Her cool hand is around my throat, and she’s pinning me to the carriage wall before I can finish my taunt.
“Gwen.” Lunarie’s voice shakes. “Don’t.”
“You are nothing more than a filthy harlot. I am a queen.”
“Don’t look like a queen,” I squeak out and openly glance at her crown-less head.
Her grip tightens, and I can’t get air. “Solano is mine. He can exhaust his youthful needs with you, and when he’s ready, I’ll be waiting. I amforever. You are nothing. Changelings are already half-dead when they’re born. Soon you’ll be nothing but ash,” she hisses.
Lunarie’s scared face appears beside her sister. “Gwen, the king won’t like it if you—”
Gwenarie releases me and sits down as I gasp. The fae looks unperturbed, as if she were only chatting me up, not strangling the life from me.
We ride for a while, the minutes ticking by as I try to calm myself, to reassure my lungs that the air will keep coming. When my hands finally stop shaking and I can breathe again, I finally meet Gwenarie’s gaze. She seems satisfied with my state.
“Where are we going?” Lunarie’s eyes widen as she peers out the carriage window.
“To market. I told you.” Gwen smiles. It’s cold.
I suddenly feel the need to bolt from the carriage and run back to Solano.
“We passed the market ages ago.” Lunarie shakes her head. “This is the Day Wood.”
I eye the door, but Gwenarie slides to the end of her bench and rests her elbow against it.
“Let me out.”
She shakes her head. “We’re almost there.”
“Where?” I eye the gigantic trees, their trunks bigger than three carriages lined end-to-end.
“To market. Changeling, are you deaf?” Her smile is beautiful, but the thoughts behind it are ugly.
“If I don’t return to the palace—”
“The king will know you’ve run away. That you saw what happened to the other nightlings and didn’t want to meet the same fate.”
I sit forward. “What do you know about the nightlings?”
“The ones he took from the Night Realm that he didn’t favor? They arrived shortly after you with the night realm noble. Because they were not to his liking, Solano beat them and whipped them. Some of them are dead by now.” She gives a fae-will-be-fae sigh. “He’s so rough on the lesser beings. But he’s a king, after all. It’s his right. Changelings and lesser fae are here to carry out our will, and if they displease us, it is our right to discipline them, kill them if necessary.”
My ears are ringing. This can’t be true. “Solanotook the others?”
“Of course. Do you think he’d risk peace with the night realm over a changeling such as you?” She shakes her head. “Aren’t you the fool?”
The carriage stops as I sit, utterly stunned. Has he been lying to me all along, lulling me into a false sense of safety when really, he’s been playing the long game with me? I don’t want to believe it. The time we’ve spent together, the way he’s held me, the way he’s shared his bed and his life with me. It can’t be true.
“Gwen.” Lunarie’s eyes are troubled. One look from her sister shuts her up.
I grip the window frame, but I can’t seem to feel it. Some of my nightling friends aredead? It can’t be true.
The coachman opens the door and helps the sisters out, then walks away.
“Come, nightling,” Gwenarie trills.
I don’t move.
“If you don’t come, I’ll have my coachman drag you out by that uncouth hair of yours.”
