Falling Kingdoms (Falling Kingdoms, #1)(108)
The chief stared at him for a moment, a drunken glaze in his eyes thanks to the two bottles of wine he’d drunk. Then he started to laugh. “You nearly had me. No, Gaius. I trust you to hold true to your word. We are like brothers after the blood sacrifice of your bastard. I don’t forget.”
“Neither do I.” The king’s smile held as he got to his feet and moved to the other side of the table. “Time for rest. Tomorrow is a bright new day. I’ve had enough of tents. We shall move into the castle. Much finer quarters there.”
He offered his hand to Chief Basilius, who still chuckled over their amusing exchange. He took the king’s hand and got to his feet, unsteadily. “A fine meal. Your cooks are to be commended.”
King Gaius watched him. “Show me some magic. Just a little. I feel I’ve earned this.”
The chief patted his belly. “Not tonight. I am too full for such displays.”
“Very well.” The king extended his hand again. “Good night, my friend.”
“Good night.” He clasped the king’s hand and shook it.
King Gaius pulled him closer. “I believed the stories. The ones of you being a sorcerer. I’ve seen enough magic not to doubt such tales until I have enough evidence to disprove it. I must admit, there was some fear. While I am a man of action, I don’t possess any magic of my own. Not yet.”
The chief’s brows drew together. “Are you calling me a liar?”
“Yes,” King Gaius said. “That’s exactly what I’m calling you.”
Taking the dagger he’d concealed in his other hand, King Gaius slashed the chief’s throat in one smooth, quick motion.
The chief’s eyes bugged out with surprise and pain and he staggered back from the king.
“If you’re really a sorcerer,” the king said coolly, “heal yourself.”
Magnus gripped the edge of the table but didn’t make a move. Every muscle in his body had grown tense at the exchange.
Blood spurted from between the chief’s fingers. His panicked gaze shot toward the tent’s entrance, which was guarded only by King Gaius’s men. His trust had allowed him to come in here with no bodyguards nearby.
“Oh, and that fifty-fifty deal of ours?” the king said with a thin smile. “It was for a limited time only. Auranos is mine. And now, so is Paelsia.”
The chief looked completely shocked by this turn of events before he collapsed to the floor with a heavy thump. The king nudged his shoulder so the chief turned over onto his back, his eyes wide and glazed, blood oozing from the gaping wound at his throat.
Magnus fought against the urge to leap back . In a way, he couldn’t say he was all that surprised. He’d been waiting for his father to turn the tables on the chief for a while now.
When the king flicked a look at his son as if to gauge his reaction to this, all he saw was a mildly bored expression on the prince’s face.
“Come, now. You’re not impressed at all?” He let out a sharp bark of a laugh. “Oh, Magnus, you’ve got to give me a little credit.”
“I’m not sure if I should be impressed or concerned,” Magnus said evenly. “For all I know, you might do the same thing to me.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I’m doing all of this for you, Magnus. Together we will find the Kindred—it’s been my life’s goal from the time I was a boy and first heard the tales. To find all four will give us ultimate power. We can rule the universe itself.”
A shiver moved down Magnus’s spine at the maniacal look in his father’s eyes. “I can’t say that my father doesn’t have scope.”
“Clear and precise. Now”—the king moved toward the entrance to the large and luxurious tent—“let us inform the people of Auranos and Paelsia that their leaders are dead and they now must bow before me. Or die.”
“Just once,” Brion said under his breath, “I would have liked you to be wrong.”
Jonas glanced at him. “I’ve been wrong lots of times.”
“Not this time.”
“No. Not this time.”
They stood at the edge of the forest and watched as the chief’s blood-covered body was strung up for all to see. The Limerian king flaunted the murder as a symbol of the chief’s weakness. He was no sorcerer or god as his people had always believed. He was only a man.
A dead man.
After his death last night, the Limerian army had turned their blades on the same Paelsians they’d previously fought with side by side. Those who refused to bow down before King Gaius immediately had their throats slashed or their heads severed completely and put on spikes. Most bowed and pledged allegiance to Limeros. Most were afraid to die.
With every moment he’d been forced to witness this atrocity, Jonas’s heart grew darker. Not just Auranos, but Paelsia had fallen to these greedy and deceptive Limerian monsters led by their king of blood and death. It was everything he’d feared.
He’d grabbed Brion just in time. His friend had been faced with a Limerian’s sword, and by the fierce and insolent look on Brion’s face, he wasn’t going to bow before King Gaius. As the knight raised his blade, ready to remove Brion’s head, Jonas killed him, grabbed Brion, and fled.
He’d killed many since this war began. He’d considered himself a hunter before this, but of animals, not men. Now his blade had found the hearts of many men. What little inside him was still a boy of only seventeen years had hardened to compensate for this. Each time he killed, it became easier and the faces of the men whose lives he took became less distinguishable from each other. But this was not the path he ever would have chosen for himself had he known where it would ultimately lead.