Lord of Embers(The Demon Queen Trials #2)(49)

“Confess!” he roared. “And we will set thee free. We ask only that thou tellest the truth. Tell us all the wicked ways thou hast saved thyself, demon. How thou hast sacrificed thy kin.”

What the

?

h ell

The crowd started jeering again.

I shouted at them, “I should get a trial. Everyone had trials. We are English subjects. It’s in the Magna Carta, for fuck’s sake!” My voice echoed. My panic had me swearing at a group of bloodthirsty Puritans.

The judge’s hammer pin gleamed in the winter sun. His grin widened, lupine. “Thou hath pleasure in thy wickedness.”

“The keys,” I said quietly. “Do you want to hear about the keys?”

The judge’s smile faded completely. “Speak not in thy demon tongue!

Thou shalt not suffer a demon to live!”

He lifted the whip and cracked it against the horses. They started to run, taking the cart with them and ripping it out from underneath me.

If you were lucky, your neck snapped, but mine didn’t. The rough rope crushed my throat, and my legs kicked helplessly in the air. All the blood rushed into my head, and my body commanded me to live, even though I was dying.

My lungs were going to explode.

Never in my life had I understood how precious it was to breathe, how glorious it was to take oxygen deep inside your chest. Never had I felt so desperate to live, to savor every moment. Maybe they would still let me out of this. Maybe they were trying to scare me before the trial.

I wanted to dial back the clock, to relish each second from my past.

I wanted to go back before that moment.

T en -sixteen at n igh t.

Memories exploded in my mind, and I felt myself tugged into the past—lying in the grass in summer and watching the clouds sliding overhead, my fingers sticky with melted popsicles. One day, I’d tried on my mom’s bra and stuffed it with socks. The boy next door told me the big kids called them

.

tits

The summer sky melted away, and I was jumping into the town pool, making as big a splash as possible. The lifeguard blew the whistle.

I’d nearly hit someone.

“Murderess!” The word ripped the memories from my mind again.

I’d been so sure the Dying God had wanted me for something, that he’d had a plan. I’d been

.

certain

Another memory: graduation from elementary school, when Mom took me to my favorite burger place and let me order whatever I wanted, and I had a chocolate milkshake. I thought it was the best day of my life, and I remembered how Mom laughed when I’d told her that, and I didn’t understand why.

My mom u sed to sin g me a lu llaby…

I could feel her here now, with me. She was on the other side, waiting for me.

But my vision was going dark, and pure panic took over my mind until there were no words left. Until I hardly had a mind anymore to think with.

Death reached for me, but along with it came something warm and familiar. I could feel Mom. If this was death, I didn’t have to be so scared anymore. I had no mind left, no body. Just the feeling of love on the other side.

And the darkness swallowed me whole.





C H A P T E R 2 6 — O R I O N

I knew I was dreaming, but I still felt as if she were right here before me. I could smell her in my dream, intoxicating.

She was standing on the coffee table in my living room, no longer in the thick woolen dress. Now, she wore a short black dress with long sleeves that puffed at the shoulders. A line of buttons ran down the front, and her red hair cascaded over the dark silk. She wore black stilettos.

My arms had been bound behind me with thick rope that chafed at my wrists…

Why was I dreaming about having my arms bound?

For a moment, I felt a strange sense of urgency, a desperation to rip free of them.

I was here now, with Rowan—or Mortana. If I could move, I could touch her. Taste her. She was only two feet away from me. If I could move my arms, I could pull her into my lap. I wanted to fuck her again, more than I’d ever wanted anything.

But that was a betrayal of Ashur and all the rest. I him

ow ed

revenge. There had to be, after all, a reason I’d survived when none of the others had. Why me, when I was the worst among them?

Because I could kill so easily—a brutal skill that I’d been born with.

It was my one purpose. I must speak for the dead, to exact revenge when they no longer could. I was their voice and their sword. I would make the mortals pay.

I couldn’t trust Rowan. And even if she’d changed—even if she was a new person completely—I was sure she would betray me.

But all those ideas were flying out of my head right now because Rowan was standing on the table in high heels, and I could not keep my eyes off her thighs.

I pulled my gaze up to stare at her lush red lips. How was it that her face looked innocent and sinful all at once? Her beauty overwhelmed me. It always had.

She took a step closer to me, heels clacking on the mahogany. “You know, Orion, I still remember your real name. From the old days. You were always so desperate to please me back then. I loved it when you begged.”

She started to unbutton the top of her dress, and my blood pounded.

Under the dress, she wore a red silk bra.

“What are you doing?” My voice came out husky and desperate.