Ravenna Nightblade's Arc

Chapter 7 of 8

Ravenna crossed the open field with the crest in her hand. The guards fell in behind her. Fenrir, the werewolf who fought for her direwolf, walked at her shoulder. Scarlett kept her bow low. The red cat trotted ahead, calm as ever. At the keep gate, Finnian waited. He had no crown. He had no army. He had only his sword and his grin. "Little sister," Finnian said. He drew the blade slow. "You came all this way for a chair. I'd have mailed it to you." His grin cracked wider. "No. I wouldn't have." He lunged. Ravenna set the crest down in the grass and pulled the sword off her back. His strike rang off her guard. He was fast, but he fought like a cornered thing, wild and afraid. She saw the fear in his red eyes. He swung again. She stepped inside it and slammed her pommel into his jaw. Finnian staggered. Fenrir's shoulders bunched to charge. "Say the word," he said. "No," Ravenna said. "He's mine." Finnian spat blood and swung high. Ravenna caught his blade, twisted, and tore it from his grip. It spun into the dirt. He dropped to his knees, hands raised, all the menace gone from him. "You won't," he said. His voice shook. "You're soft. You always were." Scarlett flinched at the word. She looked at Ravenna, then away. Ravenna held the point at Finnian's throat. She thought of the stronghold burning. She thought of the throne her ancestors kept as a symbol. She lowered the sword. "Killing you buys me nothing," she said. "Take him to the dungeons." Two guards seized Finnian's arms. He laughed, high and broken, as they dragged him through the gate. "Enjoy the chair, sister. It's colder than it looks." Then the dark of the keep swallowed him. Ravenna picked up the crest and walked inside. The hall was long and gray. At its end stood the throne her family had built. Others had sat it and called themselves kings. She climbed the steps and turned. She sat. The guards knelt. The captain lowered his head. Fenrir stood by the door, still and watchful. The red cat leapt onto the throne's arm and curled there, tail over its nose. Scarlett came up the steps last. She stopped one below the seat. "It's yours now," she said. Her voice was flat, but her eyes were not. "It's ours," Ravenna said, and Scarlett almost smiled. Word ran through the city by nightfall. The traitor was caged. The true heir held the crown. In the streets below, people who had feared Finnian's patrols lit their lamps and stood in their doorways. The pretender was gone. Ravenna sat where her blood belonged. The empire around her was still ash and rubble. She held the crest in her lap and looked out at the ruined city that was hers to rebuild. The chair was won. The work had only begun.