My Four Daddies’ Regret After I Died

The instant I hit the asphalt, my knee slammed down hard and my vision went black, but I didn't care. I scrambled up and ran for the trees.

A wall of heat hit my face, scorching my eyebrows.

Darius had been burned by fire before.

It happened while they were on the run, when the old King's army trapped them with a wall of flame. He'd charged out through the fire, and it left huge burn scars across his back and arms. Lily told me he'd never gone near a flame since.

So he wouldn't follow me in.

I shut my eyes. My body already screamed with pain from the burns, but I kept walking deeper into the sea of fire.

Soon I'd get to see my mother.

But someone tackled me from behind, caught me around the waist, and shielded me from the worst of the flames. The air was thick with the smell of singed flesh.

Whoever held me crushed me against his chest, and I felt his whole body trembling, just slightly.

I went still.

He dragged me out of the fire, and only after stumbling back a dozen steps did he let go and push me down onto the grass by the road.

His back was a mess of charred skin, raw and bloody, his shoulders heaving, his breathing ragged.

I stared up at his face, gone strangely pale, and for a moment I said nothing.

He took a while to recover, then slowly turned and looked down at me.

“You just wanted our attention, didn't you?” His voice still wasn't quite steady. “If you really want to die, next time don't do it in front of me. Go find somewhere with no one around and do it yourself. Stop pulling this nonsense.”

I didn't answer. I just curled my lip.

He pulled me up off the ground, checked the knee I'd split open rolling out of the truck, frowned, and said nothing.

He put me back in the rear seat. This time he locked the doors.

By the time we reached the palace it was full dark. I'd barely gotten to my door when Daddy Orion came over.

He didn't say a word. He just raised his hand and backhanded me across the right shoulder, hard enough to send me flying into the big tree by the entrance.

The old whip wound on my back split open again, and blood soaked through the back of my T-shirt.

I bit back the pain and pressed myself against the trunk without making a sound.

Orion came over and crouched down, his voice pressed low and cold. “Emma, do you have any idea how badly Darius got burned just now? He already had old burns to begin with…”

I didn't look up.

Darius had walked into the Flame Forest.

He's more afraid of fire than anything. And he still went in.

Orion waited two seconds, and when I stayed silent his tone went colder. “That act of yours isn't fooling anyone.”

He straightened and said to Darius, “Don't let her play you.”

Darius leaned against the truck, his face calm, hands shoved in his pockets so I couldn't see his knuckles.

Orion turned back to me. “Emma, today's Vivian's birthday. Make your scene in front of the two of us if you have to, but don't go looking for trouble with Cormac and Rex. You know how those two—”

He didn't finish.

Because I suddenly lunged for the steel cabinet behind him.

I lived in his place for so many years. Of course I knew where he kept the deadliest things locked away.

I yanked the drawer open and saw it in the corner, a long thin syringe, the chamber filled with murky dark liquid. That was the concentrated snake venom Orion brewed himself. I'd once overheard him tell his assistant that injecting it straight into a vein meant certain death.

I pulled off the cap and aimed it at the inside of my arm.

“Emma!”