Greymoor Academy: I Accidentally Bonded With Four Lycan Royals! novel Chapter 160

Chapter 160: 160. An Insane Visitor II

Tessa

Maisie’s intense blue eyes met Tessa’s directly. "I don’t deserve them. Or the crown. I... I almost died tonight. In the woods. And I had an epiphany. It occurred to me, somewhere around the part where I thought I might actually die, that I didn’t want to die over men I don’t particularly care about."

Tessa watched her carefully.

"So you can have them," she said. "And the crown. I’m leaving."

Tessa was taken aback. She turned the words over, searching for the trap inside them, because there had to be one.

But she noticed Maisie’s hands were trembling. Her lips quivered and her eyes misted. And Tessa wondered if her attempted murder tonight had indeed instilled some much needed fear into Maisie. She preened at the thought that she was finally getting rid of this wretched leech.

Then, Maisie’s shoulders began to shake.

Tessa thought for a second that Maisie was shaken up so badly, she had begun to cry.

But when Maisie lifted her head, she was laughing. "Oh, but you would love that speech, wouldn’t you? I can’t believe you bought it. You should’ve seen your face—"

Tessa had moved, grabbing Maisie by her hair and yanked it back so hard, she was sure she had pulled out a chunk of that mass of beautiful brown-gold hair. "Listen here, slut. You’ve picked the wrong day to mess with me—"

"Do you remember what you said to me during the duel?" Maisie interrupted, not looking the slightest bit fazed in the face of Tessa’s rage. "About Mercer being a brutal teacher? I believe your words were "Almost as cruel as when he fucks"." Maisie smiled. "You were right about that. Can you tell my legs are still shaking? It took me so long to get here because I couldn’t walk straight."

Tessa’s vision hazed red and she slapped Maisie across the face. "I’m going to enjoy killing you."

Maisie’s head snapped back, and she laughed, bringing her fingers to her bloodied lips. She licked the blood off with another giggle that made Tessa even more enraged as she said, "It must be frustrating, knowing the only way you could ever get them in your bed was through coercion."

Tessa’s spine went rigid. And her hatred curdled and rotted.

It wasn’t that simple.

The Queen’s favor was a fragile thing. Tessa knew that better than anyone. She could be useful today and dispensable tomorrow.

If she failed to keep the Lycan princes interested, then the Queen would turn on her just as quickly as she had elevated her.

And the rites would continue.

If she could not seduce them, if she could not keep her place by making them desire her, she would force it on them. It was either that or be matted off. Locked away. Forced into some politically convenient future with the bloody MacKeltar, or made to swallow the humiliation of being someone’s wife.

The thought curdled in her throat and she spat at Maisie, "Coercion? They owed it to me. Their affection. Their love. Their desire. It should’ve been mine. It was mine. However I chose to take it is none of your business."

Maisie nodded, her expression contemplative. "Maybe you’re right. Maybe it is none of my business. On the matter of personal businesses..." She straightened. "You see, I made this journey because I had a little message for you. One I’m sure you’ll remember for the rest of your life."

It happened in under a second.

The slap caught Tessa full across the face. The strength and speed behind it was startling. The kind Tessa had felt once before in the dueling ring and had spent weeks trying to forget.

It knocked her clean off her feet, sending her sideways into the furniture and Tessa cried out when her thigh slammed into the table and her head cracked against the wall hard enough that the room briefly doubled.

She hit the ground with the taste of blood in her mouth.

When her vision cleared, she noticed something from the angle with which she lay on the ground that she hadn’t before.

The floor was wet. That was where the smell of liquor was coming from. It was dripping from the curtains, her dresser hung open and all of her beautiful dresses were on the floor, soiled and wet. It was on the bedsheets too. It was everywhere.

There was a strange fear curling in her gut when she glanced up and found Maisie watching her calmly.

"’Don’t poke the bear,’ they said," Maisie murmured. She was flicking something between her fingertips. "Or one day, it will poke back. I’m not a bear. And I try so hard to be kind. But you keep pushing me, Tessa."

"But I do think you won’t tell anyone I was here. It would be rather humiliating, narrating to everyone how a mutt got one up on you."

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