just Adrian. It was my whole world. The people I had once trusted were now my enemies. The people who had been my enemies—whom I had detested for so long—were the only ones I dared believe. And at the root of all of it was him—my father. The foundation from which my life of lies had begun.

I ground my teeth, jerking suddenly, knocking the blade away and shoving my feet into my father’s knees. He grunted and went down. Then I kicked him in the chest, and he fell onto his back, losing his sword in the process. I scrambled for it and took it into my slick palm. As I rose to my feet, he came to his knees. I pointed the blade at him, and he lifted his hands in surrender. The mist behind him was a bloody curtain.