I want to tell him it doesn’t have to be like this. But it’s not only the weight on my chest that stops me.
It’s also because I know the Ezryn that would offer him forgiveness died.
The Ezryn who believed in mercy died.
So it does have to be like this. Me. Or him.
Then Kairyn moves strangely. He puts his hands on either side of his helm and lifts.
My brother shakes his head, his long black hair falling free. Dark eyes peer back at me.
I remember them.
I remember them, lit up as he ran through Meadowmere, chasing fireflies. I remember them looking up at me as we flipped through picture books in our shared bedroom. I remember them staring at me with both fear and admiration as I donned my first helm and never saw his face with my naked eyes again.
Until now.
Kairyn’s lip trembles and his voice cracks. “You would choose death rather than stand by my side?”
I fight against the breathlessness in my chest, the great weight. “It would not be to stand by you, brother, but to kneel before you. And that is something I cannot do, not with what you have done.”
A hardness falls across his features. “Then you will die.”
I close my eyes. For some reason, it brings me peace to have seen my brother’s face one last time. I only hope Kel and Rose can find a way out of this. That there will be peace for them.
My Petal. I’m so sorry.
Kairyn grips the hilt of the hammer. Even the smallest bit of extra pressure on my chest sends me gasping. “Look at me as I end your life.”
He pushes down.
My first rib breaks with a snap. I can’t even scream, all the wind ripped from my lungs. Kairyn’s face is soft as he pushes down and down. “It’s okay,” he murmurs as he kills me. “Look at me. Shush, shush. Look at me. It’s okay.”
My chest is caving in. Agony ripples out from my ribs to my fingertips, my legs, my skull. Kairyn’s face fades in bursts of blackness.
I know it now for good.
I’m going to die.
And I hope she knows … I hope she knows how much I loved her.
There’s the sound of plant fibers shredding, and something flashes in my peripheral vision. I fight through the darkness to see it.
Another similar sound and flash occur on my opposite side. I turn my head.
A thorn. Dark purple.
Another thorned vine erupts out of the ground, then another, tearing open the dome. Kairyn releases the hammer and quickly puts his helm back on, looking around. “What’s going on?”
I recognize these thorns. They feel like home.
A huge briar spurts up, cracking through the stone ground, and slams into Kairyn. He flies backward, hitting the floor hard. Then it’s as if a whole briar appears, tearing down Kairyn’s dome. One of the thorned vines wraps around the hilt of the hammer and pulls.
I gasp in a rattling breath, relief flooding through me at the release of pressure. I force myself up. At least one rib is broken, maybe two, a couple more bruised.
I turn to the huge bramble bush. And floating above it, held aloft by thorned vines, is Caspian.
His arms are crossed, a smirk on his face.
He looks horrible. His skin is ghastly pale. A black goo oozes out from his nose and mouth. And though his eyes are bruised and lined with dark circles, there’s a defiant look there that I’ve never seen him without.
Caspian. The Prince of Thorns. My enemy.
Saved my life.
The thorned vines float Caspian to the ground. He walks over to me, hips swaying side to side as if he were attending the fanciest dinner party. “Why, Ezryn, I adore the new look. You’re certainly not hideous. What a treat.”
I look from him to my brother, lying in a pile of rubble, to Kel and Rose still fending off the knights.
Then a gurgled cry emits from the throne. My father falls, tumbling down the steps.
I turn my back to Caspian without a second thought, racing to my father as fast as my injured body will carry me. He lies face down at the base of the stairs, convulsing.
I fall to my knees beside him and look back at Caspian. “I don’t understand why you did what you did, but … Thank you. Can you get us out of here?”
Caspian isn’t looking at me, or even Kel or Rosalina. He’s looking at my father.
“Caspian!” I cry.
“Ezryn,” he says, voice low and gravelly. “You need to step away—”
I shake my head, turning back to my father. His whole body seizes. He needs help. He needs a healer. He needs—
A thorned vine shoots out from Caspian’s hand.
And stabs straight into my father’s heart.
105
Rosalina
Everything is happening too fast: the spray of Keldarion’s ice shield as he barely holds the sword and lance at bay, the thorns carving through the ground, Caspian appearing—Caspian! Caspian! Caspian!—and Ezryn’s cry, something born of both rage and sorrow, as the Prince of Thorns drives a sharpened vine through Thalionor’s heart.
Ezryn clutches his father’s lifeless body, mouth agape. Strangled cries escape him as he shakes the old fae. He places his hand over the gaping wound, spewing heart’s blood, but even I can see Thalionor is already gone.
Across the throne room, I notice Kairyn staggering up.
How could you? I gasp in my mind, eyes on Caspian. He wavers. I’ve never seen him like this. So weak. So sick.
Caspian begins to cough. They’re so strong, his whole body wracks. A trail of sludge ejects from his mouth on to the floor. The purple thorns start to wither and die.
I retreat behind Keldarion, heart pounding. The knights haven’t stopped their relentless attack, and Kel is barely holding them off. Caspian is so weak. He just killed Prince Thalionor. And Ez…
Ez drops his father’s body. Stands. Walks a few steps, back stiff, to where his sword lies. Picks it up. Turns to face Caspian.
“You killed my father,” he says lowly. “Now, your death belongs to me.”
Caspian sighs. “I thought that might be the case.”
Stop! I scream in my mind, but neither of them turn to me.
A great shadow engulfs us, bringing the smell of swamp and mulch. Plants slither from the pillars, the ground, the ceiling, and rally to Kairyn. They wrap around his limbs and chest; he grows five feet, then ten as more and more plants form giant legs, lifting him into the air. Moss and vines cover his arms, creating two long whips.
Kairyn lurches his massive, botanical body back and bellows, a sound like felling trees.
“You will all pay!” he cries, then whips one of his large plant arms forward, knocking away the Sapphire and Bronze Knights. Then he wraps Kel and me in his vines, squeezing us so tight, I lose the grip on my bow. It clatters to the ground. We’re flung upward, far above the throne.
With his other arm, he does the same to Ez and Cas, wrapping them together and lifting them high into the air. The musty aroma of decaying vegetation clouds my nose.
“Each one of you has been nothing but a relentless weed since I first met you,” Kairyn growls. “I pluck you out, and yet you keep coming back.”