Chapter 50
The following morning, Dijana woke with a sense of anticipation because she was going to see Taeron again in the afternoon doing what he did best. Well, there were other things he did very well, but those things were only for Dijana to know about. The previous evening, after Taeron left the banquet, her father informed her that her window would be guarded from that lecherous Calabrian so that he did not try to climb up to sing to her as the other males had done. Chaela laughed when Dijana slammed the shutters on her window when Guillem and Valter along with the chorus of flunkies appeared to sing their song to her privately. There was only one man whose voice she wanted to hear, and while his singing voice was beautiful, she wanted to hear the things he murmured in her ear when they were alone together in her bed. The thought of any of those cretins her father had chosen to court her doing the same made her shudder with revulsion.
Her mother insisted that she take her first meal with her in her chambers, so after dressing with care, choosing the green and gold gown she had worn to present her case to the council, she went to her mother's chamber with Chaela. She was earlier than usual, but she was hoping to have a chance to see Taeron before he prepared for the tournament that was to be held in the city plaza. Dijana knew that her mother had planned it that way to prove her strength to the people, as if she needed to do that after disposing of two former council members in quick succession the previous day.
Guillem and Valter were not standing guard outside her mother's chamber for which Dijana was thankful. The two oafs could not possibly believe she would be tempted from her mate by them, and her father was demented if he thought his plan would work. He had made quite clear that he was displeased with the agreement her mother had crafted to obtain the help of the emperor to rout Balak. When he believed that Dijana was Nyko's daughter, he had been willing to send her off to marry a man he thought of as a brutal butcher, to live among primitive people that did not respect and revere females as they did on Teralon. Now that he knew the truth, he was adamantly against the match, and she had heard her parents argue frequently about her marriage.
This morning was no different. She reached to open the door, but she could hear voices raised inside, and she paused to consider her options. She could leave and return in a few moments when the argument would have subsided or she could enter and become involved in their argument with whatever she had to say being ignored by both of them.
Chaela gave her a third option. She leaned forward to listen, and while Dijana would not consider spying on her parent's private conversations, she suspected that Chaela had done this very thing on Calabria. After hearing the story of the emperor's love for Chaela's mother, Dijana now found it difficult to imagine the stories Chaela told her. Now Dijana watched Chaela press her ear to the door and she would not have done so had her friend not waved her forward.
"... and if he manages to foil your plan? Have you seen him fight, Roehan? What will you do then?"
"No, Neria, I have not seen him fight. I am beginning to think he is naught but a legend. He has a glib tongue and a gods' blessed voice, and I have heard plenty of his prowess, but I have seen no evidence of it." Her father's voice was angry, as usual, when he spoke about Taeron.
"Were you not watching when he disposed of Balak?" Her mother was disgusted. Dijana realized that her mother liked Taeron despite all the disparaging comments she made about him. When Dijana had approached the council, her mother had browbeat them into accepting Taeron so she never really had a chance to have her voice heard. In that instance, her mother knew what was best for her.
"Yes, Neria, I was watching as he murdered the man I wanted to rip to pieces for you."
"Lord Prince Taeron took care of that problem quite efficiently. You know that we would have had to capture Balak and take him before the council, the council he had whittled down to his supporters, for judgment." Her mother sounded vexxed with her mate. "Do as you will, Roehan, but know that I am displeased. The Calabrian will make a fool of your warriors, hence a fool of you."
"I think not." They heard footsteps and Chaela seized Dijana's arm to pull her back several feet just before the door opened and her father appeared.
His features were stonily angry, and he looked surprised to see Dijana standing near the chamber. Dijana was so intimidated by the giant warrior that she could not even speak. The emperor's daughter was not so constrained.
"We have come to break our fast. Are you not joining us today, my lord prince?"
He narrowed his gaze on Chaela. Her friend was not only Calabrian, but she was also Guerani and her father did not trust her. "I have important matters to deal with." Roehan paused beside Dijana, and he put his hand beneath her chin to raise her face so that he could meet her gaze. "You are the most precious thing in my life, Dijana." He pressed a kiss to her forehead and then moved past them to continue down the hall.
