RISING (#2, of Crows and Thorns)

Chapter 71

Jeroen's broad hand slapped my arm downward and his calloused fingers encircled my wrist like a fucking handcuff. He jerked and twisted my arm up behind my back, and used my momentum against me. He slammed me up against the front of the godsdamned china cabinet. The antique plates and tea sets rocked and rattled and chinked as if an earthquake trembled the Keep. The side of my face—lips and teeth—smeared the glass before I'd even had time to blink. Fiery pain set my joints ablaze.

"What the hells do you think you're doing?!" he bellowed.

"You went behind my back to the Szarvases!" I roared, struggling against his strength to free myself.

My father's grip on my arm tightened and twisted harder.

I gritted my teeth against the intense throbbing as he twisted my arm higher.

Fuck!

He barked, "Because you didn't announce the betrothal—"

"Gee Dad, I wonder the hells why?" I interrupted bitterly. "Jurgana awoke starving, and she feasted on us like we were fucking hors d'oeuvres. Sorry if I thought it wasn't the right time to make a polite announcement to all the Houses. But you know what? I sure as hells aren't going to marry Irma and you can't make me!"

I fought pathetically to get myself free, but he had me pinned tight. I was practically eating glass. "For years you two were headed for marriage." He moved closer and spoke so quietly, I knew no one else would be able to hear him hiss into my ear, "So what happened, Varen? Did she spread her legs for someone else?"

All I saw was a haze of red descending across my vision. "Fuck you!"

I snapped my head back and reverse-headbutted him, hard and fast. The back of my skull cracked into his nose. He roared in pain, stumbled backward, and I tore my arm free, instantly spinning around. The room filled with my rage, the sound a vicious unearthly bellow, and I threw a punch—

Jeroen ducked, easily avoiding the wild strike. He rose, nose bleeding, and shoved me back with a shoulder to my guts.

I slammed up against the china cabinet. This time fragile china and porcelain shattered; glass cracked like spider webbing.

He fixed me in place with an arm across my throat. My airway was blocked and I struggled to draw in oxygen. His face was an inch from my own and black dots started to dance across his image. "You are my son. My heir. You will be Head of this House. And as I haven't relinquished my hold on my position to you just yet, you will do as I say, as I see fit, anything that is necessary to elevate our House!"

"Jeroen?"

I jolted. My gaze slid sideways and I met my mother's terrified gray eyes, the same hue as the stormy sky outside. Her lank, brown hair hung down her back and over her slight shoulders. My mother cried my father's name, Jeroen, once more, muffled behind her hand.

Shame hit me hard to see my mother's bewildered expression and red-rimmed eyes from crying too much. I should have fucking thought this through. I shouldn't have confronted my father when my mother was about. My sweet mother with her broken heart.

"Isobel—" my father grunted. I wasn't sure if he was about to apologize, because my mother cut him off.

"The Contract of Intentions," she breathed. "You went ahead with it?"

My father at least looked a little abashed when he nodded, blood streaming from his nose. He eased the pressure off my windpipe and pushed away. I sagged as air burned my throat while I greedily sucked down oxygen.

For the first time, in what seemed like forever, my mother saw me. Worry flitted across her gaze. Thin blades of guilt cut my flesh in response to that unwanted concern.