Balfour slammed a dagger into Malloryn’s side. Malloryn gritted his teeth and twisted, slashing his sword across Balfour’s throat. The spymaster fell back, clutching at the blade, blood pouring between his fingers. Malloryn tried to go after him, but his leg gave out beneath him and he went down on one knee, holding his side. A Falcon grabbed Balfour by the shoulders and hauled him away as Mina defended her ex-lover.

“Stay down,” she snapped at Malloryn, putting herself between him and the two Falcons she’d been fighting.

“Mina!” The queen crawled to her side, her hands still holding the bloodied knife.

“Stay with Malloryn.” Mina winced as one of the Falcons nicked her arm. Cool blood splashed down her sleeve, the muscles screaming in her shoulder as she tried to counter the next blow.

A man flew through the air, smashing into one of the Falcons and sending them both tumbling. Caine had thrown him. Mina could barely spare the duke a shocked glance as she met the remaining Falcon’s thrust with a quick prise de fer of her own. Blood dripped into her palm. Clapping a hand to the wound and panting, she parried another thrust, the jarring force of the steel in her hand ringing up her forearm.

Blood and blazes. Desperation sunk its hooks into her. “Go!” she said to Alexa. “To the Nighthawks!”

“Not without you!” the queen cried, staggering to her feet beside Mina and holding her pathetic little stiletto as if she had some idea how to truly use it.

Blast her. Yet the flush of emotion speared behind Mina’s eyes. We always said we’d do this together.

Another woman appeared out of nowhere, kicking the Falcon in the back of the knee and driving him to the ground. Mina promptly ran him through, staggering back in relief as the woman—clad in strict black—countered the attack of the two on the ground, whipping her blade across one throat and then spinning low to slash her sword across the back of the other’s thigh. A master of the blade.

Lady Peregrine.

The Nighthawks.

Mina’s sword tip lowered to the ground and then Alexandra was there, easing her back onto the throne of all things. Mina’s fist curled in her queen’s sleeve. “Whatever you do, stay with Lady Peregrine.”

Lady Peregrine stepped closer, her sword held low and ready as she surveyed the melee. “Are you injured?”

“Nothing serious.” Mina’s arm was afire now, but at least the bleeding had stopped. Alexandra tore at her skirts, tying a very fashionable bandage of green silk around Mina’s upper arm.

“I’m fine,” Mina told her, but the queen was crying, endless streams of tears washing her pale face.

Two men faced the entire gathering of Nighthawks who’d surrounded the throne. The rest of the room was emptying, debutantes and thralls having fled in fright.

The prince consort leaned in one of his Falcon’s arms, breathing heavily but not dead. Not yet.

“You swore,” the prince consort sputtered, blood spraying the fine linen of his cravat. His feet kicked at the ground, as if to get away, but he and the Falcon were trapped against the wall. Nowhere to go. Nowhere to hide. “You swore an oath to me!”

Caine took a threatening step up onto the dais, his sword held low and ready. Emotion burned hotly in his pale blue eyes. “And you spat it in my face.”

“Don’t do this!” the prince consort said shrilly. “You’ll destroy everything we ever worked for!”

“Perhaps…change is coming. It seems inevitable.” Sadness flashed through the duke’s eyes. “But by the blood I swore to you, I shall see this done myself.” His arm lifted. “That much I owe you.”

Caine, the only man with the strength to drive that piece of metal through the prince consort’s breastplate, sent it straight through the prince consort’s heart and into the Falcon holding him upright. They both stiffened, the prince consort’s feet drumming helplessly as blood bubbled over his lips.

The duke twisted the blade and then withdrew it with a flick of violet blood across the marble floors. As one, the assembled crowd held their breath.

He turned, tilting his head toward Alexandra, emotionless once more. “Long live the Queen.”

Twenty-eight

Minutes dragged by. Orders. Nighthawks setting up a guard on the queen as Alexandra ordered her husband’s body burned. Balfour was missing and Malloryn had sworn to find him, but otherwise, they were in control. Mina caught the queen’s sleeve.

“I have to go.” Urgency burned through her. “I have to find Barrons.”

“Barrons?” Alexandra demanded. “But I need you here. There’s so much to do—”

I have done enough. This, at least, was for herself. “I don’t know where he is.” She flashed a look at Caine. “I don’t know if he’s still alive, if he’s hurt. If he’s…” Her voice trailed off.

Lynch knelt beside them, his hand settling over the queen’s. “I’ll keep her safe,” he said to Mina. “The last I saw of him, Barrons was going to find several Falcons who were keeping watch with a detonator. The entire Tower is full of explosives, as I understand. The prince consort meant to see us all dead.”

All of the heat washed out of her face. “Leo could be dead then.”

“I doubt it. That flare the prince consort fired was meant to be the detonation signal. The very fact that we’re still here means Leo is alive.”

Or was alive.

The queen gave a wan smile. “I assume this means you have changed your views on marriage?”

Mina gave the queen’s hand another squeeze, torn again. “Do you need me…?”

Alexandra reached out and kissed her brow. Her lips were wet with tears. “You have done enough, Mina.” The pressure of her lips eased. “Go. Go and find your man. That’s a royal decree.”

* * *

The smoke was clearing, but still she couldn’t find him. Mina shoved through the crowd, pushing past bloodied Nighthawks and some of the ruffians from the rookery. The world sounded strange. Diluted. As if she were traveling through it but no one could see or speak to her.

A tiny sphere of icy cold began to grow in the pit of her stomach, little fingers of it seeping outward, slowly locking through each muscle. There were so many people tromping through the Tower grounds that it made sense she wouldn’t find him immediately. Of course it did.