A bullet.
It was crafted of the same reeking metal as a Death Mark. As if it had been created from all those coins tossed into the river. Whatever properties its metal held must have allowed it to be touched and moved by the dead.
“I don’t understand,” Ithan said. “What is it?”
Connor began gesturing, too fast for Ithan to follow.
But robes rustled on stone, and Ithan grabbed the black bullet before the Under-King appeared from between the temple pillars and declared, “Your time has come to an end.”
Connor looked to Ithan’s hand, then up at him, eyes pleading with him to catch his meaning.
“Just one more minute,” Ithan begged. “Please.”
“You have already been granted more than most mortals ever receive. Be grateful.”
“Be grateful,” Ithan breathed as Hypaxia stepped beside the Under-King. “For what? For my brother being here?” His shout echoed off the gray pillars, the gravel, the empty mists.
Connor signaled to shut up. Ithan ignored him.
“I refuse to accept this,” Ithan seethed, claws glinting at his fingertips. “That this is the best it gets—”
“Remember your vow, pup,” the Under-King warned.
Ithan bristled. “What are you but some freak alien from another world who capitalized on this one?”
Connor was staring at him now—eyes wide, urging him to be quiet, to stand down.
But that thing that had awoken in Ithan the moment the parasite had vanished wouldn’t go away. It stared down this creature, this thing from his people’s home world, and it knew the Under-King for what he truly was.
Enemy, his blood sang, and it spoke of caves beneath hills, of plundered graves and musty darkness. Enemy.
Ithan’s snarl cleaved the mists, bounced off the temple. Frost curled at his fingertips. Even Connor backed away in surprise.
“What is that?” the Under-King said, backing away a step as well, toward the temple interior. Ithan peered down at his hands. The ice crusting them.
Enemy.
The silent dead, the suffering—Ithan would stand for it no more.
“Get out of my realm,” the Under-King said, and Ithan scented his fear. His surprise and dread. Like he knew Ithan for that ancient enemy as well.
The Under-King backed away another step, nearly inside the temple now, and slipped on pure ice. Righting himself, robes fluttering, he lifted a bony hand, and Ithan knew in his gut it would be to summon the hunting hounds.
Ithan didn’t give him the chance.
Ice crusted the Under-King’s withered hand. Then his arm. Then his shoulder— “Stop this now!” the Under-King bellowed.
But the ice kept crawling over him. Ithan let it. Let this male see what a ruthless fucking murderer he was, let him see that he wouldn’t tolerate this shit for his brother, for his parents, for anyone he loved.
No more Sailings. He’d never go to another.
He’d single-handedly destroyed the Fendyr line. Why not destroy Death, too?
The Under-King opened his mouth to shout, but Ithan’s ice covered his face, his body. An encasing cold so complete, Ithan could feel it in his heart. Hear its frigid wind, capable of killing in seconds.
Ithan yielded to it. Poured it into the being now trapped on the stairs before him like a statue.
He knew Connor was watching in horror. And he didn’t dare take his focus off the Under-King long enough to read Hypaxia’s face.
Ithan became so cold he forgot what warmth was. Forgot fire and sun and—
Connor got in front of him. Snarling.
Ithan’s focus slipped. But instead of the disgust and dismay he thought would be on Connor’s face, there was only sorrow and worry.
“Well, that’s one way to shut the old windbag up,” Jesiba Roga said, stalking from the shadows of the temple interior.
Ithan whirled. But Jesiba said to Hypaxia, who was tense and thrumming with power by the nearest pillar, “Do it.”
The former witch-queen didn’t strike with her shimmering power. She merely lifted an unlit brazier from beside the temple entrance. With a face like stone, Hypaxia swung the dark metal.
And the Under-King exploded into sparkling shards of ice.
83
There was a ringing silence as Ithan took in the pile of ice that had once been the Under-King … and felt nothing.
The Under-King was dead. Gone.
Ithan had killed him.
“Looks like we’ll need a new Head of House,” Jesiba said calmly to Hypaxia, who was staring down at the Under-King, clearly appalled at what she’d done.
What they’d done.