Chapter 4 - The Midnight Ambush
They moved through the shadowy corridors of the lower bailey, avoiding the main torchlit halls where Cedric’s loyalists patrolled. But betrayal was already at work within the castle walls.
As they approached the arched gateway leading to the menagerie, crossbow bolts shattered the stone pillars around them.
“Ambush!” Marcus roared, shoving Helena and Rowan behind a massive marble buttress as a volley of heavy iron-tipped bolts embedded themselves into the masonry.
From the shadows of the colonnade stepped Lord Cedric Harrow, flanked by a dozen heavily armored palace executioners bearing multi-pronged fire-scythes. Prince Lucian stood a few paces behind them, his face pale and conflicted, clutching a ceremonial dagger he didn't quite know how to hold.
“Mother! Step away from him!” Lucian shouted, his voice cracking slightly under the pressure. “Cedric is right! That boy is a usurper! If the court sees a nobody claiming the throne through a demonic beast, House Ashbourne falls tonight!”
“House Ashbourne fell the day you let Cedric turn this court into a slaughterhouse, Lucian,” Helena replied, stepping out from behind the pillar with absolute poise.
Cedric sneered, raising his hand to signal the executioners. “Cut them down. Leave the boy’s body for the beast, and tell the council the prisoner tried to assassinate the Queen-Regent.”
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The executioners raised their fire-scythes, the wicked blades igniting with blue-white chemical fire.
Before the weapons could swing, the heavy iron-reinforced gates behind Cedric exploded inward in a shower of splintered timber and flying iron rivets.