"Your father is sweet," commented Chaela. "He is very handsome, as well."
Dijana wondered what her mother would think if she had heard Chaela's comment. She seemed to be jealously possessive of her mate.
When they entered the chamber, they found Neria pacing, wearing a dressing robe that was finer than any garment Dijana had, including the one she wore now. Her mother stopped to look at her, her lovely brows arched, then drew together. "Do you not have something nicer to wear? After lord prince Taeron defeats your suitors in a public display of his godly skill, you shall exchange vows with him and that shall be an end of your father's interference."
Dijana looked down at her gown. When Balak had dragged her before the council several weeks ago it had ill fit, but now it molded pleasantly to her curves, curves she had not had not so many weeks ago.
"Well, you are lovely in the rag, but we shall have to provide a better trousseau for your trip to Calabria. We Teralonians are not so poor that we cannot array our own princess." Dijana opened her mouth to respond, but Neria continued on in her usual one-sided conversation. "And once you are on Calabria, Lady Larya will see to your raiment. You have noticed Lord Taeron's garments? She created them with her own hands."
Dijana took a breath to speak, but it was unnecessary.
"When I am forced to leave you behind, I will not be so anxious for you, knowing that you will be with your lord husband's mother."
Dijana glanced at Chaela and saw that she was smiling with amusement.
"She is very proud of her son, and rightly so. When I tell her about his courtship, she will be ecstatic to know that he acquitted himself so well."
A short knock at the door preceded the entry of the serving women with the meal that they set at the table that was arranged for four people. The morning tea was served first to the queen who all but gulped it down, waving for a second cup even before Dijana and Chaela could be served.
Since she had her mouth full of tea, Chaela spoke. "Gracious lady, are you in ill spirits this morning?"
She swallowed the tea. "I am sure you know half of the reason." She gave a pointed look at Chaela. "You must have discerned, in your magical way, why I am annoyed with my mate."
"I listened at the door," Chaela told her with a smile. "I did not need to use my Guerani power. But I can tell you, from my Guerani senses, that your mate is anxious for his daughter's safety, and it makes his heart ache."
The cup making its ascent to Neria's lips again paused in midair.
"He does not dislike Lord Taeron," Chaela told her. "He hates all Calabrians because he sees us as a blood-thirsty race. Even the story Taeron told last night is rife with the worst of my father's people, but he will not overcome his prejudice until he comes to Calabria."
Neria frowned at her. "Are you telling me that Calabrians are not blood-thirsty?"
"There are many who are more comfortable with a sword in hand, but there are many more that I believed of that ilk in the hall last night accompanying my lord prince when he sang his ballad. The scribe told me that the warriors helped Lord Taeron compose the song." Chaela smiled. "I shall enjoy teasing every one of them."
The queen shook her head. "I was on Calabria. Men came at your lord prince on several occasions with swords in the very halls of the imperial palace."
"And my brother dispatched men in the halls of your palace yesterday," countered Chaela.
Neria sniffed. "That is an entirely different matter."
"Is it?" Chaela raised a brow.
Dijana envied Chaela's ability to argue with her mother. Then again, she was the imperial second princess and she had always played that role well on Teralon. Now she had effectively silenced her mother.
They ate without speaking for several moments, and then her mother remarked, "You have little to say, Dijana. Your comportment is akin to a shadow."
Chaela opened her mouth to respond, but Neria waved her quiet. "I would hear my daughter speak."
Dijana took her eyes from her now empty cup of tea and looked at her mother. "Balak did not allow me to speak at the table. When I was a child, I asked him many questions because that was the only time of the day that I saw him, but he trained me to remain silent at the table."
For a moment Neria did not respond, but Dijana could see by the pulse in her neck that she had become agitated. "Did...did he...?"
Her mother could not even put to words what had been a part of Dijana's life. "He beat me," she confirmed. "With his own hands. He broke my wings once, but the council reprimanded him severely for doing so."
