Kill the Queen

by Jennifer Estep

  “Watch out!” I screamed, but it was no use.

  Maeven threw her lightning at the doors, driving people away from them. Everyone dove for cover behind the overturned tables and chairs, and she kept tossing bolt after bolt of lightning at them, smiling all the while, like a cat playing with an entire den of mice.

  She was so busy trying to kill people that she didn’t notice that her lightning had shattered the glass doors, creating a jagged opening. All I had to do was distract Maeven long enough for Gemma to escape. That bitch might be a magier, but this mutt knew more than one trick, and I could handle a little lightning.

  But first, I had to get Gemma over to the doors. I was still sprawled on top of Isobel, and I scrambled to my feet. “Forgive me,” I whispered, although she was far beyond any sort of hearing now.

  Then I reached down, grabbed hold of the sword still stuck in her chest, and yanked it free. Isobel thumped back down to the ground, and I had to remind myself that I wasn’t hurting her, that she was gone, dead, and that I would be too if I didn’t move. More tears streamed down my face, but I gritted my teeth and turned away from her.

  Keeping low, I darted over to Gemma, grabbed her arm, and yanked her out from under the table. She yelped and started to pull away, but I gave her a small shake, trying to snap her out of her panic. After a moment, she realized that I wasn’t one of the guards and that I wasn’t trying to hurt her.

  “Do you know Alvis?” I yelled over the chaos. “The Andvarian master? Do you know where his workshop is?”

  The Andvarians always visited with Alvis whenever they came to Seven Spire, and I was hoping that Gemma had been to his dungeon workshop. Her eyes were so wide that I thought they might pop off her face and roll away like marbles, but she finally nodded.

  I pointed out the opening in the glass to her. “Then you go through those doors and run to his workshop as fast as you can. Don’t you dare stop for anything. You tell him what’s going on and that Evie said to get out of the palace. Do you understand?”

  I hadn’t been able to save Isobel, but maybe I could help Alvis. It was a long shot at best, but it was the girl’s only hope of escape, and Alvis’s too.

  More tears rolled down Gemma’s cheeks, but she nodded again.

  “That’s a brave girl. Here we go. One, two, three, go!”

  I grabbed her hand, and we sprinted toward the shattered doors. But as soon as we started running, I realized that we weren’t going to make it. One of the guards, a mutt with some speed magic, was closing in on us. Together, Gemma and I were too slow and too much of a target to reach the doors. But she might be able to make it—if I cut him off.

  So I shoved her forward, put my shoulder down, and veered to my right, barreling into the guard and knocking him as far away from her as I could. Gemma stopped and looked over her shoulder, but I waved at her.

  “Don’t stop! Keep going!” I yelled.

  Her lips flattened out into a grim, determined line, and she stepped in my direction, as if she was going to come to my rescue. But she never got the chance. Xenia grabbed the girl around the waist and scooped her up.

  My eyes widened. I had studied the ogre face on her neck dozens of times, but I had never seen Xenia’s actual morph form before, and it was truly terrifying.

  Lady Xenia had grown to more than six feet tall, and the muscles in her arms and legs bulged against her clothes, straining the fabric. Long black talons tipped her fingers, each one dripping blood. More blood covered her face, including each and every one of the sharp, jagged teeth that now filled her mouth. Her amber eyes burned like torches, and her coppery hair glimmered with a dark red light, even as the strands whipped around her face, almost like they were coral vipers that were writhing around her head.

  Our gazes locked, and I shook off my surprise and waved at her.

  “Go! Save the girl!”

  I didn’t know if she heard me, but Xenia loped away, sprinting for the shattered doors.

  I started to follow her, but the guard I’d knocked down got up, surged forward, and slammed his fist into my face. Pain exploded in my jaw, and white stars winked on and off in my eyes, but I blinked them away and focused on Xenia, who was still racing toward the doors.

  Maeven tossed a bolt of lightning at the morph. The magic clipped Xenia’s shoulder, spinning her around and making her yelp like a wounded animal. She staggered, almost dropping the girl, but she tightened her grip and kept going, and she crashed through what little glass was left in the doors and into the palace. Xenia and Gemma disappeared from sight.

