It’s my mate pulling away. He’s trying to sever the bond we’ve only just created.
The bond that is still not yet complete.
I gasp, my lungs robbed of air as a portal shoots up in front of Knight.
He spins, falling backward, his hard, dead eyes locked on mine. He disappears through the marble colors as I stumble my way to my feet.
After all this time, I finally feel a connection to Knight, and he’ll hate me now. No longer want me. Does it matter to me? I know who this family is now.
Deveraux, the God of Hell and his mistress of Sin.
The Lords of Darkness.
The royal family of Stygian.
These boys aren’t what I thought—oh no—they are worse. The demonic monsters that hide behind their human form are the opposite of what they are now.
The woman who was once my queen, stares at me with dead eyes, mumbling quietly to herself as she pieces parts of the puzzle I’m still missing together. “The nursery rhyme you used to sing…”
London’s Bridges.
London…
Oh shit, someone—
The queen lifts her chin and my thoughts die with the murderous look that washes over her pale face.
“Please…” I plead. “I didn’t—”
“Kill. Her,” their mother wails, and I watch as fire rolls around their father in a tornado of ash. Panic grips my throat as I look to any of them for help. Legend. He’s always been the kind one, but even he steps backward, disappearing through the dark cloud of smoke.
I squeeze my eyes closed, succumbing to my fate. In Rathe, we Bleed. I whisper the words of death to plead with the gods to give me a direct pass-through when an arm hooks around my waist.
“Focus on your gift!” the female hisses, and briefly, I catch the blue eyes of the maid before I’m being sucked through a fusion of colors.
My stomach rolls as my body floats through the air, but by the time I figure out I’ve been thrown through a portal, my feet land on the carpet and the familiar space hits me.
Home.
A piece of paper is the first thing I notice on top of the carpet, and I drop to my knees to grab it, opening the folds.
London,
Despite my efforts, you find yourself closer than you should ever be, so listen to me, young Crow, as it may be your only hope.
You must never go near Rathe U. See this as a warning. Everyone you’ve ever loved will die.
Your G.
I read over the words. And then reread them again. Is this the letter I found all those weeks ago? Why the fuck didn’t I open it?
Who would warn me away?
Who knew I wasn’t really London Crow but Villaina Lacroix?
Flipping it backward, I try to find any other details when his voice catches my attention.
“London?”
I whip around, a different kind of relief washing over me.
“Ben!” I cry out, rushing to where he’s standing, his eyes wide on me. “Oh my god, I’ve missed you!”
I throw my arms out as I run to him, and my best friend smiles wide, ready to accept me in his warm embrace, but then his face falls, the flesh on his throat splitting wide open.
Blood fills the wound before a sharp dagger materializes in front of him. His body falls to the ground and everything moves in slow motion.
Knight appears, his eyes slicing to mine as he swipes the end of his blade along the base of his tongue.
“No…” My legs turn to jelly as I drop to the ground near Ben. “It can’t be real,” I whisper, knowing this is as real as it gets. With shaky hands, I lift his head, gently placing it on my lap. I push my hand over the incision, but blood only slides between my fingers. “Please. No.” Tears fall from my eyes as pain stabs me through the chest and takes hold of my heart, tearing it straight out.
“You took from me. I take from you,” Knight announces, but I can’t. I can’t even fucking look at him.
“Ben!” I shake his body, forcing his eyes to mine. I watch as the hazel eyes I found comfort in, that I felt most at peace and at home, slowly dilate. His pulse weakens against his neck as his body turns limp in my grip. “Ben.” A wail so loud tears through my vocal cords and I taste the faint metallic liquid at the back of my throat. I ease him down, shooting to my feet.
A scream ripples through my body, the sound so loud the earth shakes beneath my feet, and then silence.
My eyes snap up to meet cool, cold-blue ones.
“You killed my best friend.”
Knight lifts his chin. “You killed my sister.”
His words are sharp and true, and if I weren’t so fucking numb, they’d be painful, too.
Because, yes.
I was the daughter of the boogeyman Argent mothers warned their children about, expected to be a monster as he came to be, but the king and queen of my people, of the Stygians, saw me as an innocent little girl.
And then I killed theirs.
I murdered Temperance Deveraux, the princess of Dark Magic.
My then best friend.
My mate’s very own…triplet.
Too many emotions swirl within me, but my brain has shut down, blocking them all out until all that is left…is rage.
Burning, boiling rage.
I get it now, why my father turned on his kind.
It’s too much, cuts too deep, like a blade forged from the bone of a dragon.
That’s when I feel it, my Ethos, born of my bond. As weak and incomplete as it may be, it’s tearing its way to the surface.
Ready for a fight, though it doesn’t yet know our fated is the target.
Knight’s eyes narrow and my mouth curves at the edges.
I don’t call on my new gift.
I become it.
Tears roll down my cheeks in steady streams, but I hardly feel them as a flash of that last day with Temperance slips into my mind, Ben’s lifeless body following.
My head tips to the side, every inch of me tingling with rage and it bleeds into my warning of a whisper. “London’s bridge is falling down…”
And then everything goes black.
Twenty-Nine
To be continued …
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Thank You
Thank you so much for going on this ride with us! We hope you loved your first taste of this new world because we are only getting started!!
Book two will be darker, dirtier, and so much more than you could ever expect…
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REALLY SOON!
XoXo,
Amo and Meagan
Acknowledgments
Oh man! The work that went into this baby.
We want to give a huge shout out to our editing team!
Paige, Ellie, Sarah P., Becca, Geissa, and Sarah S.! This would not have been possible with out each and every one of you! So thank you so much!
To our personal teams, thank you girls for supporting us on this new adventure…
even if we didn’t share all the details right away!
To the early readers who helped shout Fate of a Royal to the rooftops.
We appreciate you and all you do!
Lastly, to each and every reader who picks this up along the way, thank you. Thank you for trusting us and taking the time read our words. It means more than you know.
I’m pretty sure this was our best kept secret ever.