Crush the King (Crown of Shards #3)(38)



“I’d like to blast those bastards out of the sky for everything they’ve done to you, highness,” Sullivan growled. “For everything they’ve done to us, to our families.”

His hand twitched, and a bit of blue lightning sparked on his fingertips. The same power flashed in his eyes, and hot, peppery anger blasted off him in waves.

I touched his arm. “I feel the same way, but we both know we can’t do that. We can’t start a war. Not here, not now, with so many innocent people around. We need to beat the Mortans at their own game, remember? That’s our plan, and we need to stick to it.”

He stared at me, a muscle ticking in his jaw, even as more peppery anger surged off him. After a few seconds, he curled his hand into a fist, snuffing out his magic. I squeezed his arm, and we both turned our attention back to the sky.

Given the number of strixes, I couldn’t tell where the Mortan king was—or if Maeven was here. I hoped she was. I might be plotting to kill her brother, but I also wanted to continue my long game with her.

The rider at the very front of the formation lifted his fist and then dropped it in a sharp motion. One after another, the creatures and their warriors plummeted to the ground, landing on the hard-packed dirt of the arena floor. The crowds in the boxes and bleachers yelled, cheered, clapped, screamed, and whistled, impressed by the aerial acrobatics, and several people on the royal terrace politely applauded, although most were far too refined, snobby, and self-important to deign to show any true, raucous emotion.

Still, everyone loved a good show.

The strixes landed in the same arrow formation they’d shown in the air, with the riders still atop their respective creatures. The first rider raised his fist again and let out a loud, earsplitting whistle, and the other riders steered the strixes into two rows. The Mortans were really going all-out with their show.

One of the strixes hopped forward and stopped in the open space between the two rows, and that rider looked around, as if checking to make sure that everyone was in their proper place. Once he was satisfied, the rider dismounted, and a servant rushed forward to help the man take off his golden helmet, along with his dark purple riding coat.

My breath caught in my throat. That had to be the Mortan king.

Behind him, a few other people also dismounted from their strixes and removed their own helmets, along with their riding coats. One of them was a woman with golden hair.

Maeven.

“She actually showed up,” I whispered. “She’s actually here.”

Sullivan, Paloma, and Auster crowded in closer to me. I glanced across the terrace. Cho and Xenia had also spotted the king and Maeven. They both looked as tense as I felt, but Cho nodded at me. He and the others would be ready to move should the Mortans try to kill me.

The Mortan king took his sweet bloody time handing his helmet to a servant, stripping off his riding gear, and slipping into a new jacket. Only when he was properly attired did he deign to stride across the arena floor.

The crowd, of course, loved his long, drawn-out entrance, and they cheered wildly as he waved at first one section, then another. People also started tossing flowers and other trinkets from the bleachers down onto the arena floor.

Chains of white daisies, bundles of purple gladiolas, and crowns of blue laurels sailed through the air and landed on the hard-packed dirt, along with pennants and small stuffed strixes. Auster had told me that it was a Regalia tradition to shower gifts upon the gladiators after their bouts as a way for the audience to show its appreciation. Apparently, the people thought the Mortan king was also worthy of such high regard, although he didn’t bother to pick up any of the items.

I looked past the king and scanned the section of bleachers closest to him. A bright flash of metal caught my eye. A figure wearing a black cloak with the hood pulled up over their head was lurking in the center of a pack of people near one of the gates set into the arena wall. The figure raised a black-gloved hand, and that bit of metal flashed again.

An instant later, an arrow zipped out of the crowd, zooming straight toward the Mortan king.

*

For one bright, shining, wonderful moment, I thought the Mortan king was going to die right there on the arena floor.

He must have somehow sensed the arrow, because he whirled in that direction. Large purple hailstones exploded out of his fingertips and punch-punch-punched into the arrow, reducing it to splinters a second before it would have slammed into his throat.

People gasped, and a stunned silence dropped over the arena. No one seemed to know for certain what had just happened, although all the guards on the royal terrace snapped to attention, ready to defend their own kings and queens in case any more arrows came zipping out of the crowd.

The Mortan king casually flexed his hand, causing more hailstones to streak out of his fingers and up into the sky. Then he whipped up his other hand and sent a bolt of cold purple lightning shooting out at the hailstones, shattering them in midair. Bits of purple ice rained down all around him, although he summoned up a breeze to make sure that none of the pellets actually touched him.

The Mortan king did that same hailstone-lightning sequence over and over again, adding in howling gusts of wind so that the ice showered different parts of the arena. I’d known that he was a weather magier, but I hadn’t realized just how much raw power he had.

The crowd roared, apparently thinking it was all just part of the show, and more flowers, pennants, and stuffed animals sailed through the air. No more arrows came shooting out of the crowd, though, and several Mortan guards flanked their king, forming a protective ring around him.

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