  Maeven snapped her fingers at the closest guards. “No one escapes!” she hissed. “After them! Now!”

  A couple of guards peeled off from the main part of the battle and headed in that direction, darting through the opening after Xenia and Gemma.

  I hoped that the two of them made it to safety. I hoped that they were able to reach Alvis and warn him. But I’d done all that I could for them, and now it was time to try to save myself.

  I blinked away the last of the stars and faced the guard. He surged toward me again, but his boot slipped on a bloody patch of grass. Before he could recover his balance, I lunged forward and buried my sword in his stomach. His eyes bulged, and he screamed with pain. I shoved the sword in a little deeper, then yanked it free.

  He toppled to the ground, and I turned toward the doors again. Maybe if I was lucky I could sneak up behind the guards who had gone after Xenia and Gemma and kill them—

  “No!” a deep, familiar voice shouted. “No! Stay away from her!”

  I whirled around. Vasilia was clutching her sword and advancing on Durante, who was standing in front of Madelena, shielding his pregnant wife with his own body, and holding out the stem of a broken champagne flute like it was some sort of weapon. I hesitated, torn between running toward the doors and whatever safety might lie beyond and trying to save them. Madelena had never been particularly kind to me, but she had never been cruel either. And her baby was innocent of everything.

  I cursed and ran in that direction, darting around the panicked people who were still alive, ducking the turncoat guards who tried to attack me, and hopscotching over the bloody bodies, broken glasses, and cracked tables that littered the lawn. But I was too far away, and I wasn’t going to reach them in time. Even if I had, Vasilia could easily cut me down with her sword. Still, I had to try. Vasilia might not have a conscience, but I did, and I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I didn’t at least try.

  Durante lashed out with his broken glass, but Vasilia avoided the clumsy blow, snapped up her hand, and unleashed her lightning. Durante screamed, his body convulsed, and the stench of fried flesh filled the air again. A few seconds later, Durante crumpled to the ground, smoke rising off his charred skin. His chest convulsed a few more times, and then he was still, his gaze locked onto his wife, as if he was still trying to protect her, even in death.

  Madelena put her hands over her stomach and backed up. “Please, Vasilia,” she begged, tears streaming down her face. “You don’t have to do this. I’m not a threat to you. I never have been.”

  “I know,” Vasilia said. “But I don’t care.”

  She snapped up her sword, lunged forward, and stabbed her sister in the heart. Madelena didn’t even have time to scream before Vasilia twisted her sword in even deeper, then yanked it free. Madelena crumpled to the ground, one hand stretched out toward her husband and the other curled over her stomach, still trying to protect her unborn baby, even though it was as dead as she was.

  Vasilia smiled with satisfaction, whirled around, and waded back into the fight, using her sword and her lightning to kill everyone in her path.

  My steps slowed, and I stopped in the middle of the lawn, staring at Madelena and swaying from side to side, as the chaos raged all around me. Something wet stung my cheeks, and I realized that more tears were streaming down my face. I had always known that Vasilia was cruel, but I had never thought that she would be so heartless as to m
urder her own pregnant sister.

  What kind of nightmare was this? And how could I escape from it? I wanted to rewind time and go back to this morning, when the worst thing in my world was making pies.

  But the screams, shrieks, and vicious attacks continued, and I knew that I could never escape this. Even if I somehow survived the massacre, I would never, ever forget this—

  “To me! To me!” Captain Auster’s voice rang out. “Protect the queen!”

  My head snapped in that direction. Auster had managed to get Cordelia out of the kill zone in the center of the lawn, and he’d maneuvered what few men he had left so that their backs were to the stone wall that overlooked the cliffs and the river below. Auster headed to his left, toward the shattered doors that Lady Xenia had gone through, but Nox and several turncoats charged forward to block his path.

