The Dragon Queen (Death #4)

12. Talon

Chapter 12

Talon

We flew back to the castle at the top of the cliff, Khazmuda flying with the greatest speed he’d ever shown. It felt like we were flying directly toward the heavens and gravity pulled hard on my body, but now it was just the speed of the wind from the momentum of his wings.

Part of the castle was set ablaze, the trees continuing to burn, and the place that had been rich with olive trees and flower beds had turned into a giant pyre. Dragons were visible circling above, but none of them had riders.

They are blocking Constantine’s escape.

A rush of relief swept through me, even greater than the relief I felt at the sight of Calista. Thank you.

They didn’t do it for you. They want Constantine, their king, to be free.

That means someone is still controlling his mind.

I will find him. Khazmuda approached the cliff and came in for a landing. The second we approached, the heat from the fires made my body sweat under my armor, made my gloves lose their grip from the moisture inside. The darkest part of the night had passed, and now the sky had shifted from black to a deep blue. Dawn was just hours away.

I landed on my feet and yanked my gloves free from my hands before I marched to the courtyard.

Constantine was stuck on the ground, bloody and gashed from all the attacks from Khazmuda and the others, his beautiful scales running with a river of blood. On his back were Barron and his two sons, desperate to escape but unable to.

The army General Ezra led had arrived at the gates and was in the process of breaking it down.

It was over.

My army of the dead surrounded Constantine and made their attempts to stab and attack. Constantine spun in a circle to attack his next assailant, a fearsome dragon forced to fight like a rat stuck in a corner.

Barron yanked on the reins. “Fly!”

Constantine launched from the ground to the sky, but like birds that swooped down on prey, the other dragons dropped lower and slashed with their talons to keep Constantine close to the cliffs.

Constantine lost his balance when one of his wings was kicked, and he landed hard against the stone of the courtyard, the same place where he’d burned my kin. His fire was responsible for their death and their burned flesh, but I didn’t hold him accountable for what he’d been forced to do.

I only held Barron accountable.

Jairo had landed near one of the trees, and he nursed his broken arm. Kael was nearby and went to his brother to help him to his feet.

Barron went for the dragon. “Get up! Get us out of here, you worthless animal.”

I’d instructed the dead to make the stakes, but they’d only been able to make two in all the commotion. But one was all I needed. I unsheathed my blade as I approached, none of them aware that I’d arrived.

All the dragons roared overhead.

“Rooooaaaaaaarrrr!”

“Roooaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrr!”

“Rooooaaaarrrr!”

The power of the sound shook the cliffs and nearly toppled them into the sea. The dead banged their swords against their shields as I approached. The army broke through the gate with General Ezra in the lead, but they came to a halt when I raised my palm in the air to stop their progression.

Barron stumbled to his feet then realized I was there, and he did so with a definitive look of horror. The castle he’d taken burned behind him. The trees that had thrived for generations were nearly ash. All the dragons he’d enslaved were dead or free, and the dark allies he secured had died by the sword.

He was all that remained.

He looked at his sons before he moved toward me and unsheathed his blade.

Constantine didn’t rise again, either from exhaustion or a broken wing. His eyes opened and closed as he struggled to maintain consciousness.

In tune with the dead who banged their swords against their shields like drums, I did the same, slamming my fist against my chest plate, eyes locked on Barron as he drew close, my sword at my side.

Barron didn’t attack. He stopped several feet away, his sons on the ground behind him. His confidence had died long ago, and now all that remained was the scared dog about to be served his punishment. He carried his sword with exhaustion rather than strength. His shoulders dropped under the weight of his defeat.

I sheathed my blade as I came close, my fist banging harder against my chest, nearly denting it with the force. “I reclaim what is mine as King Talon Rothschild, King of the Southern Isles, the fifteenth of my name. Barron Augustus, for the treason you’ve committed against not only my kin, but King Constantine and his brethren, you and every one of your kin will burn.” I slammed my fist into my chest once more and screamed, “And you’ll burn last!”

The fear of the end finally came into his eyes, and instead of looking like a king or even a soldier, he looked like a boy afraid of his father. His fingers relaxed on the hilt of his blade, and he dropped it beside him. Then he dropped to his knees, pathetic and pitiful, and looked up at me. “I killed your family so no one would oppose my rule, not because I desired it?—”

“Vivian would never have opposed your rule. You could have let her go.”

“Talon—”

“I would grant you mercy if you’d just let her go. If you’d just fucking let her go .” Tears squeezed from my eyes and ran down my cheeks. I felt my eyes grow red in rage. Felt all the tendons in my body grow taut and nearly snap.

The dead moved behind and secured Kael’s wrists behind his back. He started to protest and fight, but there was no escape. They did the same to Jairo, while others went into the castle to grab his wife and whoever else they could find.

Barron didn’t look behind him—but he knew. “Talon.” He pressed his palms together and begged. “Please…”

The tears continued to roll down my cheeks.

“If I could take it back, I would.”

“Only because you now know the consequences. How can someone desire power to such a degree? I would have been perfectly fucking happy living in a hut in the forest with my wife and child. All you had to do was let them go.”

