A Vow So Bold and Deadly (Cursebreakers, #3)(22)

One of the men, a captain named Solt, ducks my sword and tackles me around the midsection, using brute strength to do the same thing.

Iisak’s magic makes the fall slower, but somehow it hurts more. The soldier draws a dagger, aiming for my throat, but I’m quick, and I use my bracer to block before he gets close.

“You can’t slice through everything,” he says, and there’s an edge in his voice.

Captain Solt doesn’t like me. He’s not the only one.

I duck out of his hold, trying to reclaim my weapon, but he kicks it out of reach and tries to pin me. He’s a second too slow, but he has the strength to make up for it, and we end up rolling, grappling, fighting for purchase. He’s got my arm wrenched back, and I wouldn’t put it past him to pull it right out of its socket. Solt would likely kill me if he thought he could get away with it. I taste dirt and blood on my tongue, but my sword is only an inch—maybe—

An icy blast of wind rockets across the field. “Magic,” Iisak calls.

Ah. Yes. Magic. Sparks and stars flare in my vision, and I cast my power into the ground. Fire blazes up from the dried grass around us.

Solt swears and lets me go, scrambling back, smacking at his arm where the fire caught. His eyes are dark with irritation. The sparring matches around us have drawn to a close, and now we’re the center of attention. The other soldiers shift away from the charred ground and speak under their breath in Syssalah.

I let the flames die as another blast of cold wind sweeps across the field. Jake steps over to me and puts out a hand to pull me to my feet. I take it, then claim my sword and drive it into its sheath.

My eyes are on Solt, though. “That wasn’t the point of the exercise.”

“We fought,” he says darkly. “You used magic. Your plan, yes?”

He says magic in the same voice he’d use to accuse me of cheating. Not quite mockery, but definitely contempt.

This feels dangerously close to insubordination—if we’re not there already. But he’s got the respect of most of the soldiers on this field, and he’s good with a sword. I need him as an ally, not an enemy. Still, the tension between us thickens the air.

There’s only one other soldier here who isn’t wary—or disparaging—of my magic. Tycho stands a short distance off, sheathing his own sword. He’s only fifteen, and small for his age, but he begged for a chance to train with the recruits. At first, the younger soldiers all but refused to spar with “the boy,” but Tycho put one of them on the ground in less than twenty seconds, so now they grudgingly allow it.

He’s watching the standoff between me and Solt.

Jake steps closer. “Let’s do it again,” he says equably. Jake’s very good at playing the peacemaker, at pulling the tension out of a moment without making anyone yield ground.

“Fine,” I say. I cast a glance up at the sky and whistle to Iisak.

The soldiers mutter again, shifting back into their formations. This time I don’t need any translation. They’ve reluctantly allowed the scraver to help us train, but they do not see him as an ally. He was enslaved by Karis Luran, and is now oath-bound to me, but they do not trust him.

In truth, most of them do not trust me.

Iisak eases to the ground beside me, his wings folding neatly. “Your Highness,” he says, his voice rasping on the words. He doesn’t need to call me that, and I’ve told him not to, but he says it reminds others of my role here.

“Five minutes,” I say to him. “We’ll go again.”

A horn blares from the palace, and I startle. So do most of the others around me. The horn sounds again before I can speak. Then a third time, followed by a pause. It’s louder than their battle horns, almost deafening.

A gasp goes up around me.

I look at Talfor, my guard. “What does it mean?”

He’s gone pale. “An attack.”

“Rhen?” says Jake. His voice has gone tight. “Is he attacking?”

“No,” says Talfor. “An attack on the queen.”



Lia Mara is in her chambers, prone on the bed, but it’s hard to see past the press of guards and advisors surrounding her. Her eyes are barely open, her skin ashen. As I get closer, I notice tears glistening on her cheeks, and my chest tightens as my heart gives a kick. Nolla Verin is on her knees beside her sister, clutching Lia Mara’s hand, kissing her knuckles. On her other side is Noah, a doctor formerly of Washington, DC, but now known as a healer from Disi. He’s pressing a dripping roll of fabric against her legs.

Then I see the blistered, reddened flesh. The blood. The charred fabric. The soot on Nolla Verin’s robes and cheeks.

“He’s coming,” Nolla Verin is murmuring. When she sees me in the doorway, her eyes flare wide. “Grey. There was an attack.” Her voice breaks. “There was—she was—you have to heal her.”

I’m already beside the bed, pulling at the soaking fabric, looking for the source of damage.

“Slow,” says Noah, grabbing my wrist. “Slow. There’s a lot of glass.”

Then I see the small pile beside him, each piece bright with fresh blood.

I hesitate, my eyes finding his. “What happened?”

“Some kind of bottle bomb.” I must be looking at him blankly, because he says, “A Molotov cocktail. I don’t know what you’d call it here. An incendiary—”