Neria pushed herself from the table and moved quickly away, and Chaela reached out to take Dijana's hand. Somehow her friend conveyed to her the deep sadness and regret her mother felt at abandoning her. But Dijana could hardly feel sympathy for a woman that would leave any child to the gentle care of Balak after what he had done to her before imprisoning her in the northern palace. Balak's beatings had been a part of her life since she could remember so she expected no different. She had assumed that Avar and Sharisse received beatings as well, but now that she knew the truth, she was sure that they had been treated far differently as Balak's children. Balak had thought her the daughter of Nykos, but if he had known the truth, that she was a bastard, he would not have stopped at breaking her wings.
"I suppose Roehan knows what happened to you," murmured Neria, her voice raw with emotion.
"He does," Chaela answered her.
Neria glanced at her with a frown. "Does anything escape you, Guerani sorceress?"
Chaela did not seem bothered. "I overheard him questioning the servants."
"You are an effective spy."
"I grew up in the imperial palace," Chaela reminded her with a shrug. "I know where to find out information."
Neria returned to her breakfast. "I will not insult you by apologizing, Dijana. I was younger than you are now when you were born. Nykos and Balak were brutal men who beat and raped me. I tried to care for you as an infant, I tried to..." She fell silent for several moments and then she said. "I was afraid, Dijana, so very afraid that he would kill me."
No one knew that kind of fear better than Dijana. She had complied with Kai for so many days out of a desire to live, and in the end she wished he had killed her.
"Your father wants back the years he was denied," Chaela told Dijana. "He doesn't want to give you up to the man that took away his only chance to take the vengeance that has rooted in his heart."
"Then Roehan is a fool!" snapped Neria. "If he had killed Balak, the council would have ordered his execution. We are better off that the Calabrian lord prince did it for us."
"What is my father planning to do to Prince Taeron?" asked Dijana. She should not fear for Taeron's safety, but she could not help it. If her father was so set against her marriage to him, he would be desperate to prevent it.
Neria sighed with exasperation. "If I tell you, you will warn the lord prince and I will show myself disloyal to my mate." She shook her head. "I cannot do that to Roehan. If his plan fails, then it will be the will of the gods."
Fury exploded in Dijana. "Out of one side of your mouth you regret what happened to me while out the other you refuse to help me!"
"You have quite a temper," remarked her mother calmly. She was assessing Dijana over her cup of tea, and then she shook her head. "No, I will not betray Roehan."
Reaching for her own cup, Dijana planned to throw it, but Chaela seized her wrist and Dijana tried to fight her calming touch and failed. "Do not worry about Taeron," Chaela told her. "You have never seen him fight as I have. He had to prove himself worthy to become Amyr's imperial guard and you cannot imagine what he had to do. There is nothing your father can think of to equal what my father forced Taeron to endure to gain his position. There is no warrior his equal."
Blowing out her breath, Dijana rose. "You will have to excuse me, mother. I no longer have an appetite." Not waiting for her permission, she stalked to the door, her skirt swirling around her legs with her long strides almost tangling her and rendering her exit more humiliating than righteous.
The last thing she heard before slamming the double doors was her mother remark, "She has much to learn about the comportment of a princess."
Dijana headed towards the steps that curved along the wall down the tower, but her way was blocked by winged warriors who crossed their long spears to prevent her from passing. One of them told her that she could not leave the royal residence without an armed escort and there were no men available to escort her. She stomped back to her room, furious to be thwarted, and even Chaela's serene presence did not calm her.
"We are prisoners again!" she declared hotly.
Chaela shrugged. "I am used to this kind of imprisonment. There is another council member who has a reason to harm your parents and he can do that quite effectively by harming you. Jaleila sent assassins to your chamber, not to your parents which proves that females are far more intelligent than the males. I do not know what Deryn has in mind, but you cannot believe that he is accepting his banishment with benevolent acceptance."
"Jaleila was trying to kill me?" asked Dijana in horror. Chaela had told her what happened in the corridor, but the servants had been cleaning outside her parents' chambers, not her own and when she pointed that out, Chaela laughed.
"Amyr battled them down the hall so that the noise would not disturb your sleep."