  Auster and his men were closer to the doors than I was now, and I darted through the melee, trying to reach them and swinging my sword at every single turncoat who came near me. Not because I thought the remaining guards would protect me—the queen was and should be their top priority—but because they were the only ones left standing.

  Everyone else was dead or dying.

  I was probably going to wind up that way too, but I couldn’t reach the doors by myself, and Auster and his men at least gave me a fighting chance. And if I was going to die, then I wanted to die protecting the queen, the same as them. I wanted to do my royal duty one last time, maybe the only time that it would ever matter, that it would ever truly help someone.

  But once again, I was too late.

  Auster was busy fighting Nox and two turncoats, so he didn’t see Vasilia sprint up and slice her sword across the stomach of the guard who was the closest to the queen. That man screamed and toppled to the ground, giving Vasilia a clear path to her mother.

  Cordelia leaned down and fumbled for the dead man’s sword, but Vasilia kicked the blade out of her hand. Cordelia scrambled up and backed away from her daughter, but there was nowhere for her to go, and she hit the wall a second later.

  Vasilia knew that she had her mother trapped, and she stopped, another smile filling her face as she twirled her sword around in her hand. The bitch was savoring the moment.

  Cordelia lifted her chin and squared her shoulders. Then she bowed her head, congratulating her daughter on her treacherous victory, and raised her arms out to her sides, accepting her fate.

  “Trying to die with a little bit of dignity?” Vasilia sneered. “You should know by now that there’s no such thing.”

  “You’ll discover that for yourself soon enough when your Mortan friends betray you,” Cordelia said. “My only regret is that I won’t be alive to see it.”

  She stared at her daughter, her face as cold as ice, and widened her arms, embracing the death in front of her.

  Rage sparked in Vasilia’s eyes, and she drew her sword back and then swung it forward, determined to kill her mother.

  “No!” I screamed. “No! Stop!”

  My shouts surprised Vasilia, and she didn’t put the full force of her body behind the blow, but she still did plenty of damage. Her sword bit into the queen’s side, and Cordelia screamed and staggered back. She hit the wall behind her again and bounced off, her legs buckling and her body crumpling to the ground.

  Vasilia turned toward me, but I rammed my shoulder into hers, knocking her down to the ground and away from the queen. Then I hurried over and dropped to my knees beside Cordelia. Her back was up against the wall, with her legs tucked under her body. She had her hand clamped on her side, but blood still gushed out from between her fingers.

  “Get up!” I yelled. “You have to get up! You have to move!”

  I reached out to grab her arm and haul her to her feet, but Cordelia caught my hand in hers. She blinked several times, as if she was having trouble focusing on me through the pain of her gruesome wound, but she finally managed it.

  “Everleigh,” she murmured, surprise flashing in her gray-blue eyes. “Of course it’s you. The little orphan girl nobody wanted. First your parents, and now me. You’re surprisingly good at surviving assassinations.”

  My mouth dropped open, but I didn’t know what to say. Why was she talking about my parents? Why now? Was her mind already gone?

  Cordelia’s lips curved up into a smile, and she actually laughed, as if she found something about this whole situation highly amusing. But her laughter soon turned into a racking cough, and blood bubbled up out of her mouth and trickled down her chin. Her gaze moved past me, and she stared at the bodies that littered the lawn like dead, brittle leaves. Sorrow sparked in her gaze, and a single tear escaped from the corner of her eye, but she focused on me again.

  “Summer queens are fine and fair, with pretty ribbons and flowers in their hair. Winter queens are cold and hard, with frosted crowns made of icy shards,” she rasped in a low, urgent voice.

  It took me a moment to recognize the phrase as an old fairy-tale rhyme, one that my mother used to sing to get me to sleep. “Why would you say that? What are you talking about?”

  “Because you’re the last one left. The last Winter queen. You have to live,” Cordelia rasped. “You have to survive, no matter what you have to do, no matter who you have to cheat and hurt and kill, no matter what the cost is to your heart and soul. Do you hear me, Everleigh? You have to live. You have to protect Bellona. Promise me you’ll do that.”

