Total pages in book: 138
Estimated words: 137958 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 690(@200wpm)___ 552(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 137958 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 690(@200wpm)___ 552(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
She then started to dash in only for True to catch her about the waist and pull her back.
It was then Mars moved, pulling me from his back, tossing me toward Luther, who caught me, and he did this lifting a finger in True’s man’s face and warning, “Harm comes to her, you die.”
He then stalked True and Farah’s way.
Finally, my feet were again to the ground.
Though they were to the ground about a foot away from where a dead man lay.
“Close the door,” True ordered Cassius, who had arrived next.
I saw Elena peer around Cassius and pale.
“Close the bloody door!” True bellowed, having trouble containing a now hysterical Farah.
Mars arrived in time to look in as Cassius stepped in what seemed cautiously, holding Elena back with a strong arm, and closed the door.
“I swear to the bloody goddess, Cassius—” she began, her voice trembling with fury.
“We’ll talk later,” Cassius grunted.
“We fucking will,” Elena threatened.
But I was watching Mars.
His head was bowed, his eyes closed.
My heart sunk.
He looked…
Grieved.
Elpis had made it to them, and she had her hands on Farah, trying to help True soothe her, but her attention was on her son.
“Mars?” she asked tremulously as Basil came jogging down the hall.
Mars looked right to him.
“Get a bloody snake charmer,” he bit out.
Basil halted, his head jerking in shock, then he walked backward four steps before turning and jogging again, this time the other way.
“A bloody dozen of them!” Mars shouted at his back.
Snakes?
Farah collapsed to the floor.
Elpis went down with her, pulling her in her arms, tears falling down her cheeks, shushing noises coming from her lips.
I pulled at Luther’s arms.
“Countess,” he murmured.
I looked up at him.
“Farah,” I whispered.
He made the correct decision at the expression on my face, took my arm and guided me to her.
I got down on my knees and did my best to pull both her and Elpis into my arms, for they’d collapsed into each other, sobbing.
But I glanced up when Cassius murmured, “Aramus,” as Aramus opened the door to Sofia’s chamber.
A black snake with emerald eyes slithered toward freedom only to be caught on the tip of Aramus’s sickle, picked up but an inch only to fall in two parts from the honed blade.
Where it separated, there was a weak spark of yellow light.
He did the same with another one.
And got the spark.
And another.
With spark.
Magic.
I looked beyond his bulky body.
Only to see the bed covered in slithering, glistening black bodies, unblinking emerald eyes, and Sofia all but buried under them, staring unseeing at the ceiling.
I closed my eyes tight.
“Cassius, don’t you go in—” Elena started.
I opened my eyes only to see the door close on Cassius with Elena on this side.
I saw movement and turned my gaze toward it.
Mars was crouching by a body in black, pulling the tight-fitting hood off, lifting the head by its dark hair and staring at the face.
Still holding it, his eyes came to me.
And they were what I thought was a trick of the light earlier.
But it was no trick.
They were twin flames burning into me.
I had never been afraid of him.
Not really.
I knew that then.
Because in that moment, he terrified me.
“You will now, my little monkey,” he started, his voice a physical thing, slithering at me threateningly like one of those emerald-eyed snakes, “learn what it truly means to be a Firenz.”
I held the women sobbing against me, but now I did it trembling.
It was then, I swayed powerfully back, Farah and Elpis swaying with me, Ha-Lah, who was moving toward us, throwing her arms out to catch her balance.
The floor moved more, more, shaking us, the walls, the chandeliers in the ceilings.
The door to Sofia’s room burst open and Cassius and Aramus surged out, Aramus slamming it behind him, Cassius’s long arms snatching Elena to him as Aramus raced to Ha-Lah.
This while True crouched over Farah, Elpis and me.
But Mars moved to me with long, sure strides, plucking me up, turning me into him, bending and lifting my legs as his knees buckled.
He fell to his rear, curling over me with his body and holding me tight just as plaster disengaged from the ceiling and started raining down on us.
I heard cries, people scurrying, a chandelier down the hall crashing to the floor.
And then it came, low at first, but it grew, built, filling the air around us so full, you were breathing it in.