Remembering his overbold remarks about what he had witnessed when arriving in her chamber yesterday morning, Dijana was annoyed by what she should have considered solicitous behavior. Was that yet another statement about what she had been doing with his lord prince all night? And it had been all night. She tried not to think too much about their night together because she knew that Chaela had not mastered blocking the feelings and thoughts of others, and she knew by the other woman's knowing smile that she was failing miserably.
Exasperated, she tried to take her mind off of the only thing she wanted to think about. "Is my gown a rag?"
"Certainly not!" Chaela laughed. "Unless you are judging by your mother's standards. But she is right about Lady Larya. She made my mother a gown to celebrate twenty years of marriage to my father and it was magnificent. I think the imperials hated her even more for it – well, both of them because they do not like Lady Larya either."
Dijana frowned. "They do not like my lord husband's mother?"
"Lady Larya was a shameless whore who wrapped many of the males of the great houses around her little finger under the orders of Emperor Zeno's courtesan, Xuxa. She tried her hardest to seduce my father and the last time she tried was after attempting to stab my mother."
Those were facts not reported for public consumption or Dijana would have read of it in her extensive research on Lord Taeron. "The emperor forgave her?"
Chaela laughed. "Hardly. He banished her to the pirate satellite where he probably thought they would use her up and kill her." Seeing Dijana's shock that Emperor Trey could do something so ruthless she explained. "He could have had her executed, but he gave her this small chance. She used it to her advantage, and I am sure you know what happened next. I don't think my father or my mother have ever regretted their decision to allow her to live. They have become very dear friends."
When the suns were at equal distance in the sky, a warrior came to escort them to the grand plaza in the middle of the city. The courting males were dressed finely so that they could show themselves off to their best advantage as they displayed their skill at fighting. Her father accused Calabrians of being blood-thirsty, but Dijana noted that the men and women gathered to watch were enthralled by the warriors that executed their best moves in the sky and on the ground for the approval of their chosen female. Since the other females had no other male vying for them, they watched with rapt attention, and when their males finished, they stepped forward and offered their hand with a pledge of union. On the morrow they would all exchange vows in the Queen's Grotto.
The thought of exchanging vows with Taeron in the grotto made Dijana uncomfortably anxious, enough so that Chaela looked at her. The grotto was an extension of the palace garden, constructed long ago with stone arches to which flowery vines clung. Beneath the many arches were statues of the females that had ruled Teralon, their wings spread, many statues centuries old but made of stone that had not crumbled in time. As a small child Dijana had stood under her mother's statue, marveling at her beauty, the beauty with which Sharisse had been blessed, and she asked the unyielding stone why she had abandoned her. She had stopped when she was old enough to realize that her mother had not wanted her, that she was probably ashamed of her ugly daughter. As if to mock her, Balak had commissioned a statue of her to join the others in the grotto, and the artists had still been working on it when the Varoonyan forces attacked.
The secret entrance into the palace was through the grotto.
Dijana had shown Kai the way in, convinced of his love, certain that he was going to keep her safe. She had been so stupid to trust him.
"Do not think about the past," Chaela told her as she entwined her fingers with Dijana's. She nodded to the plaza where her suitors had gathered. Taeron was wearing the same black garment he had worn the night before that matched many of the warriors who had come to Teralon with the imperial guards that dressed in dark gray and crimson. Chaela explained to her that Taeron was an honored member of a zenoite clan on the second moon where his father governed. Zenoites, she learned, were the people that opposed the rule of Emperor Trey because he had not killed his father. They had fought in open rebellion for nearly a decade before the emperor had prevailed and they accepted banishment to the moon where they would live according to their customs but under the governance of the emperor's imperial guard.
"Would the emperor be angered to know that Prince Taeron honors them by dressing in their custom?" asked Dijana. She thought she knew everything there was to know about Lord Taeron and Calabria, but she realized that she knew only what outsiders were allowed to know.
"I do not know," said Chaela. "Darlac and his men have earned the respect of the empire by fighting alongside the imperials under Taeron's command, but Darlac's father did something that my father considers unforgivable. Amyr told me that he was angry that they had come into his presence with Taeron when he returned from Norvana."