  Vasilia shook off her daze and got back up onto her feet. Behind her, more and more turncoats advanced on our position. I wasn’t getting off the lawn alive, but there was no need to make the queen’s death any more painful than it already was.

  “I promise,” I said. “I promise to protect Bellona until my dying breath.”

  A smile flitted across Cordelia’s face, and she nodded. Then she reached up, dug her fingers into my loose, tangled hair, and pulled my face down to hers, so close that her gray-blue eyes filled my vision. Tearstone eyes, Blair eyes, just like mine.

  “Find Serilda Swanson,” she whispered in a low voice that only I could hear. “She’ll . . . protect you, help you, train you. Tell her . . . that you’re the last Winter queen. She’ll understand. And tell her . . . tell her . . . that I was . . . wrong . . . and that . . . I’m sorry . . . for everything . . .”

  Cordelia sucked in another breath, like she was going to say something else, but her breath escaped in a soft puff of air that kissed my cheek. Her fingers slid free from my hair, and her head lolled to the side, her gaze fixed on something far, far beyond me.

  My heart ached, and more tears streamed down my face, but I didn’t bother saying her name or shaking her shoulders like I had with Isobel. There was no use.

  The queen was dead.

  Chapter Eight

  I didn’t know how long I stared at Cordelia. It seemed like forever, although it probably wasn’t more than a few seconds. I reached out and gently closed her eyes. I studied her face, committing it to memory, along with her cryptic last words. I wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t like I was going to have time to puzzle out her meaning.

  I would be joining her in death soon enough.

  Footsteps scuffed through the grass behind me. I’d dropped my sword when I’d been trying to help Cordelia, but I didn’t bother to pick it up, since I was now trapped up against the wall. Instead, I drew in a breath, got to my feet, and turned around, determined to meet my death with the same dignity that the queen had.

  Vasilia stood in front of me, her sword dangling from her hand. Her gray-blue gaze, the one that was so much like mine, swept over me, taking in my wild, disheveled hair, the cuts and bruises on my face and hands, the grass stains on my clothes, and the blood that covered me from head to toe, like I’d been dipped in rusty paint.

  “Well, well, well, if it isn’t Everleigh,” Vasilia said, a mocking note in her voice. “You surprised me, cousin. I wouldn’t have thought that you would have survived this long.”

  “And I wouldn’t have thought that you wo
uld have slaughtered everyone. But I should have known better. You always were a treacherous bitch, even when we were kids.”

  She smiled, as though my hateful words amused her. She had always been able to smile, no matter how I tried to best her, no matter how hard I tried to hurt her the same way that she had hurt me. My hands clenched into fists, and I longed to slam them into her over and over again until she was as bloody, broken, and dead as everyone else. But she would kill me with her sword before I landed a single punch, so I forced myself to stand still.

  Felton was hovering behind her, along with the turncoat guards. More turncoats surrounded Auster, who was still on his feet, although he had been disarmed, and Nox had his sword pressed up against the captain’s throat. Maeven stood off to the side, all by herself, her arms crossed over her chest, staring at me with a thoughtful expression.

  I peered past them, my gaze sweeping over the lawn. It looked like a waterspout had surged up from the river, arced over the stone wall, and crashed down onto the area. Broken tables and splintered chairs stuck up out of the grass at crazy angles, many of them marking the spots where the dead lay.

  My gaze rested on Madelena’s crumpled form, then flicked to Isobel’s body. I wanted to fall to my knees and scream and scream, but I couldn’t do that. I wouldn’t do that. Vasilia and the others were going to kill me, but I wasn’t going to beg, and they weren’t going to see me cry—

  Thwack-thwack-thwack.

  That strange sound, along with a few soft moans and groans, startled me out of my grim thoughts. Some people were still alive, and the turncoats were moving from one person to the next, stabbing them until they were dead.

  The weak, whimpering pleas of the injured, and the resounding, unrelenting thwacks of the turncoats’ swords biting into flesh and bone, were almost more than I could bear. But I watched while what was left of the Blair royal family—my family—was slaughtered.