The Shadow Queen (Ravenspire, #1)(79)
Tatiyana, lying on the ground and looking into the forest, where she locked eyes with her sister.
An understanding of what Irina was now capable of. Of what Irina would do.
A handful of ebony cradled in her sister’s blood. A whispered incantor.
The heart of the carriage’s ebony bowing before the power in Tatiyana’s blood and sending that power, that magic, into the ground, where it raced away from Morcant like a streak of light that pulsed brighter and brighter as her sister struggled for air.
The light reaching Ravenspire’s castle, burrowing into the stone, and searching for the one with lips as red as blood, hair as black as ebony, and skin as white as snow.
Lorelai, asleep and unaware. The light leaping from the stone, pouring over Lorelai’s skin like a blanket, and then sinking into the princess’s blood as Tatiyana breathed her last.
Irina dropped the bones, her hands shaking as rage obliterated the thickness in her throat and dried the last of her tears.
Even in death, her sister had managed to steal what Irina most wanted. Even in death, Tatiyana had corrupted Irina’s chance at a happily ever after.
Lorelai, the untrained half-Morcantian girl, possessed her own magic and every last drop of her mother’s as well.
Irina couldn’t fight that. Not with the Ravenspire ground turning against her. Not when her heart stumbled and burned every time she did the simplest spell.
Lorelai was coming for her, the Eldrian king by her side, and there was nothing Irina could do about it unless she found another source of power to bolster her own.
Another heart to bend to hers and give her its strength, its will.
A heart that wouldn’t poison her blood as the hearts of those in Ravenspire all seemed to do.
She climbed to her feet and left her sister’s bones lying scattered on her open grave. Tatiyana may have thought she could finish Irina by giving her daughter more power than any mardushka had a right to own, but Irina had a weapon her sister could never have foreseen.
She had the human heart of a Draconi warrior just waiting for a new chest to call home.
THIRTY-TWO
IT TOOK MOST of the day to travel halfway through the Hinderlinde Forest. All three of them were covered with scratches and bites. Lorelai had been so exhausted after using the weary heart of Ravenspire to destroy the roads and then using Kol’s dragon fire to fight Irina that she’d been unable to walk on her own for the first few hours. They stopped in the late afternoon in an abandoned shack that Gabril remembered using when Lorelai’s father went hunting for deer in the spring. The shack was small—maybe twice the size of their tent—and its lone window was covered in the same dusty grime that coated the floor inside, but it was well-built and had a fireplace.
Lorelai paced the floor, her thoughts racing, while Kol started a fire and Gabril readied a small pot with the last of their beans for dinner.
The longer she waited between attacks on Irina’s infrastructure, the more time she gave the queen to recover her strength. If she really wanted to have the advantage when she entered the capital, she needed to hit Irina again.
Tonight.
The strength of Irina’s response would give Lorelai valuable information about the queen’s current state of health. Information that would help the princess decide if she should continue attacks from outside the capital or make her move against the castle itself.
It’s a good plan, Kol said as she glanced out the window and considered her options, but maybe you should eat first. Rest a little.
Every second I rest is a second I give Irina to rest too.
True. But you had dragon’s fire inside you today. And you barely slept last night. He held up a hand when she turned on him, her thoughts blazing into his mind. I’m not saying I don’t trust you to know what you’re capable of doing. I’m just saying maybe some beans would be a good idea. Not just for your sake but for Gabril’s. Whatever you do tonight, all of us have to be ready to respond.
He was right. It had been a long, hard day for all of them, and if she provoked a response from Irina now, they would have to fight. They would have to run.
They had a much better chance of surviving if they’d eaten and rested for a while.
I admire the way you think. Kol smiled at her as he stacked the extra wood he’d gathered beside the fireplace and took a seat at the rickety kitchen table.
She gave him a look as she took a chair for herself. What is that supposed to mean?
He raised a brow as Gabril set the pot of beans down in the center of the table. Are you always suspicious of compliments? I meant that I like the way you constantly analyze the situation, decide on a course of action that makes the most sense to you, and then just . . . do it. You want to go after Irina now, and if you had no one but yourself to consider, you would. But you don’t do what’s best for you. You do what’s best for those you’re trying to protect.
So you’re saying you and I are alike. Minus the fact that I’ve yet to try to kill you.
And I’ve yet to call you fetching,
And I’d never lock my headmaster in his toilet closet.
And I don’t have magic. But otherwise, yes. We are a lot alike. He grinned at her, and she smiled back until Gabril slapped a spoon against the table.
“Mind telling me what’s so funny?” he asked as he spooned beans onto their plates.
“Nothing.” Lorelai avoided looking at Kol.