Dijana tried not to think about the intricacies of imperial politics because she was frightened by the role she would have to assume as the warlord prince's wife at the imperial court. Instead she drank in the sight of her mate who towered over the winged warriors now taking up wooden staves with blunted ends with which they would fight until one man was standing. She was annoyed to see her father speaking to Guillem and Valter, probably giving them instructions to defeat the Calabrian.
Taeron did not even glance back at the many Calabrian warriors who had come to watch him fight and as they spoke to each other animatedly, Dijana was reminded of the time the handful of Calabrians had watched her challenge Taeron on Norvana. Her cheeks burned at the memory, knowing how foolish she must have appeared to them, daring to instruct the greatest warrior in the binary system. The Calabrians were betting, not on the outcome, but on how long it would take for Lord Prince Taeron to dispatch his rivals.
The fight was not fair to begin with, since the winged warriors made no attempt to fight each other in the melee combat. And Dijana worried that Taeron could not fight with the staff when she had only seen him wield a two-handed sword. To make matters worse, the winged warriors took flight so that they could dive down in their attacks. Guillem and Valter stayed aloft as the other four males relentlessly attacked Taeron. They were probably planning to swoop down in tandem when the others had tired out their opponent.
If her father hoped to humiliate her Calabrian suitor, he was disappointed because Taeron showed himself more than equal to the task. He parried the attacks effortlessly, using the staff one minute like a staff and the next a sword, but his movements were fluid and quick, his footing sure and graceful. He twisted and turned, his long hair flowing out behind him, again and again, like a dancer, and as Dijana watched his body move, she thought about her body moving with his, rising to him, her fingers gripping his hair.
She gasped with pleasure as he leaped into the air and smacked one of the warriors to the ground, spinning immediately to catch one that had come up behind him, tripping him up by weaving his staff between his legs. And when he fell on his back, the warrior lost his grip on his own staff and Taeron flipped over him, seizing the staff that had bounced from his grip. Armed with two of the weapons meant to be handled by two hands, Taeron launched himself in the air to Guillem and Valter who could not move fast enough to escape. They barely evaded the blows Taeron had aimed for their heads, and when he missed, he flipped in midair and twisted to face them as he descended back down to the plaza. The men he had defeated should have honorably left the plaza, but they charged Taeron in spite of the hissing of the crowd. For their efforts, Taeron gave them blows that sent them unconscious to the ground.
Dijana dragged her gaze from the spectacle to look at her father, knowing that he had instructed the men to ignore the polite rules of the contest in the effort to rid himself of the bridegroom that he did not want for his daughter. She did not need to say anything because she could see, if not hear – praise the gods – her mother scolding him for his dishonorable tactics. He shrugged her off as if he were the brutal Calabrian, and he signaled to others to join in the fight.
Gasping, Dijana saw a score of winged warriors take flight and descend upon the plaza along with Guillem and Valter.
"By the gods!" cried Dijana frantically, half-rising only to be pulled back down by Chaela. "They will kill him!"
"They will have to send more than that to harm Taeron," Chaela told her. "Do you see the imperials? They are not moving to help him, are they?"
Dijana wanted to shout at Prince Amyr to help his lord who was swinging two staffs amidst so many winged warriors that she lost sight of him. But Amyr was laughing at something Darlac said and she wished she could throw something at him. She even looked around to see if there was anything launchable but had to settle with promising herself to do it when he least expected an attack.
As Chaela predicted, Taeron was more than equal to the task her father had given him. He quickly culled the warriors, knocking them senseless with his incredible power and speed, and a quick glance at her father told Dijana that he was awed by her Calabrian suitor.
But when Dijana turned to look back at the thinning fight, she noticed the sky in the east darkening and she cried out when she realized that hundreds of winged warriors were approaching. How could her father do such a thing? Dijana was outraged until she realized that Roehan was shouting for his men, and by the screams of the men and women as they fell over each other to get away from the plaza, Dijana realized they had come under attack. There was chaos then as the forces swarmed the plaza, and Dijana tried to see Taeron, but Chaela was pulling her away.
