Kingdom of Ash

“Do you care if he walks out alive?”
Lorcan said with deadly calm.
Elide studied the male whose heart she
held. “No.” Good, Aelin almost said. Elide
added, “But make it quick.” Lorcan opened
his mouth. Elide shook her head. “My father
would wish it so.”
Punish them all, Kaltain had made Aelin
once promise. And Vernon, from what Elide
had told Aelin, seemed likely to have been at
the top of Kaltain’s list.
“We need to question him first,” Rowan
said. “See what he knows.”
“Then do it,” Elide said. “But when it’s
time, make it quick.”
“Quick,” Fenrys mused, “but not painless?”
Elide’s face was cold, unyielding. “You
can decide.”
Lorcan’s brutal smile told Aelin enough.
So did the hatchet, twin to Rowan’s, gleaming