Twisted Love

Chapter 24

Kai

"Um, Your Majesty," a guard murmured from behind the prince - er, emperor - well... almost emperor. Anyways, Kai turned away from the window to face the young guard.

"What is it?" he snapped. He had long lost his patience ever since his father had died.

The guard hastily bowed. "I just wanted to inform you that Queen Levana and Miss Linh were just spotted falling off a tower."

***

Cinder

To say that Cinder was shocked to find herself falling off of a tower was an understatement. A BIG understatement. She was so surprised that she almost let herself drop off the edge like a stone statue.

Almost.

At the last second, her hand desperately shot out to grab something. Luckily - thank the stars - her fingers connected with a stone ledge. Closing her fingers around it, she barely managed to stop her fall. Before her fingers slipped, she looped her other hand around it.

With a jerk, both bodies stopped falling. She nearly lost her grip, but she held on like her life depended on it - which, it did.

Cinder made the mistake of looking down, seeing the dizzying view of the hard, cement pavement on the floor so far below. Feeling sick, she averted her eyes to Queen Levana's face.

Again, she nearly fell, because Queen Levana's face was revealed.

If this wasn't the ugliest, most horrifying thing in the world, she didn't know what it was. She was too busy gawking in horror to realize that the Lunar queen was trying to claw her way up her body to get back to safety.

Once she finally realized, she immediately shook her entire body.

With a screech, Levana flew back down, but still kept a strong grip on Cinder's ankle. "LET GO OF ME!" Cinder shrieked, shaking her legs until they felt like jelly. The queen's sharp nails dug into her leg, making her wince in pain and nearly letting go of the edge.

Gathering what was left of her strength, she twisted and turned, but Levana was about as stubborn as a bull. From all the movement and weight hanging from it, the stone ledge they were hanging from let out a sickening crack.

Both parties shut up and glanced up fearfully at the ledge, which currently had a long crack running across the middle.

"Cinder?!" a voice suddenly came from above her. Cinder's head snapped up. She knew that voice anywhere.

When she recognized his face, her face immediately lit up in a brilliant smile. "Kai!" she exclaimed. "You're here!"

He gave her a lopsided grin. "Yeah. Need some help?"

Levana barked out a sharp laugh, but there was nothing funny about it. Losing his easy grin, Kai glared down at the Lunar queen. "Oh, look. The little princeling. How ironic."

"Levana," he said coolly. "I do have to say, you do look at least 50 times better with that veil on."

Levana's eyes widened in surprise, and Cinder took this moment to give her one last shake. With a loud shriek, the queen's iron grip finally let go, and she plummeted to the floor below with an ear-piercing scream that would be imprinted in Cinder's mind forever.

A loud crack echoed throughout the courtyard once her body slammed onto the pavement. Almost immediately, a large pool of blood formed around the body, which was positioned grotesquely.

Cinder managed to tear her eyes away from the scene when Kai's fingers gently encircled her wrist. His face looked as shaken as she felt. "It's over," he whispered. "She's dead."