Chapter 30 · Choose Who Gets the Crown

"You want him dead? Then come through me first."

My command cracked across the judgment hall before the black-bone soldiers could move.

They did not stop.

A hundred hollow faces turned toward Varan. Their jaws split open with dry clicks. Black marrow dripped from their teeth and hit the stone in smoking drops.

Varan shoved me behind him.

"Sula, get back."

"Move, and I'll break your knees myself."

His head snapped toward me. Blood ran from the cut above his brow, down the side of his face, and under the iron war ring clenched in his fist.

"They're coming for me."

"I noticed."

"Then stop standing in front of me."

"No."

The first soldier lunged.

Varan met it with his shoulder. Bone slammed against bone. The impact sent both of them through the judge's table, scattering broken seals and blood-stained papers across the floor.

I grabbed the black shard buried in Kaiser's side and ripped it free.

He made one sharp sound. Not a cry. Kaiser didn't give anyone the satisfaction of a cry.

Then his knees buckled.

"Don't you dare fall," I snapped.

"You pulled a spear out of my ribs. I'm allowed one bad second.