My jaw slackened. The rebels accepted us. For me, that meant a lot. For Vale and the Riis brothers it was more complicated—though as I spied Luccan and Arie, still dancing and happy, I thought maybe it actually wasn’t. Perhaps they were pleased to be part of the movement that changed the kingdom.
Maybe they—I gasped as Luccan fell to his knees. Though I couldn’t hear the scream leaving his lips, his face contorted in pain, and I saw the panic ripple across Clem’s delicate features as she knelt next to him.
“Thyra, I have to go!” I rushed back into the dining hall and headed straight for Luccan.
When I arrived, Clemencia held him tightly, tears running down her face. Vale, Anna, and Arie beat me to him, and Thantrel arrived as I did. In the time it took me to run to them, Luccan stopped screaming, but he was still panting, his eyes wide.
“What happened?” I asked.
“Something broke inside me. A snap, like a bone cracking,but in my heart. Fates ithurt.” Luccan gripped his chest. “I think someone has attacked my magic. A gateway.”
“What?!” Arie shared a wild-eyed look with Thantrel. “The one in Vitvik?”
Luccan shook his head. “Not that one. This connection felt further away. I’m fairly certain that a gateway in Avaldenn is gone. The one in my house. They all have a unique sensation, and I can feel it better now that the shock is less.”
Clem rubbed his back as the rest of us exchanged startled and pointed looks.
“Few things can destroy a gateway,” Luccan continued. “Which is why when they’re destroyed, the maker—if they’re still alive—feels it.”
“Many people witnessed us run to your home,” Vale spoke softly. “The king might have had it investigated, and he has ample resources.”
“Agreed.” Luccan rose. He did so without help, so I stood back, watching him. When he stood again, he brushed himself off and said with calm fortitude, “This changes any plans we might have to move about the kingdom.”
“It does far more than that,” Arie murmured. “It marks our house as traitors to the Crown of Winter. The realm, as far as most fae are concerned.”
My heart gave a hard thud as the danger I’d put my friends in grew ever larger.
Chapter 37
VALE
After what happened to Luccan, it became clear that we could do nothing to discover the truth of what happened, nor remedy the matter. Not right away anyhow. So we remained at the celebration, hoping to seize a few more hours of joy. To lose ourselves for a night.
Hours of revelry passed. Hours in which wine and ale flowed. I danced with my mate, and watched my half-brothers fall deeper in love. As the hour of the direwolf approached, a handful of rebels had requested that Caelo and I join them in a hand of nuchi. Caelo agreed, whereas I declined.
I had other ideas for how to spend the small hours. None of them involved gambling, but rather getting Neve into our bed.
Since the mate bond snapped into place, I’d wanted her more than ever before. Body. Mind. Soul.Everything.
As my mate, she was my beginning and my end, the veryair in my lungs and the blood in my veins, and I’d give everything I had to her. I counted myself lucky to have that pleasure.
I could have lived a thousand turns and never met my mate. Or never had one at all. For most fae, that was the reality of life.
And as that force of nature I called my wife entered our bedchamber, dressed in a thin gown that left little to the imagination, I planned to make the most of every moment we had together.
“Thought you might already be asleep,” she teased. “Snoring drunkenly.”
I scoffed at her cheek. “I’d never do such a thing.”
“You have!” She slipped beneath the furs. “The night we fled Avaldenn. Stars alive, you snored so loudly, you sounded like a lür horn blasting through the room.”
I grabbed her, flipped her beneath me. The squeal that left her lips set my heart racing. “I only recall battling a vampire that night, so I’ll have to take your word for it.”
“Better that way.” She stroked my cheek, the heat I’d grown so used to seeing in her eyes when we made love fanning there momentarily before her face stilled, her gentle hand fell away. “Vale, I have something important to ask, and I don’t want to delay.”
“Delayed gratification can be fun though. Let me show you,” I kissed her neck, but she pushed me away gently.
“Seriously.”
