This is going to be easier than I thought, Irina said. I made a mistake containing the curse to your collar. I’m going to rectify that the second she touches you. As I’m sure you felt when her magic brushed against you, I’ve all but destroyed the bond you shared with her. The two of us together are unstoppable, Kolvanismir. You will do as you are told. And if you even think about defying me again, I will squeeze the life out of your human heart and leave you with nothing.
I won’t kill Lorelai. He held the princess’s gaze, trying to tell her with his eyes how much she meant to him as he waited for Irina to destroy him.
Lorelai shook her head vehemently as if she could see that he was waiting to die, and took another step toward him.
So then I guess we move on to contender number two in our little game. If you refuse to kill the princess, then you will go to the capital and kill this woman and her children instead. Irina showed him an image of a pretty woman with dark skin and black hair cut close to her scalp. Two boys, who each looked remarkably like Gabril, stood at her side.
Kol clenched his fists as the pain in his chest spread down his veins, and struggled to draw an unfettered breath. Skies, it hurt. Worse than anything he’d ever imagined. Worse than the torture she’d inflicted on him already. Worse than losing his human heart. His thoughts were fraying, and his dragon heart beat was surging, viciously demanding its due.
I won’t . . . Where were his words? He reached for them, and they floated away, awash in a sea of unendurable pain.
You will. Irina sounded satisfied. I own you. I have your human heart in my hand. I have your little bond with Lorelai corrupted. I control what you can remember. I control the pain. I control YOU, and there is no one who can save you from me, Kolvanismir, least of all Lorelai.
I won’t . . . He closed his eyes and struggled to remember what it was he wouldn’t do. Disobey his queen? That sounded wrong, but it was the only thought he could find that made any sense.
Don’t disobey his queen. Make the pain stop.
“Nakh`rashk.” Lorelai’s voice, full of fury and power, filled the cave. “Nakh`rashk! Find Irina’s magic and scatter it to the winds.” Her hands, ablaze with magic, wrapped around his, and he arced his back, his jaw locked helplessly against the waves of agony that swept over him.
Irina’s laughter filled his head. Lorelai gets to die first, but I think we’ll go ahead and kill the others as well, just to make it a tidy little victory.
He was consumed, every piece of him, with red-hot light. Irina’s magic collided with Lorelai’s and became a cage of brilliant flames that felt like they would burrow beneath his skin until they incinerated his bones.
Stop, he begged, but no one listened.
Irina was laughing.
Lorelai was saying her incantor over and over, her eyes blazing as she fought to push Irina’s magic out of his body.
And his body . . . his body was fire. It was pain. It was more than he could stand.
Stay with me, Kol. Lorelai’s voice was a soft caress within his tortured mind, and there was something he had to tell her. Some warning he needed to give, but it was lost in the unraveling of his thoughts. I won’t let you go. I won’t let her take you.
Irina stopped laughing. Time to teach her whom she’s dealing with.
The collar around his neck seemed to tighten, and a wave of magic that felt thick as sludge slid out of the collar and over his arms.
He tried to pull away from Lorelai, but her magic was wrapped around his wrists, and she was determined not to let him go.
Please, he said but no one was listening. Irina was chanting words he couldn’t understand, and they seemed to devour the last of his reason and deliver a terrible thirst for pain in its place.
He was fire, blood, and death.
No, you aren’t. You’re Kolvanismir Arsenyevnek, ruler of Eldr. You’re stronger than she thinks. You can fight this. I’ll help you, Kol. Fight this. Fight!
He fought. He strove to drown out the awful pounding of his dragon heart. To ignore the scathing fire that dwelled where he’d once been human.
To pull away from Irina.
He fought, but he was losing.
Lorelai was losing.
The tainted magic that seeped from his collar coated his wrists, slid over the bonds of Lorelai’s magic, and then leaped for her hands.
She screamed, throwing her head back as the pain that lived inside Kol poured into her instead, leaving him as empty as a canyon with a river of magic rushing through it.
See? Irina whispered against his ear. I’m stronger. I control you. And now because she tried to save you, because you both defied me, you get to watch her die.
Let go, he urged Lorelai, but the thought refused to breach the curtain of Irina’s magic. He was trapped inside himself, lost to the impulses of his dragon and the cruel wishes of his mistress. And Lorelai, the girl who had fought so hard to save him, was going to die.
He yanked at their joined hands, ferociously determined to break their connection as Lorelai’s already pale skin went white with strain. Her voice broke, her breath was a sob in her throat, and tears streamed from her eyes as she met his gaze.
I’m sorry, he said, but she couldn’t hear him. No one could.
No one but his queen.