Falling Kingdoms (Falling Kingdoms, #1)(66)

“She was going to kill you.” Her words came in tight bursts.

“And you saved my life. Thank you for that.” He wiped her tears away with his thumbs.

“You don’t hate me for what I’ve done?”

“I could never hate you, Lucia. Ever. You hear me?”

She crushed her face against his chest, taking comfort from her brother’s strength. “What will Father do to me when he learns of this?”

Magnus tensed and she pulled back from him to look up into his face. Her brother’s attention was on the door—now fully open. Standing there was her father.

He was staring at the charred remains of Sabina Mallius. Then his gaze slowly tracked to his children.

“You did this, didn’t you, daughter?” His voice was soft, but never before had it sounded so dangerous.

“No, it was me,” Magnus said, raising his chin higher. “I killed her.”

“Liar. It was Lucia.” The king moved toward them and gripped Lucia’s arm, lurching her up to her feet and away from Magnus. “You killed Sabina, didn’t you? Answer me!”

She opened her mouth, but nothing came out for a moment. Her throat was nearly too tight to speak. “I’m so sorry.”

Magnus sprang to his feet. “Sabina was going to kill me.”

“And you saved him with your magic.” The king shook Lucia. “Didn’t you?”

All Lucia could do was nod, her gaze moving to the floor, hot tears streaking down her cheeks.

The king grasped her chin and forced her to look into his face. His grim expression was now mixed with something else.

Victory.

A hawk took flight from its perch on the edge of the balcony as the king said, “I couldn’t be more proud of you than I am right now.”





Ioannes transformed back into his body once he returned to the Sanctuary and opened his eyes, staring up at the constant blue sky that never shifted to night.

“I was right,” he whispered.

He’d watched over the dark-haired princess for years, waiting for a sign. In recent months he’d despaired that he was wrong and had been following a girl who held no magic within her.

But he hadn’t been.

A sorceress had finally been born to lead them back to their former glory. The magic that he’d witnessed pour from the girl’s very being tonight held no equal in the mortal world—nor in the immortal one.

“You were right about what?” someone asked.

Ioannes tensed and sat up to find that even Watchers were watched. It was another elder, Danaus. While all Watchers held the same eternal youth, the same level of beauty, Ioannes had always felt that there was something slightly dark and sinister about Danaus lurking just beneath the surface.

Danaus had never done anything that went beyond the unspoken rules of the Sanctuary. But there was still...something. Something that Ioannes didn’t trust.

“I was right that spring is soon to come,” he said. “I sensed it even in frozen Limeros.”

“Spring comes every year in the mortal world.”

“Yet it’s always a miracle.”

Danaus’s lips thinned. “A true miracle will be to find the answers we seek after so many centuries.”

“Impatient, are we?”

“If I was still capable of taking flight in the mortal world, I think we’d already know where the Kindred is.”

“Then it’s truly a shame that you can’t.” Only the younger Watchers were able to transform into hawks or—much more rarely—visit the dreams of mortals. Once Watchers moved beyond a certain age, they lost these abilities forever. “You could always physically leave this realm.”

“And never return?” Danaus smiled thinly. “Would that please you, Ioannes?”

“Of course not. But I’m saying it’s an option if you grow weary of waiting for the rest of us to find the answers.”

Danaus picked up a leaf that had fallen from an oak tree. The leaf was not green with life but brown. It was a small but disturbing sign that the Sanctuary was fading. There was no autumn here, when leaves would naturally die. Only summer. Only daylight. Eternally.

At least, until the Kindred was lost. The fade had taken many centuries to begin, but it finally had.

“You would tell me if you’d seen something of importance,” Danaus said. It was not a question. “Anything that could return the Kindred to its rightful place.”

It seemed ludicrous to think something dark about an elder, but Ioannes was not that young and not that naive. He remembered when two of his kind had turned their backs on the Sanctuary, killing the last sorceress and stealing what was so priceless and essential to their existence. They had given in to their greed. To their lust for power. Ultimately, it had destroyed them. And now their actions, so many years ago, had the potential to destroy everything.

Who was to say that they were the only ones who could not be trusted?

“Of course, Danaus.” Ioannes nodded. “I will tell you anything I learn, no matter how small it might seem.”

It was not in a Watcher’s nature to lie, but he felt he had no choice.

What he’d discovered had to be protected. At any cost.





It had been a long night, and Jonas knew he wouldn’t be getting a wink of sleep.