House of Flame and Shadow (Crescent City #3) by Sarah J. Maas

“They’re watching,” Perry breathed, stepping up to him.

Still in his wolf form, Ithan started to turn toward the witnesses of his savagery, but Perry said, “Don’t look,” and dropped to her knees before him. Tilted back her head and exposed her neck. “I yield.” She added a heartbeat later, “I yield to the Prime.”

The words struck a chord in him, one of despair and suffocation. But he couldn’t stop it—the instinct to reach forward and lightly clamp his teeth around Perry’s slender throat. To take that cinnamon-and-strawberry taste into his mouth.

To accept her submission to him. Her recognition.

Footsteps thudded nearby. Then Amelie stood there, shock paling her face—

But she, too, dropped to her knees. Exposed her neck.

It was either submit to him, or die. As a potential rival, he’d have had no choice but to kill her. A glance behind him revealed the corpse of the Astronomer sprawled across the stairs, leaking blood that trickled down the steps. But Sigrid had vanished. As if she knew he would be coming for her.

Something relaxed in him as he gently closed his jaws around Amelie’s throat, too, accepting her surrender. A bitterer, staler taste than Perry’s sweetness. But he accepted it all the same.

“Hail Ithan,” Amelie said, loud enough for all to hear, “Prime of the Valbaran Wolves.”

In answer, a chorus of howls went up from around the Den. Then the city. Then the wilderness beyond the city walls. As if all of Midgard hailed him.

When it ceased, Ithan tipped his wolf’s head to the sky and loosed a howl of his own. Triumph and pain and mourning.

Make your brother proud.

And as his howl finished echoing, he could have sworn he heard a male wolf’s cry float up from the Bone Quarter itself.





75


Ruhn didn’t recognize his city.

Imperial battleships filled the Istros. Dreadwolves prowled the streets. The 33rd had been joined by the Asterian Guard.

And the Meadows still smoldered in the north, lines of smoke rising to the jarringly blue sky.

But it was the quiet that unnerved him the most as he and Lidia crept through the sewers, making their way toward the Comitium. Flynn and Dec had peeled off a few blocks back to go scope out the Aux headquarters for any whisper of where Isaiah and Naomi might be. If they could intercept Isaiah and Naomi at the Comitium, they’d save themselves hours of searching.

Then came the hard part: finding a secure place to meet with them, long enough to explain everything. But for right now, his focus was on finding the two members of Celestina’s triarii. And trying not to get caught in the process.

“This should open up into a tunnel that will lead right under the Comitium,” Ruhn told Lidia, keeping his voice low. The sewers appeared empty, but in Crescent City there was always someone watching. Listening.

“Once we’re in the building,” she said, “I can get us to their barracks.”

“You’re sure you know where the cameras—”

She gave him a look. “It was my job when Ephraim visited to know where they were. Both as the Hind and as Agent Daybright. I could navigate this place blindfolded.”

Ruhn blew out a breath. “All right. But when we get to the barracks—”

“Then those shadows of yours come into play, and we hide until Isaiah and Naomi appear. Unless they’re already there and we can get them alone.”

“Right. Got it.” He rolled his neck.

She eyed him. “You seem … nervous.”

He snorted. “It’s my first mission with my girlfriend. I want to impress her.”

Her lips quirked up, and Ruhn led the way down another tunnel. “Am I your girlfriend, then?” she asked.

“Is that … okay with you?”

She gave him a true smile. It made her seem younger, lighter—the person she might have been if Urd hadn’t taken her down her particular fucked-up life path. It knocked the breath from him. “Yeah, Ruhn. It’s okay with me.”

He smiled back, remembering how she’d chastised him when they’d first met for saying “Yeah,” for being so casual.

Ahead, Ruhn saw that they were approaching a dented metal door marked Do Not Enter. “Now, that’s practically an invitation,” he said, earning a laugh from Lidia as he kicked in the door.



* * *



The sight of the imperial battleships in the Istros robbed Tharion of any joy at the river’s familiar, beckoning scent. So did the presence of the Omega-boats docked with them. And right by the Black Dock … the SPQM Faustus. The very Omega-boat they’d barely outrun that day on Ydra.

He hadn’t dared venture into the northernmost part of the city to see the damage to Asphodel Meadows. They weren’t here for that, and he knew he’d see nothing that would make him feel any better. The city was eerily quiet. As if in mourning.

Face and hair hidden under a sunball cap, Tharion glowered at the armada for long enough as he stood on the quay that Sathia warned, “You’ll draw attention to us with all that glaring.”

“I should slip into the water and blast holes in all their hulls,” Tharion snarled.

“Focus,” she said. “You do that, and we won’t accomplish what we came here to do.” She frowned at the ships. “Which is clearly still necessary.”