I turned to look at Locke sympathetically then. For all his faults, I couldn’t imagine my own father trying to kill me. “We’ll find him,” Locke ground out, and his eyes blazed with fury. “But first,” he said to me, “you need to tell us what you were doing in Warrick’s lab.”
“Oh, that.” I placed my half-eaten hunk of cheese on the plate and cleared my throat. I’d been waiting for them to ask. Letting out a long breath, I went on to tell them all about the drawings of the outliers I’d seen in Warrick’s lab. I didn’t mention that I’d seen Locke’s report, nor did I explain about my sister. I simply told them I was desperate to know if Warrick had information about what I was or why I hadn’t changed into a monster. I also explained all about the fae male who’d been tortured and why he said he was there. Finally, I spoke about the portal the fae said he’d created. When I finished, everyone was silent for a beat before Kade growled, “You shouldn’t have gone down there. There’s a reason Warrick’s lab is so deep beneath the mountain.”
I prepared myself to argue, but Locke spoke up, his brow wrinkled in thought. “When we fought the fae in the city, they were shouting about a prince. There were only around twenty fae warriors, and when Kade and I joined the gargoyles and other monsters who were already fighting, I thought they’d flee back into the portal when they realized they were outnumbered. But they didn’t. Some of them used magic, but it wasn’t enough to overpower us. It wasn’t until there were only two fae left that one of them went back through the portal. It closed soon after, but it’s possible this Prince Azaren is who he says he is.”
“If he’s a prince, why would only twenty soldiers come through?” Asher asked.
Darian placed his goblet on the table and strolled over, dropping down on the bed near my legs. “It’s been a while since the fae have attacked. They might have been hoping to create a portal in the forest like Prince Azaren and thought they could scout the area in smaller numbers to find him.”
“Do you think he’s found the books?” Kade asked Locke.
I jerked my head back so I could look at the wolf shifter. “Wait. So the books are real?”
“Very,” Kade growled. “Locke and I have been searching them to try to find information about the curse or whatever bond this is. I’m not sure why we bothered when they’re all damned fairy tales.”
Fairy tales?I thought of Locke and Kade reading fairy tales together, and my lip quirked up, but then I thought of what Prince Azaren had said about me. “So about the bond…,” I began.
“What about it?” Asher asked, and one of his large hands casually flopped onto my thigh. “It’s turned out to be useful. Locke wouldn’t have known about you being in danger without it.”
I tried not to think about how both Kade and Asher were touching me now, and I said, “Well, Prince Azaren said he could tell I was cursed.”
“Cursed?” Darian asked, his blue eyes sparking with interest. “Aren’t we all? You’re obviously turning into something powerful.”
I wiggled uneasily against Kade’s body.
Kade sucked in a sharp breath, and I realized I’d rubbed against his growing erection that had begun to poke into my back. An erection that I’d been trying desperately to ignore. “Sorry,” I muttered, then turned my attention back to the others. “He said he could feel strange magic around me. Magic that’s different from the curse Queen Izla placed on Katakin. Magic that has bound my soul to others. He suggested that maybe someone has experimented on me.”
“Your soul? What the fuck,” Asher spat out.
Kade growled, and Darian cursed.
“Warrick,” Locke bit out, and his lip curled to reveal fangs.
“So you think he did something to me too?” I asked, a little deflated.
No one answered, but their silence told me that they did.Well, fuck.So I was another of Warrick’s experiments. I sighed heavily. “Well, Prince Azaren said if I went with him to the fae realm, he would be able to remove the curse.”
Kade’s body stiffened behind me, and the others tensed as well.
“We’re not removing the bonds,” Kade growled, and I was surprised at the anger rolling off him.Didn’t he want to be free of me?
Darian and Asher muttered their agreement, but Locke was the one to say, “If Warrick has experimented on her, there’s no telling what he’s done or whether Raine’s life is in danger. We should try to remove the magic he’s placed over her.”
Asher and Kade went to protest, but I held up my hands. “If there’s a way to remove the curse on me, there must also be a way to break the curse on Katakin. I intend to find it. You heard Warrick. His ‘demonstration’ went well. He intends to create an army of the creatures and doesn’t care if any of the monsters of Katakin are killed along the way. Weneedto find that cure. Besides, I won’t be responsible for getting you all killed. I want to try to find the portal and go to the fae world.”
The idea of going to yet another strange world made my stomach churn, but I had to do it. If the curse was removed from Katakin, Warrick would no longer have magic and could no longer create outliers. I might not have found my sister yet, but Warrick was still alive, and if she was in Katakin she was in danger. I didn’t know how long Prince Azaren’s portal would stay open, and it could be my only chance.
“The fae would kill you,” Kade snarled, his body rigid.
“And who’s to say where this prince is now? Not to mention, even if you did find him in the fae realm, why would he help us?” Darian asked.
It was Locke who answered. “If there’s a cure, we must find it. Warrick wants war. If we break the curse, we destroy the outliers.”
“And who’s to say the fae won’t wipe us out when we’ve been turned human again?” Kade growled, challenging Locke.
“I’d rather die a human than remain a fucking monster,” Locke replied calmly. “And, if we’re human, maybe we can stop the war.”
Asher pulled his hand from my leg and sat up straighter. “So you’re just goin’ to waltz into the fae realm and find it? I’m down for an adventure, but that’s madness.”
