I stayed close behind him, my shoulder still aching faintly from the wound, my thoughts spinning harder than my steps.
“What will happen to Inderia?” I asked, voice low. “I find it hard to believe she wasthatcareless. How could she not know the dragons communicate telepathically?”
Zander didn’t look back, but his jaw tightened.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Theron is… fond of her. He’ll find a way to twist this, to make itourfault. Or the Order’s. I don’t know how yet, but he will.”
He turned a corner, footsteps slowing slightly.
“But he also knows this—” Zander’s voice dropped, sharp and final. “I can no longer marry Inderia.”
My pulse picked up.
“Are you sure he can’t force you?” I asked, breath catching. “I mean, if hebecomesking…”
Zander stopped then, turned to face me fully, his expression fierce in a way that made the torchlight tremble.
“First, that willnothappen. Dorian is the rightful heir. And second…” He looked away for a brief second, then back again. “Hein willkillInderia if she ever attempts to come to my bed. She is dead tous.”
The words shouldn’t have made me feel warm.
But they did.
I swallowed hard, finding comfort in their finality. “Can he make you choose another?”
“No,” Zander said. “My contract was with Inderia’s royal house. Now that it’s broken, I am free.”
His gaze met mine.
“I am free to choose my own bride.”
I nodded slowly, unsure of what burned hotter in my chest, relief, or the dangerous hope that threatened to rise with it.
We continued walking, the hall narrowing as the air turned damp and cold. The torches flickered weaker here, the scent of moss and iron creeping in.
Down ahead, the dungeon gates loomed—black and rusted, thick with old magic.
Whatever answers we sought—they were waiting in the lavish suite belonging to Alahathrial.
The dungeon should have felt cold.
Oppressive. Stone and iron and mildew.
But as Zander and I stepped through the heavy warded doors into the suite, the world changed.
Rich crimson and gold tapestries draped the walls, their embroidered edges woven with ancient sigils. The air was warm, perfumed with something spiced and unfamiliar.
The floor beneath our boots shifted from worn stone to a deep-violet rug, so plush it nearly silenced our steps.
A low table sat in the center of the room, carved from dark wood and inlaid with etched silver vines that seemed to move when the light hit them just right. Surrounding it were velvet chairs and a curved couch with black dragon-scale inlays along the arms—elegant, deadly, and clearly expensive.
Shelves lined the far wall, cluttered with tomes and crystalline decanters, their contents catching the light in fractured rainbows. The books bore no titles, just runes etched in fading ink and symbols I didn’t dare touch.
It was more asanctuarythan a cell.
But then again, what use was a locked door to a fae who could slip into any form, any face?
We barely had time to absorb the room before he emerged.
