Two Rooks ran up the steps to aide their queen. With a quick back spin, I unleashed my throwing knife into the eye socket of one, and the other . . . Sawyn grabbed him and stabbed a dagger into his belly and booted him back down the steps.
“She’s mine, fool,” Sawyn snarled, booting the bleeding Rook back down the steps. “No one gets between a Wolf and her prey. Speaking of,” our blades locked and she took the moment to casually look me up and down as if she had all the time in the world even as screams and sobs echoed through the throne room around us, “Why haven’t you shifted? Not Wolf enough, you bloody skin chaser?”
I shoved her back and took a swift sidestep to avoid the swipe of her blade. My steel met her own, slamming into her cross guard as I growled, “I’ve spent too many hours sharpening this blade to end you with my teeth.”
I lunged forward, catching her side. I wasn’t sure if I caught skin or only fabric but Sawyn’s eyes flared at me as her green magic sputtered, trying and failing to protect her. A flicker of betrayal flashed in her eyes as she glanced from the slashed fabric at her waist to me. “Everything I’ve done would’ve benefited you, too, you ungrateful bitch.”
“Including killing my family?” I asked with disdain.
She didn’t have an answer for that.
Fast as a snake, she struck again, and I barely had time to block her blow. My arms buckled. A messy block. My hand flew wide and I darted backward, knowing she’d take advantage of my exposed side. I twisted again, using the momentum to yank my paring knife off my belt and drive it into her bicep. She growled, grabbing my wrist and twisting until the knife clattered free. She kicked it off the dais, scowling at the blood seeping from her arm.
“I thought you had plans for that dagger?” She lashed out with maddening speed. Again and again. I tried to find another opening in her defenses.
“I have more plans than just that,” I said, retreating a step, then another, leading her back toward the throne until I could drop into it. “I have plans to take my rightful place right here. I have plans to steal back everything you have taken from my kingdom.”
I knew it would infuriate her enough—seeing me on that throne—to take that final step, the one I’d been slowly goading and guiding her to take with all my feigned blows and seemingly faulty footwork. And when she did, Maez was there. A chain looped around Sawyn’s neck and Maez yanked it tight, making the sorceress’s eyes bulge from her skull. I didn’t hesitate, driving up with my golden blade and plunging it into Sawyn’s gut.
“This is for Olmdere. And this,” I said, twisting my dagger until blood poured from her wound. “This is for all the Wolves like me too afraid to claim their true selves because of people like you. We fear your hate no longer.” I twisted the knife again as Sawyn choked on her own blood. “And this is for all of the humans you tried to crush under your boot.”
Sawyn’s sword clattered to the ground and her bloodshot eyes welled, brimming over with heedless tears. Maez let her drop, crouching over Sawyn and grabbing the keys to her collar out of the sorceress’s pocket.
Maez wheezed as her collar crashed to the floor and, without a pause, she rushed down the dais to Briar. Her muddy hands brushed Briar’s hair out of her eyes. She bent down so tenderly, clutching Briar’s lifeless face, and whispered, “Please work.”
Tears slipped down her cheek as she kissed Briar, tracing clean trails through the grime. I held my breath, waiting, hoping. Maez’s arms shook as she kept her lips planted on Briar’s, a desperate cry coming from their joined lips. My heart punched into my ribs, watching for signs of life.
“Wake up, wake up.” She chanted it like a prayer. “Please,” she sobbed.
Briar’s finger twitched and a howl escaped my lips as she lifted her hand to Maez’s cheek. The room seemed to pause, a collective gasp rising up as Briar’s eyes fluttered open. In another blink, they returned to the melee. Performers mobbed the Rooks, overtaking them three to one—far more musicians, jugglers, bards, and acrobats than the feathered obsidian guards. It hadn’t seemed like that even moments before, my focus naturally drifting to the formidable guards, but now that I surveyed them all individually, there were hundreds of human performers entering the fray.
They were a whorl of colorful costumes and detailing and . . . My eyes widened when I spotted them.
Badges.
A sea of badges, every color of the rainbow, filled the hall. The same ones I’d seen hanging above the kitchen table in Galen den’ Mora. The ones I’d noticed missing before. There was the blue songbird and there was the crescent moon. In the corner was the red candle and at the back door was the white rose. My hands trembled and my chest heaved. They’d come. The humans had come to defeat Sawyn. They’d come to help Ora, to help me.
Rooks began tearing off their uniforms, dropping to their knees and raising their hands in surrender. Their hand scythes clattered to the ground; their loyalties so easily turned.
I took a step forward toward my sister, and a hand grabbed my ankle. I scowled down at the bloodied fingers and then up at Sawyn’s pale face. Blood dripped from her mouth as she coughed. With the wound in her gut and the poison coursing through her veins, no magic would cure her. Even shifting was beyond her now. Hers was the face of someone in their final moments, but there was no fear in her eyes, only pure wrath.
Standing before the throne of my ancestors, I crouched down to Sawyn.
“Do you know who won this battle?” I whispered, my lips curving up at the anger and hate in her eyes. “The humans. If you’d only seen their true power, you could’ve been here to lead this better world.”
“You fool.” She panted ragged wet breaths, blood trailing from her mouth and nose. “You’re turning your back on your own kind. You’re giving away your power to those sheep.”
“I’m gaining so much more than you could ever know. You feared losing power so much that you cut off everyone who would’ve helped you attain it.” Sawyn reached for her sword, but I stepped on the blade and slid it out of her pawing grasp. “You were a one-Wolf kingdom, Sa-wyn, so consumed with being above everyone that you ended up with no one but yourself. That’s why all this felt so hollow, like something was missing.” I waved my arms around the grand hall. “The things that separate us and the humans are so much smaller than you would choose to believe.”
“People.” Sawyn’s eyelids began to flutter, the poison flooding her veins as blood pooled around her. She screwed her eyes shut as if summoning the strength to take her last breath. “Let’s see your powerful humans save you from this.”
She threw out her hand and a loud crack shook the ground, pulsing through the air. A flash of bright green light made me shield my eyes . . . and then silence.