Page 162 of Fallen Nocturne

“I have never cared for dancing,” she says.

His gaze cuts toward me again. Envy has always made Ruth crueler.

He releases Rhianelle and crosses to a black casket beside the throne. The sight of what’s inside is familiar in the worst possible way. I know these instruments and I know what they’re for. Ruth always had a gift for cruelty. He chooses a pair of iron shoes with long tongs and holds them over the green flames.

“These should improve your steps,” he says. “You will dance beautifully once you are wearing them.”

Rhianelle draws one careful breath.

Around her, everyone fights their restraints. Garrett pulls against the living chains. Shade attempts to summon a blade, but the circle dies beneath the suppressing enchantments. The wolf claws at the branches while Rainer struggles to rise. Even Landon tries to move, though he can barely lift himself from the floor.

I watch Ruth lower the shoes closer to the fire and know the moment has come.

“Let me put them on her.”

The room falls silent.

Ruth turns toward me. “What?”

I ease Lilith from my lap and rise. “You want to break her. Let me be the one to do it. Let me show her that she was always a fool who trusted the wrong monster.”

“Arescaine,” Rhianelle whispers.

Garrett looks at me as though he wants to tear out my heart.

Lilith claps her hands together. “Yes! Oh, yes. Let him do it.”

Ruth does not want to surrender the pleasure to me, but he cannot deny her. He hands me the tongs with obvious reluctance. “Don’t disappoint me, brother.”

I take them from him and stand before the green flames.

For a moment, I only stare at the shoes burning inside them. I watch them as though I am waiting for the iron to grow hot enough to hurt her.

In truth, I am waiting for anything else.

“The shoes, Andras,” Ruth snaps. “Do not keep our queen waiting.”

I reach into the flames and lift the white-hot shoes with my bare hands.

The iron sears my palms instantly, but the pain cannot rival the ache inside my chest.

Lilith leans forward upon the throne. “Shall we begin? I believe we have a queen to break.”

She looks at me expectantly.

Rhianelle is the love of my existence, my everything.

I bow to Lilith. “As you command, my lady.”

Every step is the longest step I have ever taken. My body moves, but my beasts resist, pulling back and screaming at me to stop. They want me to turn around and rip Ruth’s throat out with my bare hands and paint these walls with Lilith’s blood. Coinneach writhes in the dark of me, pressing against my ribs, tearing at the inside of my chest, demanding I stop.

But I can’t. Not yet. We are not ready yet.

Lilith watches me with those black, bottomless eyes. She’s enjoying this. Feeding on the fear that must be radiating from Rhianelle and everyone in this cursed room.

I kneel before Rhianelle.

She is shaking, but not from fear. I know her fear, and this is not it. She’s exhausted, pushed beyond her limits. It must all be taking its toll on her. Summoning the beings from Astefar across such a great distance, watching her friends suffer, seeing Landon crucified and bleeding. But when I meet her eyes, I see something that breaks me.