Protect the Prince (Crown of Shards #2)(84)

I cut through one poisonous rope after another. Every time my immunity sliced through one, the others drew together, tightening their grip on Heinrich and trying to strangle my power. Even worse, I felt the poison reaching out, as if it was trying to slither from the king’s body into my own. I had no idea if it could do that, but I wasn’t going to let it infect me, and I wasn’t going to let it kill Heinrich either. So I gritted my teeth and reached for even more of my magic, using it to shield both myself and the king.

Heinrich shifted in his seat, clearly wondering what I was doing and wishing that I would drop his hand. I tilted my head to the side and peered up at him out of the corner of my eye.

Even though I’d only cut through a small amount of the parasitic vines, I could feel and see the change in his body. His shoulders had straightened, his face had lost some of its tight, sickly pallor, and his blue eyes were clearer and brighter. He looked much more vibrant and alive, which encouraged me to keep going.

Snip, snip, snip.

As I cut through the poison, those venomous vines grew more and more desperate, and they lashed out at me over and over again, trying to break through my immunity. But I ruthlessly cut them all down and kept going.

Snip.

Finally, I cut through the last vine. I held on to Heinrich’s hand a moment longer, just to make sure I’d cleansed all the poison from his system, but I didn’t detect any magic in his body now other than his own magier power. So I rubbed his hand between my own two, as though I was warming it up, then let go and sat back in my seat.

I dropped my own hands down by my sides, hiding them so he wouldn’t notice my trembling fingers, and slumped back against the cushion. I’d never used so much of my immunity in such a small, controlled way before, and I was utterly exhausted.

Heinrich regarded me with open curiosity, but he didn’t say anything. Perhaps he didn’t know what to make of me. That was nothing new. Sometimes I didn’t know what to make of myself. Either way, I didn’t say anything to him. How did you tell a king that someone had poisoned him? I didn’t know, and I wasn’t going to try to explain it, much less my immunity. I had no idea whether he would believe me, and it was a risk I wasn’t willing to take.

“Are you okay, Everleigh?” he asked. “You look pale. Here, have some tea.”

He leaned forward and poured some hot, steaming tea. I managed to stop my fingers from trembling long enough to take the cup from him. I sniffed the contents, but the peppermint tea was free of the cloying, floral poison that had infected him, so I took a few sips to be polite.

The awkwardness between us passed, and Heinrich leaned back in his seat, sipping his own tea.

“Mmm. This was just what I needed,” he said. “Isn’t it amazing how much better a cup of hot tea can make you feel?”

“Actually, in Bellona, we prefer our tea to be iced,” I murmured, making inane chitchat. “We feel that the ice deepens and intensifies the flavors.”

He grinned, looking even more vibrant than before. “You Bellonans are rather barbaric that way.”

He must have been feeling better if he was making jokes about tea, and I forced myself to return his grin with one of my own.

“So I’ve been told,” I murmured.

Heinrich drained the rest of his tea, then set down the cup. This time, instead of glancing into the fire, his gaze moved over to the spot along the glass wall where Dominic had been attacked. The rug there was pristine, as was the glass, but I could still smell the faint stench of the prince’s blood in the air.

“I can’t believe that I almost lost another son last night,” Heinrich said. “Here. In my own palace. Those Mortan bastards. They won’t be happy until they’ve killed us all, will they?”

He was talking about his family, the Ripley family, and perhaps me too, but something occurred to me about the assassination attempt. When the Mortans had rushed into the library, they had attacked both Dominic and me.

But more of them had attacked the prince.

I thought back. Most of the Mortans had bypassed me and headed straight for the prince, including the weather magier. I frowned. Maeven wanted me dead, so why hadn’t the majority of the assassins targeted me first? Or at least the weather magier, since she had been the most powerful? And why hadn’t they attacked while I was alone in the library? Why had they waited until after Dominic had showed up?

Unless . . . I hadn’t been their true target.

As soon as the thought slammed into my mind, I knew that I was right. The Mortans hadn’t been here to kill me. At least, not only me.

Dominic had been their main target.

Someone had poisoned Heinrich, and someone had wanted Dominic to die last night. Who? Why? Was some noble making a play for the throne? With both Heinrich and Dominic dead, Gemma would be the heir, but she was only thirteen, and it would be easy enough to influence her—or kill her later on.

Perhaps Maeven wanted to put a puppet on the Andvarian throne, the same way she had wanted to put Vasilia on the Bellonan throne. Or perhaps this was about something else entirely. Perhaps someone wanted revenge against Heinrich and Dominic. Maybe one of the nobles who’d lost a loved one in the Seven Spire massacre wanted to take away the king’s family before they finally killed Heinrich himself.

Those possibilities and a dozen others filled my mind, but there were just too many variables and unknowns to narrow down the possibilities and come up with a culprit. The only thing I knew for certain was that someone wanted the Ripleys dead—and me too.