“You would have come for me?—”

“I would never have risked my wife and child for vengeance,” I snapped. “I would have stayed at their side always. You took a kingdom from a beloved king and poisoned it with your treason. You killed beauty and made it ill. You tainted your soul, and all for what? To starve your people. To treat your citizens as prisoners. To hand over the keys to monsters. So let me ask—was it worth it?”

He bowed his head.

The dead secured Kael and Jairo to the stake. The army came forth with a woman with her wrists bound behind her back. She said nothing, like she accepted her fate and even craved it. Others followed, Jairo’s and Kael’s wives and their young children. The youngest seemed to be the age of five.

“Was it worth it?”

He kept his head down as he started to tremble. “Please…”

I stared without an ounce of pity.

“Talon, I know I don’t deserve your mercy?—”

“You’re right, and I’ll never granted it. But I enjoy watching you beg for it. Perhaps you don’t remember how hard I fought for you to spare my wife, but I do. I cried harder than I’d ever cried as a boy— and you fucking smiled .”

Tears splashed down his cheeks when he broke.

A powerful triumph exploded inside me. A surge of revenge that tasted better than any gourmet meal or aged scotch. It was raw power in my veins, satisfaction so tender. “Look at me.” I felt the smile stretch across my lips, felt the sick pleasure at the fall of my enemy, at the revenge I secured for Vivian.

He hesitated before he lifted his chin to meet my gaze.

But all he saw was my smile, the biggest smile I’d worn in a very long time. “Start with the children.” I stepped away from him and approached the stakes.

The women started to scream. Kael and Jairo tried to fight their bindings.

The children cried as the dead skeletons came for them and dragged them to the stakes. The women tried to fight them off, but they were struck down then restrained.

Barron didn’t turn around.

The crying children were tied to the stakes, their fathers using their entire bodies to break free of the stakes but unable to move. It was horror. It was chaos. Screams and cries pierced the night, sounding exactly like another night twenty years into the past.

I continued to smile. “Bring him here.”

The dead grabbed Barron and dragged him close, right into the center, the stakes on display around us for him to watch. He cried the way I’d cried, cried as they secured his wrists behind his back so there was nothing he could do but wait for his turn to burn to ash.

The kids were probably too young to truly understand what was about to happen, but they cried their hearts out anyway.

Khazmuda dropped to my side and waited for my command to burn them.

I took an extra second to look at Barron, to savor the way he sobbed like a child.

“Wait.”

I looked up at the sound of her voice, a voice that was powerful enough to distract me from the revenge decades in the making, one that had played out better than I ever could have hoped.

Calista came before me in a different shirt because the medic had attended to her. She stood between me and the stakes, the kids still crying behind her. Her eyes flicked back and forth between mine—and it was the first time she truly looked afraid of me.

“I told you not to distract me.” She was unhurt and now a nuisance. “You said you wanted to watch. Now, watch.”

“Talon.” Her eyes continued to flick back and forth. “These children have done you no harm.”

“My wife never did anyone harm. Neither did my family. And neither did my daughter.” Calista wasn’t the woman I loved in that moment. She was just someone who stood in my way. Another soldier who wanted to fight me. Another obstacle.

“Killing these children won’t bring them back?—”

“I’m aware. Now, step aside.”

She gave a slight shake of her head. “This isn’t you?—”

“Trust me, it’s me,” I snapped. “I will burn every last one of them.” I felt my eyes widen with my commitment, my ruthlessness escaping in my words. “I begged and begged and fucking begged…”

“You do this in Vivian’s name,” she said. “Do you think she’d want you to kill children in her name? Would your father or mother or your siblings?” Her eyes continued to stare steadily into mine.

A twinge of guilt flooded me, a rush of humanity I didn’t want to feel. The rage had felt so good, so damn good, it made me forget how fucking devastated I was. I savored the ferocity with relish, and I didn’t want to lose it so soon.

“Barron did this to you. His sons conspired with him. They deserve this. They deserve to be burned the way they burned everyone you love. But spare the women and the children, the children who weren’t even alive when this happened.”

“My daughter was killed before she drew her first breath.” She was killed before she had the chance to live. “I didn’t even get to hold her in my arms…” I felt new tears flood my eyes that I tried so desperately to defeat.

Her eyes watered too.

“Barron’s sons have known the joy of fatherhood—a dream I will never know.”

“Not never?—”

“They don’t deserve to be fathers.” I breathed harder as I fought the broken dam behind my eyes. “They deserve to watch their children die the way I watched mine burn.”

She gave a slight shake of her head. “You’re right. You do deserve that. But you’re not Barron or Jairo or Kael. You’re better than them. I have seen your heart and know that it’s as pure as sun and snow.”

“After everything I’ve done to you…you can say that?” I couldn’t accept the praise when I didn’t deserve it.

