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“I should put all four of your heads on a pike for treason. I just assaulted the Queen, and you cowards stood there and watched me do it. The next time someone lays a hand on her and you don’t kill them where they stand, I’ll carve out your eyeballs and feed them to the fucking hounds. It doesn’t matter if it’s me or the Regent or Blessed Mother Lumnos herself. Do your damn jobs and protect our Queen.”
“They want us to feel small, Eleanor. They want us to be quiet, be predictable, be unimportant, behave. Then they make us think we deserve it. But I think they’re just terrified we’ll stop listening to them and start listening to each other. And do you know why they’re so scared of women like us?”
“But rest assured, my Queen, when I do kiss you, there will be no confusion. You will know that I have claimed you—and I won’t have any desire to deny it.”
“Or maybe you prefer me in muddy pants and a borrowed tunic.” “Only when it’s mine.”
“That if a man made you doubt whether his love for you would survive anything, he does not deserve you.”
“Unleash, my Queen. Show this world what it means to Challenge Diem Bellator.”
He smiled—a true smile, broad and exquisite, his face radiating such matchless brilliance that I pitied the sun.
“Don’t worry about it, Queenie. We’ve got your back.”
“With all due respect to my lovely cousin, the only person I’m getting down on my knees for is you, my Queen.”
“Queenie, you hear that? Lu wants to get on his kn—” Luther flicked his wrist, and a burst of shadow flew from his palm and smacked against Taran’s face, sealing like a gag across his mouth. Taran yelped and tugged at the dark patch as he let loose a string of muffled curses.
“If a kiss is the reward, my Queen, I’ll get on my knees for you whenever you want.”
I know how easily your beauty shines through.”
“You are my Queen, and I am your sword. Point me at your enemies, and watch them fall. Lead this world, Diem, and I will follow you—into war, into death, into the tundra of hell itself.” He took my palm and set it against his chest, just above the patch of unscarred skin that lay beneath his jacket. “You are the fate my heart was spared for. As long as it beats, you will never fight alone.”
“I want every breath, every laugh, every tear. Every taste of your mouth, every inch of your skin. I want to kneel at your feet, soaked in the blood of your enemies, then worship your body until you scream my name.” His hands slid to my hips and tugged me closer. “Yes, Diem, I want to serve you—in every way a man can.”
“I want to burn alive in that fire in your eyes. I want it to melt me down and forge me into the weapon you need me to be. I want to stand by your side for the rest of my life, and I don’t need you to marry me and make me a fucking king to do it.”
It’s a reminder that no challenge can destroy the parts of us that truly matter. We’re not reborn in the flames. We’re revealed.”
“I would have walked into the flaming heart of the sun itself,” he shot back. “If you are suffering, nothing will keep me from coming to your aid. Least of all something as trivial as death.”
“Perhaps, for the right person, we endure the pain, because the torture of never having them at all is the more unbearable fate.”
Taran pumping his fist and yelling “finally!” at the top of his lungs.
His mighty aura cascaded around me and within me, tasting me as deeply as his tongue. It spilled into my soul and branded me with his power, claiming me inside and out. The kiss was a warning to the crowd, but this was a threat to the gods themselves: If you take her from me, I will come for you, too.
“I am yours, Luther Corbois. Scars and all.”
“It’s rude to kiss a man like that and then die, Your Majesty,” Luther panted, his breath hot against my swollen lips. I hummed. “I guess that means I’ll have to live.”
“You are fearless. You are strong. You do not cower in the faces of gods nor kings. You are fated for greater battles than this, so you do whatever it takes, and you fight like hell.”
