Crown of Beauty and Vengeance

Chapter 46

Chapter 46

The moment the light had gone out in Destan's eyes, Jai closed his own, rocking his brother back and forth as he held him. He tried not to hear Laurel's screams and sobs, tried to hold himself together and not to think about everything he'd wished he would have said, everything he wished they got to do together.

This wasn't supposed to happen. Jai had been more than willing to give up everything for Lyv until Destan had to jump in the way. But his brother had thought the same, apparently, willing to give everything up for him, too.

The horror that had gone through Jai at the sight of his younger brother, that knife coated with venom deep in his chest before he pulled it out...

He knew there was no taking back what had happened.

Oh, gods...his parents. And Eamon. How was he could to tell them?

And Lyv...he couldn't feel anything from her but numbness. Couldn't even feel her magic after securing that damn iron cuff around her wrist hadn't been anything Jai had seen before. The obsidian stone Mik had pressed against her forehead had taken it from her. At that moment, though, he had been focused on getting to her.

Every bit of her magic had been siphoned from her...except the magic that was hidden behind that wall. And when Destan went down, she would have done something if she could have, but no matter how much magic she did or didn't have, nothing would have worked. It had already reached his heart, which had been the point of no return.

Now, Lyv was holding Destan's hand until she stood, letting it slip and fall to his chest. And instead of numbness, a fire raged through her as she took a step toward Guinevere, who had started laughing.

"How many humans can say they've killed one of the Fae princes of Dalcaine?"

That was the absolute wrong thing to ask.

As Lyv took another step, Jai leaned down to press a kiss to Destan's forehead before gently moving him to the ground so he could stand. Lyv wasn't the only one who wanted revenge and death to come to the queen of Escarral.

And as he started forward, Jai stared at Lyv...and felt the swell of her magic surge back to life within her. The iron cuff melted off her wrist, something he had never thought possible.

But as the daughter of one of the most powerful Fae males and one of the most powerful sorceresses...well, he always knew there was something more to her magic. He had seen it before when she would turn her enemies to ash. The wall that held everything back, the one they now knew Bridget had placed within her to keep her safe after Guinevere stole her away...well, the fissure grew and began to shudder as magic rushed through it.

It was the most raw and real and powerful magic Jai had ever felt before.

Lyv started to glow as that wall crumbled into dust.

And the glamour her mother Bridget had put on her to hide who she truly was disappeared as well, revealing what Alyvia, the only daughter of Lord Alberich and Lady Bridget of Asturia, truly looked like.

He had seen how much Lyv looked like Bridget when he finally saw them together. But now, Lyv features shifted into a sharper version like Alberich's and her ears extended into delicate points. There was her Fae heritage, finally showing itself.

And her hair...it was no longer dark brown, but rather the burgundy that had always been there in the sunlight. Just like her mother's. Another thing she got from her father was a silver streak that revealed itself through her hair along the right side of her temple, a legend of old about the Deverell family. It wove into her curls that were falling out of her braid and glistened in the sunlight.