The Windward King by K.T. Ivanrest

Author:K.T. Ivanrest
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Ink Drake Press
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 24

The Shattered Throne

Glass rained through the air. Shara threw his arms over his head, and the world spun in a blur of fabric, startled screams, and the eerie song of glass on stone.

Then silence. Hundreds of wide eyes stared. Guards hastened up the aisles. Galthi stepped protectively toward him.

“Your Maj—”

Something small and dark sailed between them. It clattered to the ground and rolled toward the throne, shrieking with a high, thin—

The throne exploded in a spray of shrapnel.

Shara reeled back, tripped, fell. His skull slammed against the stone amidst broken glass and the remains of the throne. The world went dull, then erupted. Shrieks and shouts, the angry bellowing of chair legs dragging over the floor, the thunder of footfalls, more explosions. Barks of pistol-fire stabbed at his ears, and a soft hiss filled the room like a den of snakes.

A pair of hands seized his shoulders and pulled him to his feet. “Your Majesty!” Galthi’s wide eyes trailed to Shara’s shoulder, where a jagged piece of wood protruded like a tree growing up from a lake of blood.

Pulse racing, Shara yanked it out with a grunt and buried the alvithi traits trying to burst through his skin in response to the pain and threat. “I’m fine.”

Fine. He’d been listening to Korith far too long if he could say such—

Korith.

He spun, searching. People bolted for whichever exit was nearest, tripping over chairs and knocking them aside as they scrambled to be the first to safety. Princess Nashai disappeared within her entourage, one arm wrapped protectively around Lady Masar’s shoulders. Thick, billowing smoke enveloped it all, stinging his eyes and nose.

Flashes of red uniforms filled his hazing vision. A woman grabbed his arm, and a swarm of guards ushered him across the dais toward a door ahead. Through the barrier and the smoke, Shara glimpsed Malothi, her blue coat swirling like a patch of calm sky as she tried to keep the stampeding crowd in some semblance of order.

His eyes snagged on Korith, and he staggered, dragging his guard to a halt. His cave-brother strode across the room, determined gaze fixed on something Shara couldn’t see. Not the attacker. Korith, don’t—

Movement pulled his attention from Korith. A black-clothed shape pushed in the wrong direction, weaving strangely, melting into the smoke and reemerging. A familiar voice shouted angrily. A flash of blue, another crack of gunfire.

Malothi crumpled to the floor at the attacker’s feet.

“No!” Shara shoved against his protective wall, snarling with fury. “Let me—”

The attacker’s head lifted; the fabric obscuring her—his?—face had come loose, and—

Shara flinched, slamming his eyes shut with a gasp of pain. But no, he had to see. He pried his eyes back open, but with every second they stung worse, refusing to focus properly.

Everything disappeared into a white stone corridor and the blood-red uniforms of the guards dragging him to safety. He threw them off, spun—and collided with the just-closed door. Staggering back, he hit a pair of hands that gripped his arms and guided him, none too gently, down the hall.

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