Irina shrieked her victory.
Leo’s face blazed across her mind, the laughter in his eyes turning black with Irina’s spell. Her father fell to the floor, already dying from the bite from the snake Irina had sent after him. The woman in the Falkrains sobbed over the bodies of her children before plunging her knife into her own chest. The land was rotting, the people desperately crying out for salvation; and Kol, an honorable king who’d only wanted to save his people, was lost.
All because of Irina.
Fury was a burning stone in Lorelai’s chest. It was the power in her blood, the strength of her bones. It was the beat of her heart—the heart of Ravenspire’s true queen come to save those she loved from ruin.
“Hat`sja oyti!” Lorelai’s voice rose as Kol struck, breaking the skin, tearing the muscle. “Hat`sja oyti!”
Pain was a flash of blinding agony that seized Lorelai’s entire body, but she kept her palms pressed flat against the floor, her magic pouring into Ravenspire with every furious beat of her heart.
The rumble grew louder. The marble shook, shivered, and cracked. And then the floor beneath Irina’s feet fell away and a fiery river of molten lava gushed from the belly of Ravenspire and surrounded her.
Irina screamed an incantor, but there was nothing for her to touch except the blazing stone that already obeyed Lorelai. Her eyes met Lorelai’s, and the fury in them dissolved into bewildered pain as the lava surged forward and dragged the wicked queen down into the depths of Ravenspire.
The swords dropped harmlessly to the floor, and the snapping vines disintegrated into dust.
The collar around Kol’s neck snapped in two and fell from his neck.
The snake wrapped around Gabril’s neck shrank until it became the harmless garden snake Leo had been playing with the night his father died.
Lorelai’s blood poured from her chest.
Kol closed his eyes and shook his head, as if trying to understand where he was and what was happening.
This isn’t your fault, Lorelai sent to him, and his eyes flew open as she used the last of her strength to say, I forgive you.
Horror filled his face as he saw his hand. Her blood.
He leaned toward her, but her strength was gone, and darkness claimed her.
FORTY
KOL JERKED HIS hand away from Lorelai’s chest and stared in horror at the blood pouring from her. Her eyes were closed. Her body lay limp on the crumpled marble floor, surrounded by the dust of the things that used to be vines.
Skies, no. Lorelai? Lorelai! His heart thudded against his chest, but there was no call to hurt, punish, and kill because he’d already done it. He’d hurt her.
He’d killed her.
He’d killed the girl who’d saved him.
His hands shook, and his throat ached with unshed tears as he doubled over and pressed his forehead to hers. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.
It didn’t matter how many times he said it, or how deeply he meant it. It only mattered that she was gone, and that he’d done it.
So what if Irina had driven him to it? It wasn’t Irina’s fingers covered in Lorelai’s blood. It was his.
He didn’t know how he was ever going to be able to shoulder the guilt.
The memory of her gaze and the kindness in her eyes as she told him it wasn’t his fault and that she forgave him were blazing coals in his chest. He didn’t want her forgiveness.
He wanted her.
He wanted her, but she’d done what she’d promised she’d do. She’d destroyed Irina. She’d set Ravenspire free. And she’d sacrificed herself to save Kol.
He choked on a sob and stroked her pale cheek. Ran his fingers through her long dark hair as grief ripped at him. Pressed his thumb against her red lips and jerked upright in shock as the faintest whisper of a breath passed her lips.
She was alive.
She was alive, and he wasn’t going to fail her again. He couldn’t call for help without his human heart to give him words. He refused to leave her side when he had no idea where to find a physician or how to make himself understood in time.
He’d have to save her himself. He stared at the wound in her chest and ordered himself to think. There was a solution, there had to be, and if anyone was skilled at finding unlikely solutions around sticky problems, it was Kol.
His dragon heart thumped in agreement, and its fire stirred in his chest.
His fire.
Quickly, he called the heat and let it blaze through him until it reached his hands.
If he could melt a sword with his touch, he could seal Lorelai’s wound.
He lay his hands across the wound he’d made and prayed to the skies above that it would work. The heat sizzled against her flesh, cauterizing the blood flow.