Chapter 130 Breaking Inside
I pressed my mental hands flat against the massive, freezing wall of ice I had built in my own mind, blocking the blood-bond. It took every ounce of my willpower to keep the barrier solid. If I dropped it, the sheer, crushing weight of his despair would flood my mind, and my knees would buckle. I had to stay detached. I had to be the monster the Emperor needed me to be.
I tightened my bleeding fingers around the gold wire hilt of the dagger. The chain between my wrists clinked sharply.
I took my first step toward the altar.
My soft black leather slipper glided over the stone, but the heavy silk skirt dragged behind me with a loud, distinct rustle. It sounded like the ocean receding over a bed of dry, dead stones.
"Look at her," a nobleman sneered from the gallery, his voice drifting down from the velvet-lined balconies. "The great Siren. Chained like a common thief."
"It is exactly what she deserves," a woman’s voice answered, sharp and cruel. "She poisoned the Admiral. She turned him into a feral stray."
I ignored them. I focused entirely on the physical mechanics of walking. One foot in front of the other. The heavy drag of the silk. The bite of the cold iron against my wrists. The suffocating stench of the rotting orchids arranged in the massive vases along the walls.
Nine feet.
Klaus’s breathing was a ragged, wet rasp in the quiet hall. The heavy iron suppressor collar locked around his throat glowed with that angry, hissing red heat, searing a ring of raw, weeping blisters into his pale skin. With every shallow breath he took, the dark, necrotic veins of my ancestor's curse pulsed sluggishly over his heart.
Eight feet.
I kept my eyes locked on his chest. I couldn't look at his face. If I looked into his shattered sapphire eyes again, the ice wall in my mind would crack. I focused on the target. The pale skin, the thick, raised silver scars from the Trench-Stalker, the black rot festering beneath his ribs.
"Do not rush the moment, little fish," the Emperor called out softly from the dais behind me, his tone dripping with sadistic amusement. "Savor the weight of the crown. A true ruler must look the traitor in the eye before she drops the blade."
Seven feet.
The jaundiced light from the bronze chandeliers glinted off the polished black glass of the obsidian block. I could see the smears of Klaus’s silver blood coating the jagged edges where his knees pressed into the rock.
Thorne shifted his weight on Klaus’s left, wrapping the heavy iron leash tighter around his gauntlet. The Commander’s stance was wide, grounded, entirely prepared for the moment the curse broke.
Thorne will be standing directly to his left. You will stand on his right. The layout was perfectly aligning with Vespera’s gloating promise.
Six feet.
The heat radiating from Klaus’s massive frame hit the exposed skin of my bare shoulders. It wasn't the warm, comforting heat of the man who had held me in the dark. It was the frantic, feverish heat of a body fighting a losing war against starvation and ancient, toxic magic.
Five feet.
Klaus shifted on the altar. The heavy iron chains wrapping his torso clanked loudly. He didn't pull against the bolts holding his wrists to the stone. He wasn't trying to escape.
He deliberately straightened his spine, pushing his broad chest forward. He tilted his head back, exposing the dark veins over his heart entirely.
He was offering himself to the blade.
He was making it easy for me. He didn't want me to struggle. He didn't want me to hit bone and shatter the obsidian glass. He was giving me a clean, perfect target so that I wouldn't have to suffer the agonizing process of hacking him to death in front of a laughing court.
A sharp, violent tremor ripped through my arms. The heavy chain connecting my wrists rattled against the gold hilt of the dagger.
Hold it together, I screamed at myself internally, biting the torn inside of my cheek until a fresh wave of hot blood flooded my mouth. Do not break. Do not show them anything.
Four feet.
The smell of the burnt ozone from his collar overpowered the rotting orchids. It stung my eyes, but I refused to blink. I stepped onto the dark, tacky puddle of silver blood pooling at the base of the obsidian block. My leather slipper stuck for a fraction of a second before pulling free with a soft, sickening squelch.
Three feet.
I stopped.
I was standing directly in front of him. I was on his right side, exactly where I needed to be. Thorne stood rigidly to my left, just past Klaus’s kneeling form, holding the heavy iron leash taut. The Emperor watched from his ivory throne behind me. The gallery of hundreds of vampires leaned over the railings in absolute, breathless silence.
I looked down.
Klaus’s head was still tilted back, his throat exposed, his chest offered to the weapon in my hands. His eyes were closed. The thick, pale lashes rested against his bruised cheekbones. He was ready. He had completely surrendered to the dark.
I raised my hands.
The heavy iron chain between my wrists pulled taut as I lifted the ceremonial dagger. The black obsidian blade pointed straight down, hovering exactly three inches above the dark, necrotic veins pulsing over his dead heart.
The entire Throne Room drew a collective, trembling breath, waiting for the glass to fall.