Her eyes were locked on mine as she spoke. “Yes.” Her eyes remained wet with the shine of her tears. The dead banged their swords like drums. The fires continued to send smoke to the sky. “Please…”

I sucked in a breath between my gritted teeth, her words making my eyes clench shut as the painful memory swept over me. I fought with all my strength to be free of the binding around my wrists, of the hold of the soldiers, but there was nothing I could do to stop the horror that happened right before my eyes. Nothing could stop the screams she unleashed, the final memory I had of my wife. I knew how it felt to beg, to beg with every fiber of my being, and it hurt to hear those very words from her.

“Talon.” She reached for my arm.

I opened my eyes when I felt her touch.

“You’ve worked so hard to be here. You’ve crossed oceans and conquered kingdoms and befriended dragons. Take back the throne and avenge your family—but in a way that makes them proud. Your daughter may never have been born, but your wife was still a mother, and as a mother, she would not want this.”

Shame washed over me, picturing Vivian’s hazy appearance in my faded memory. I would always remember her spirit and her smile, but the rest of her features had become unclear through the passing years.

When Calista’s message had sunk in, she released my arm.

I turned to the dead who awaited my command. “Release them.”

Affection entered Calista’s gaze, fluffy pink clouds at sunset. She gave me a slight nod in approval before she stepped away.

Once the children were released, they fled back to their mothers, who clutched them with choking sobs.

I watched them as resentment burned inside me, wishing that outcome had happened for me, that I had watched Vivian live so I could die in peace. It was a mercy I hadn’t thought I was capable of extending.

You made the right decision, Talon Rothschild.

“Thank you…” Barron could barely speak through his sobs.

“I’m not the one you should thank.” I gestured to the dead. “Jairo first.”

The women and children began to cry again. The mothers made the right decision to pull them away, knowing that couldn’t stop the inevitable, but they would rather shield their children from the horrors that were about to take place.

Barron sobbed once more. “Not my sons…”

Jairo was secured to the wood with a grim expression, calmly accepting his sentence.

“Any last words?” I asked.

Jairo wouldn’t look at me.

“You’ve committed treason against King Bolton Rothschild…” They were words I’d never thought I would say out loud, vengeance I’d never thought I would feel. It gave me some peace even before it came to pass. “You conspired against the throne and murdered the royal family. Your punishment is death.” I stepped back to Khazmuda and gestured with my hand.

Khazmuda inhaled a breath before he released the line of fire that immediately engulfed the stake and caught it on fire. Jairo was swallowed by the flames, writhing in the searing heat and doing his best not to scream in anguish.

Barron dropped his head and screamed, unable to watch the horror.

Finally, Jairo’s body went limp, and the fire continued on.

Barron cried and heaved and screamed all at once.

I came to his side then gestured for the dead to take Kael next. “I’ve watched my daughter burn—and now you’ve watched your son burn. After all these years, we finally have something in common.” I gestured to Khazmuda once Kael was secured to the stake.

Khazmuda unleashed his flames and burned the second brother, the one I’d spotted in the storage room as he conspired with his brother, the one who’d helped his father tie my family to the stake. They thought they were invincible, untouchable.

But they were wrong.

Kael didn’t have the same spine as his brother and gave in to the anguish and screamed in agony, his cries so high-pitched they sounded more animal than human. He fought against the ropes until his body gave out, either passed out from the pain or because his blood had boiled and congealed.

The flames continued to burn, a beacon in the courtyard, a pyre to unleash his soul to the afterlife—if he were welcome through the gates.

Barron looked exactly as I had on that night, so defeated he had nothing left. He didn’t care whether he lived or died. Didn’t fear the flames that would char him like a roast left over the fire too long.

“Up.”

Barron remained on the ground, his face to the stone, trembling with his tears.

“I said, up!” I grabbed him by the back of the neck and forced him up before I shoved him ahead.

He stumbled and hit the ground.

“I should have done more.” I grabbed him and forced him up again. “I should have stopped you, and I’ll regret that as long as I live.” I shoved him into the stake, the flames still burning. “But this will have to do.”

The dead were immune to the fire, so they tied him to the blazing stakes as he writhed and burned from the heat. His clothes had already caught fire before the dead stepped away. His cape lit up then brought the flames into his hair and down his spine. He was set ablaze seconds later, his cries echoing in the courtyard, not from physical pain, just misery.

I watched him burn and felt the heat on my face. I watched my final adversary pass on from this life, his soul turned to ash and taken on the wind. Even when he was long dead, I continued to stare, continued to watch the flames burn and slowly fade as they lost their fuel. I wasn’t sure how long I stood there. Time suddenly felt different to me. I’d worked toward this moment for a lifetime, and now that I’d finally achieved it…I felt nothing.

Maybe this was peace.

The sky had lightened from its blue tint to slightly pink, the sunrise approaching over the horizon, the mark of a new day, a new era for this kingdom.

I felt a hand grab mine. Felt small fingers, felt a strong pulse. I squeezed it back.

Khazmuda’s snout dropped down to my head, and he gently brushed me with soft scales.

I turned into him slightly, feeling his warm breath wash over me. He’d saved me from the courtyard before Barron could burn me, saved me when I’d taken my own life, and without him, this moment wouldn’t be possible. “Thank you…for everything.”

He rested his snout against my shoulder. We did it together, Talon Rothschild.