Their Fireheart

Chapter Twenty Nine

It was time. Time to hammer the final nail in my coffin.

"Don't get in my way," I said without looking back.

I swept from the carriage, my cloak flapping in the wind as I stormed up the steps of the Keep and kicked open the front doors.

"What the fuck happened?" I roared, the front doors banging against the paneled walls of the foyer.

Aedion and my mates followed on my heels, concealed by heavy hoods. A barren front hall greeted us, but a glass crashed from the closed sitting room and then -

Three men, one tall, one short and one monstrously muscled, rushed into the hall. Harding, Tern, and Mullin. I bared my teeth at them in greeting - at Tern in particular. I hadn't forgotten that though he was the smallest, he was also the oldest and most cunning - the leader of their ragtag little group.

If any of the three was going to sniff out the truth, it would be him - feral little gutter rat that he was.

"Start. Talking. Now." I hissed.

Tern braced his feet apart, bolstering his defenses to withstand the violent tempest that was embodied by Celaena Sardothien. "Not unless you do the same, bitch."

Aedion let out a low growl, causing the three assassins to look over at my companions. A sudden wave of fear tightened my gut. All five of them wore deep, shadowed hoods, obscuring their identities - but I didn't need these bastards getting too curious about who dared to accompany the infamous assassin.

"Never mind the guard dogs," I snapped, not able to ignore the coiling dread that warned me to draw their attention away from the males behind me. "I want an explanation. Now."

A muffled sob sounded from the sitting room behind the men, and I flicked my eyes over Mullin's towering shoulder. The pitch was unmistakable - I'd know it anywhere.

"What are those two rotten whores doing here?" I sneered, disgust dripping from every word.
Tern glowered. "Because Lysandra is the one who discovered his body. Her screaming is what alerted the rest of us."

"Was she now?" I purred, conjuring wrath to pool in my eyes that was so potent even Tern stepped aside without protest as I stalked into the sitting room.

Only I knew that the wrath wasn't directed at Lysandra, but at this manor, these people, at Arobynn most of all - for destroying what small nuggets of happiness I was able to dig out of the massive pile of shit that was my life - for being what drove my mates from me, even from his deathbed.

Lysandra was slumped in an armchair, a handkerchief pressed to her face. Clarisse, her madam, stood behind the chair, her face pale and tight. Blood soaked the hem of Lysandra's dress, stained her hands and spread streaks of red across her face and hair. Patches had soaked through the knees of the delicate silk, as though she had fallen to the floor in despair upon seeing Arobynn's desecrated corpse.

At my entrance, she jerked upright, her face blotchy, reddened eyes widening at my murderous expression. "I didn't - I swear I would never -"

A spectacular performance. Arobynn wasn't the only one whose talents were wasted in the despicable world we lived and thrived in. She could have made a killing on the stage.

"And why the hell would I believe you?" I sneered. "You two miserable whores only care about one thing, and it certainly wasn't Arobynn. Yet I'm meant to believe you oh so conveniently stumbled upon his dead body? I don't think so."
Clarisse, still golden-haired and graceful despite her aging years, clicked her tongue. "Lysandra would never harm Arobynn. Why would she, when he was doing so much to pay off her debts?"