The Rivaled Crown (The Veiled Kingdom, #3)

by Holly Renee

I was a threat to everything he stood for. And still, he had chosen me. Even after the betrayal, after learning my true identity, after every reason I had given him to turn away, he had protected me. He had given me the most dangerous weapon of all. Hope.

but now I feared what I truly was. I feared that I had become the one thing my father always wanted me to be. I was a siphon. I was just like him. I was powerless on my own.

“Let me be clear,” I said, my voice like a whip. “I will choose her over every one of you.”

“I am not an enemy you want, Eiran, but for her, I will become whatever I have to.”

But Dacre had been different. He looked at me like I was more than a crown, more than a weapon, and I had allowed myself to hope for things with him that I had never wished for before.

“You are not just the daughter of Marmoris, Verena. You are a daughter of Veyrith, the last daughter, and I bound your power to protect you. I bound your magic so it wouldn’t awaken until you found safety in someone who wanted you to have power, but did not wish to use it.”

“If you put her in a cell,” Dacre snarled, his voice thick with something dark and dangerous. “If any of you lay a single finger on her, I will burn this city to the ground.”

“You’re safe. And I will burn this fucking world to the ground before I let anything happen to you again.”

“The rest of the kingdom will fall to their knees before you, Verena.” He leaned forward and pressed a kiss just below my belly button before he stared up at me. “But please allow me to be the first.”

OKAYYY DADDYYYY

“Take from me until I have nothing left to give. I am devoted to you. Everything I have is yours to take.”

We had touched before. We had burned for each other before. But this was different.

This was not just a marriage. It was a claiming. A choosing.

But here, in the space between battle and destiny, there was only this. Only him. Only me. Only the vow we had spoken and the bond that had answered. And nothing, not fate, not kings, not gods, could take that from us now.

We had spoken the vows. We had chosen each other. And for the first time in my life, I had chosen myself.

A whisper of her power rippled through the stone. “You are the last daughter of Veyrith. The next Queen of Marmoris. Then, ever so slowly, she lowered her head. “You are the ruler that will unite us all.”

I had spent so many nights knowing Micah as my safe haven. But now, now I didn’t know who he was anymore. The boy who had protected me in the streets. The man who had betrayed me in the palace. The ghost who stood before me now, full of regrets.

“You are my father, but if you dare speak of my wife like that again, I will slit your throat and paint this city in your blood.”

Then, one by one, the rebels began to kneel. Some moved quickly, heads bowed without hesitation. Others faltered, exchanging wary glances, but still, they dropped to the ground. They weren’t kneeling for fate. They weren’t kneeling for a prophecy. They were kneeling for a choice. A choice to fight for us all, a choice to end this war.

GOOSEBUMPS

When she had still been wary of me, still guarded and sharp-tongued, and I had been more than uncertain of her. I had thought her to be my enemy, and she had embraced the role with precision. Until neither of us could resist the undeniable force that simmered, pulling us toward the truth of what we really were, of what we were always destined to be.

A crown now rested upon her head, delicately woven gold twisted in intricate patterns, the centerpiece a single dark sapphire that captured the fading light of the sun with a mesmerizing gleam.