Garrick’s lip curled. “Then force him to eat. If he refuses, break his jaw and feed him through a tube.”
When the cell door slammed shut, the silence was louder than ever.
How long ago had that been? Years, surely.
And now, Garrick Shaw was back. And this time, he wasn’t alone.
The younger man’s gaze swept over him, slow and assessing. “This is the prince?” He asked at last, his tone laced with curiosity. “I expected more.”
“Don’t underestimate him,” Garrick said. “He’s been in iron for twenty-five years and he’s still alive. He’s beaten, but he has never been weak.”
Loren bared his teeth at them. Garrick would know that, wouldn’t he? After all, they’d studied side by side for years, walking the halls of the Aetherium together. Once, Loren had thought of him as a friend.
But humans had never been meant to wield the gifts of the Goddess.
And Garrick Shaw had proved why.
The younger man crouched before him, studying him with the detached curiosity of a scholar examining a broken artifact—valuable, but only if it could be fixed.
“Beautiful work,” he murmured, reaching out to trace the collar. “He’s been struggling.” His eyes flicked to Loren’s swollen wrists and the trails of dried blood on his arms. “Why cuffs? Isn’t aly’ithrarune more effective?”
“He won’t give up his name,” for the first time Garrick sounded annoyed. “He hasn’t spoken a word to anyone Hale has sent down here to question him in about five years.”
“Impressive.” The new man sat back on his heels, grinning. “This is going to be fun.” He chuckled, turning back to Garrick. “Want to make a wager? Araya breaks the Shadowed Veil in under a year.”
Loren bit back a groan.That’s what they wanted?
The inquisitors had spent years torturing him, starving him, whispering lies in his ears—all in a futile attempt to make himreveal the secrets of the shadows.
If only they knew.
He wasn’t his father. The shadows didn’t answer to him. They watched—they whispered and waited. But they never obeyed him.
Loren exhaled slowly, pressing his head back against the cold stone. The inquisitors would be better off searching the void itself—they would find their answers sooner.
“You’re that sure about this female?” Garrick asked. “I’m not the only one you run the risk of disappointing, Jaxon.”
Loren’s blood ran cold.Jaxon.He stared at the younger man, trying to see the dark-haired boy who had once clung to Garrick’s robes.
“Completely,” Jaxon laughed. “She thinks this whole thing is her idea.”
Garrick exhaled, rubbing his fingers over the line grooved between his eyebrows.
“You had everything set up for you,” he said. “The Eldergreen project, your own research team—it took years of planning to get you that. And you threw it away to come back and play house with a fae?—”
“You act like it was a setback.”
“Itwas,” Garrick snapped. “The Eldergreen is still crawling with fae magic?—”
“Don’t be dramatic, father.” Jaxon’s jaw tightened, but his smirk remained. “You think I should have wasted another decade digging through ruins when I could be making history?”
He gestured lazily toward Loren. “I have bigger things to accomplish now.”
Garrick’s gaze sharpened. “You have things to prove.” His voice was cold, unyielding. “She’s good at what she does, but involving her in the actual work?—”
“She’s done it before.” Jaxon waved off his father’s concern. “She wasn’t supposed to, of course, but she was already doing half my work. I gave her the problem, she worked out the safest sequence, and I cast the spells. She could have saved lives in Elvanfal if the Arcanum wasn’t so shortsighted?—”
Loren’s fingers twitched, his pulse quickening as he forced himself to remain still, his head bowed in feigned disinterest. If the humans hadn’t taken the Eldergreen?—