A warrior landed in front of her and he thrust out with his short sword, but Chaela pulled Dijana out of the way so quickly that she stumbled, but she turned in time to see Chaela kick the warrior hard between the legs before jamming her own dagger up his chin to the hilt before shoving him off the blade to fall back lifeless. All around her there were swords striking swords, bolts fired from above and the unmistakable whistle of chakrams flying in their deadly paths towards their targets.
"We have to get to safety," Chaela told Dijana. She saw her mother fighting beside Roehan, both bleeding, her mother from a cut on her arm and her father from a bolt lodged in his thigh. Dijana wanted to stay and help, to do something, but she knew she was worthless in a fight, so she hurried with Chaela towards the palace.
But they could see winged warriors landing on the roof where they would gain access to the royal apartments, so Chaela changed directions towards the garden and Dijana knew they would hurry to the secret passage out of the city. When Dijana balked as they reached the grotto, Chaela assured her that they would soon return. The passage would take them to the caves in the mountains where the royal family had remained throughout the Varoonyan occupation.
Holding Chaela's hand, Dijana had difficulty keeping up with her imperial guard who ignored the vines and thorns of the exotic flowers slapping at them as they raced through the neglected, overgrown garden. By the time they reached the grotto, Dijana's heart felt as if it would explode, and she was gasping for breath when Chaela paused to get her bearings.
They had stopped only a moment before Chaela dragged Dijana to the large statue of wings over small fountain. Chaela released Dijana and leaped into the pool to grasp the statue in the middle of the pool, and twisting it, she engaged the mechanism that made a tile drop and slide to the side, revealing steps. The entrance should have been dark, but it was lit with torches and Chaela realized immediately that the tunnel had been breached. She leaped with her imperial speed to stand before Dijana with her dagger raised and her arm stretched out before her.
Bright light exploded around them and Dijana gasped when bolts flew towards them, only to dissolve and disappear in the light. Dozens of warriors poured out of the entrance until finally a woman stepped out of the tunnel.
Dijana would not have recognized the female warrior if a man did not step out behind her. Wearing a metal breastplate and holding a sword she looked every bit as fierce as Dijana's mother, and the resemblance she bore to Deryn marked her as his daughter. She jingled as she walked and Dijana could see that she was armed with chakrams, and when she came before Chaela, she put up her hand to the light surrounding her.
"Do not touch it," advised Deryn. He looked at Dijana with contempt. "So you would hide behind this sorcery? You cannot do so forever."
Dijana did not have a chance to retort, because, as usual, her own mother could not let her speak.
"She can remain where she is long enough for me to dispose of you."
Dijana saw her mother in the air, Roehan at her side with several other warriors and dozens of imperial soldiers spilling into the grotto.
Deryn's face contorted in mask of rage. "Kill that vile whore," he ordered his daughter, and as she leaped into the air to confront Neria, Deryn ordered his men to attack the warriors on the ground before leaping into the air to charge Roehan. Dijana did not see Taeron among his men, but Prince Amyr rushed forward with his sword swinging in deadly arcs, moving rapidly to where Dijana was trapped inside Chaela's protective sphere. When he reached them, Amyr slipped through the light and seized his sister's hand.
"It took you long enough to get here," she complained breathlessly and for the first time Dijana realized that Chaela was pale.
Her brother noticed at the same time. "You have done well, Chaela, but you have been weakened. Release the power and I will keep us safe."
"Where is Taeron?" asked Dijana fearfully as she watched the carnage in the grotto escalate. The winged warriors were fighting for their lives and falling under the swords of the Calabrian warriors. Looking up, she gasped in shock as her mother fought Deryn's winged daughter. They flung their chakrams at each other, twisting and turning to avoid the sharp edges of the deadly blades. Deryn had been a formidable warrior and had taught his daughter well. Neria was cut twice, but she ignored her injuries to fling her weapons and when she was out of chakrams she screamed with rage and dived at the other woman. When the two females came together, they ripped at each other with their long talons.
Dijana saw her father fighting three warriors with his staff, spinning it, slicing flesh, but he was so intent on his fight that he would not be able to stop Deryn who dived at him with his sword outthrust to end his life. Dijana cried out in horror, but before the Deryn could skewer her father, a long sword flew end over end until it embedded in the center of the warrior's chest all the way to the hilt that was decorated with jewels that glittered in the sunlight.
