Incendiary (Hollow Crown #1)(31)

“Ren,” Esteban whispers beside me. “What do we do?”

The only thing I can do. I yank off my gloves and hurl myself at the prince. I just need to lay one finger on him and tear out every memory he has ever had until he’s as good as dead. Hollow, through and through.

“Don’t!” Esteban yells, and I pause, confused.

Suddenly, it feels like roots have sprouted from the earth and wrapped themselves around my ankles. My bones heavy as mortar. My mouth numb, my tongue so thick, I can’t utter a word. Useless. And all around me, the air ripples with Dez’s power. He is holding us back.

It takes a second to register that Esteban’s Don’t wasn’t for me at all. It was for what Dez was about to do. He must have skimmed Dez’s thoughts too late.

“That won’t work on me,” the prince says, but he still steps back from my outstretched fingertips.

“Stop it!” Margo protests just as Sayida’s face grows red with the effort to move.

They are being held in place by the force of Dez’s magics, too. Tears sting at my eyes, blurring the image of the guards waiting for their orders. Castian. He’s a ripple of red and gold, but when I blink, I see the fear in his eyes that his prize might expire before he has the opportunity to torture him. Dez with poison between his lips. I shut my eyes and remember those same lips on my skin, smiling, grinning, laughing, living.

How can he do this?

It is the prince himself who steps between us, his predatory gaze flipping between me and Dez. “I accept.”

“Swear it,” Dez says, holding the vial to his lips. “Swear my unit will walk freely out of this forest and not be harmed by you or your guards.”

“I don’t make promises to Moria scum,” the Bloodied Prince says. He assesses each of us, lingering on my scarred hands. “Will there be others?”

Dez sets his teeth together and hisses, “Yes.”

We say nothing, frozen in different stages of outrage. I try once more to break free of Dez’s magics, but it is as if my body is not my own.

I will never forgive you. The words come unbidden. Are they mine or from my memories coming undone?

“There’s always more, isn’t there?” Castian steps closer to me. His dark brow is furrowed, his golden skin flecked with dirt and bruises and scars. The blue of his eyes fades to a green at the center. I want to claw them out. Perhaps he sees my hate, because he can’t hold my stare and moves on to Margo. “You four will tell the Whispers to stand down. This rebellion is over or your prince of rebels dies without a trial. I will expect your complete and total surrender in three nights, or he will be executed on the fourth day. Do we have an accord?”

“They can’t answer you,” Dez says.

Irritation flashes across the prince’s face. “Then answer for them.”

Without taking his golden eyes, hard and glassy, away from Castian, Dez nods once. The defeat I hear is so foreign I fear I’m staring at an impostor. “They’ll do as you command. Remember everything I’ve said.”

One of the soldiers comes up quickly and knocks the vial out of Dez’s hand. He grabs Dez by the wrists while another kicks the backs of his knees. They tie his arms. And all the while, Dez doesn’t struggle. He breathes fast and hard, and I can’t look away from him. I can’t even lift a finger as they bring out a brown sack to put over his head. His eyes are locked on mine. I hate the brightness of the day. I hate that he won’t let me go to him.

“Remember everything I’ve said. Remember—”

The last of his words is muffled as the guards tug the filthy grain sack over his head.

It’s one of the guards who speaks. His sienna-brown skin is covered in sweat, and he looks like he might get sick on his prince’s boots. “But . . . But, my lord, King Fernando and Justice Méndez—they had their orders. No survivors.”

For a moment, it’s as though Castian didn’t hear the man standing mere paces from him. Then there’s only the sharp metal of his fist flying through the air, spikes ripping into a fleshy cheek.

“Are you on my guard or Justice Méndez’s?” Castian asks, but doesn’t wait for an answer. “I will keep my word to spare these rebels. Is the word of your prince not good enough for you?”

The guard nurses his mangled face, then utters a single cry of understanding.

I want to scream. I want to fight. I want to die.

But I can’t move. How can Dez do this? How can he twist my feelings this way? I refuse to believe there’s even a part of me that doesn’t want to save him. Tears spill silently down my cheeks. All I can do is watch Castian and his guards drag Dez away, leaving the four of us—Sayida, Esteban, Margo, and myself—as living statues, as the forest slowly comes awake with the dawn. Inevitable.

Finally, when Dez is far enough away, his magics release us. Without their support, I stumble. My head spins.

Dez is gone.

A burning sensation like a corrosive liquid runs through my veins. I felt that fire before when I was fighting.

Dez is gone.

I smell rot. Decaying flowers. But it’s not time for the foliage to wilt. I realize it wasn’t only the fight that raged through my skin.

Sayida catches me before I hit the ground. Despite everything that’s happened, it’s my arm that’s heavy, a deadweight pulling me to the earth. My eyelids flutter, and before I sink into total blackness, I hear her say, “Poison.”