Circle of Shadows (Circle of Shadows, #1)(39)

“I mean, also, I want to be the best taiga ever,” she said, attempting to cover up her flub. “With ryuu magic, we could be better than anything we could do with just taiga magic. I mean, you saw what the ryuu could do with fire and wind and . . .” She trailed off because she couldn’t remember what else they’d done.

But I’m sure it was incredible.

Daemon reached the ground and smashed Sora against the wall. He had a hand around her throat and a knife pressed under her rib cage. “He did something to you.”

“What are you—? Who did something to me?” Sora’s pulse quickened, but at the same time, she analyzed their position for ways she could escape.

“Prince Gin. He magically brainwashed everyone to convince them to switch allegiances. It must be the new magic he learned while he was exiled, because he certainly wasn’t able to persuade taigas that easily during the Blood Rift.”

Sora frowned and shook her head. The sunny awe the Dragon Prince made her feel couldn’t possibly be a lie. It ran too deep, as though it was woven into the fiber of her being.

Oh . . . Maybe Prince Gin had rejected Daemon. Maybe he was angry because he was upset. Sad or embarrassed or jealous to be left behind again. . . .

“If the prince said you couldn’t join him, I’ll talk to him,” Sora said. “I’ll tell him you’re great, and I’m sure—”

“I don’t want to join him!” Daemon said, pushing Sora into the wall again. “Listen to me. The Dragon Prince does not want what’s best for Kichona. He wants to raise an army of taigas—or ryuu, whatever—to go out like mindless pawns and conquer other countries to expand our kingdom. But if he does that, do you think our people will get to continue leading their peaceful lives with Autumn Festival celebrations and apple harvests and quiet, lazy mornings of fishing?

“No,” he continued. “If the prince gets what he wants and starts attacking other countries, they won’t sit back and let him take them. They will attack Kichona. They will storm our coastal cities. Torch the crops and the countryside. Pillage towns, rape women, kill children. Empress Aki has preserved Kichona’s stability, prosperity, and peace. But Prince Gin will bleed other kingdoms to conquer them, chasing that stupid Evermore legend, and in turn other armies will come to Kichona and burn our country to the ground.

“So just . . . please,” Daemon said, the anger in his voice suddenly giving way to desperation. “Please snap out of it. I can’t do this without you. I can’t save the whole gods-damn kingdom on my own.”

A sharp electric shock zapped through their gemina bond, and Sora jumped. It fried the pride and sense of purpose Prince Gin had inspired, and the literal jolt Daemon had sent through their connection jostled her brain awake. For a minute, all she could see was bright blue light, bursting like sparklers and engulfing everything in its brilliant determination to set her free. Even her nerves vibrated.

When the blue light faded, the remnants of the spell were gone, and horror set in. “Stars, Daemon, I’m sorry,” she said. “He got into my head. If it weren’t for you, I’d be . . .” She couldn’t bear to finish the sentence.

Daemon narrowed his eyes. “Is this a trick? How do I know you’ve really come back to your senses?”

“I don’t know. . . .”

But then she did. She let the shame she felt flood through their gemina bond. It was like waking up in sewer water.

“Oh, Sora. There was nothing you could have done.” He released his hold on her throat, lowered his knife, and embraced her.

That sent a surge of a different kind of spark through their bond, this one gentler. Soft, like a lullaby.

She relaxed into it.

When she released him, though, she asked the obvious question. “If there was nothing I could have done to resist Prince Gin’s magic, how did you escape it? And how did you break me free?”

“I-I don’t know.” He worried his lower lip. “All around me, you and the taigas toppled like dominoes to the Dragon Prince’s words. But I didn’t feel any different. I don’t know how he charmed all of you and why it didn’t affect me.”

“Maybe that’s the superpower you’ve been waiting for,” she said.

He let out a short laugh. “Right. I’m terrible at magic, except I can resist one random thing.”

“It’s a pretty good thing to be able to resist.”

“I suppose so.” He grew solemn. “You know what this means, right? Prince Gin can force everyone to love him.”

Sora’s insides clenched violently, like she’d eaten spoiled fish. “Crow’s eye. The woman in Paro Village who told us she had been chosen as a Heart . . . He’s not only hypnotizing an army of taigas but also ordinary people. He’ll turn Kichona into a kingdom of bewitched puppets.”

Daemon nodded. “They’ll march overseas with him and give up their lives, just because he asked them to. And he could do it to anyone. Our friends. The people in your hometown. Your parents.”

Sora had to lean against the wall to support herself. The Dragon Prince had already hurt her family once by murdering her sister. She wouldn’t let him do it again, not to her family or any other.

Her fingers went to the small leather pouch on her belt. Fairy’s satchel of deadly powders.