When she saw Taeron leap into the air to jerk his sword free to leave the body to fall to the flagstones of the garden, Dijana cried out in relief.
Amyr chuckled and looked over his shoulder, keeping his arms outstretched to maintain the protective light around them. "You did not worry about my lord prince did you?" When she glared at him, he laughed again. "Don't hit me, princess, or I might waver."
"Don't joke," murmured Chaela weakly as she leaned against Dijana.
The lord prince of Calabria had brought the black clad warriors with him into the grotto and the fight did not last long. Neria had managed to fell her opponent with a two handed blow to the face and the woman fell from high in the sky onto her back on the stones of the grotto where her head slammed so hard that her skull cracked open to ooze blood and brain matter. Deryn lay nearby, living long enough to see the Calabrians put an end to his rebellion.
Neria landed near Deryn who lay in a pool of his own blood. She scarcely spared him a glance as she hurried to the protective shield which Amyr lowered for her to pull Dijana into her embrace. She was sobbing with relief and Dijana soon found herself enveloped in two sets of wings as her bleeding parents held her between them.
"Bastard!" Deryn's rasping shout made Neria step back to look at the dying old warrior.
Although blood poured from the bolt that was still lodged in his leg, Roehan strode to where he lay. "You did this!" he accused. "All along, you were pulling Balak's strings!"
Deryn coughed weakly. "You are not as stupid as I thought, Roehan. I intended all along for my daughter to be queen, and so I did not remove her wings. It was very difficult to hide her for all these years, training her to take the place she deserved. Neria's mother was weak and foolish; there were so many plots to end her line that I had but to wait for the dust to settle before it was my turn to try."
"You were going to kill Balak," predicted Neria.
"Balak removed your supporters on the council." Deryn laughed, then coughed up more blood. "I offered to back him with my warriors when he finally chose to strike, so he did whatever I suggested."
Roehan's lips twisted in disgust. "They were noticeably absent from the battle."
The dying man laughed again. "I wish I could have been there when the brainless idiot realized I had betrayed him." He turned his head to look at Dijana. "You should have died that day when I sent Avar to tear off your wings."
Neria gasped with outrage and lunged at Deryn, but Roehan caught her and held her back. "You despicable traitor! Why would you do such a thing?"
"Because I wanted her dead. I knew what she was and I despised her for it." He sneered at Neria. "I suggested to Balak to kill Nykos, and I followed you that night when you went to rut with your baseborn lover. I knew very quickly after her birth what she was."
"You could have told Balak and he would have done as you wanted" pointed out Roehan as he stood over Deryn, his body shaking with rage. "Why did you wait?"
"It amused me to see him constrained to keeping her alive, knowing as I did that she was the bastard of a palace guard." Deryn laughed bitterly, the sound little more than a wheeze. "I invited Prince Rangyor to invade, to send his warlord to seduce that worthless, ugly bastard, and I convinced that idiot Balak that it was his idea. When I discovered that vile creature Kai left Dijana alive, I told Avar that she would be unfit to rule without her wings." His bloody lips parted in a sickening smile. "The fool believed me, and I watched him do it, but he made a mess of it and before I could finish it, Kaseja had taken over her care and saved her pitiful life."
"I have heard enough." Neria looked at her husband. "Do you wish to end his life? Will that satisfy your need for vengeance? It will not satisfy mine, but I know now that nothing can."
Dijana felt a strong arm around her shoulders and she knew instinctively that it was her mate. Turning, she buried her face into his chest and when he put his arms around her, she burst into tears. She could smell blood and sweat and death everywhere, and she could not bear to watch Deryn writhing in agony in his last moments, his breathing rattled and labored as Roehan stood over him to watch him die.
"Take my daughter from this place of death," she heard her father say.
Taeron lifted her and she clung to him with her arms around his neck, keeping her face pressed against him although he was soaked with blood. She started to feel dizzy, and soon the angry voices and the cries of agony faded away to darkness and silence.
