“Actually … he did. I told him you were taken by the elves.” I’m lost as she swears, more tears springing to her eyes.Thisis what she cares about?
“Oh Gods,” she breathes, moving from me, pacing in the small space in front of the sink. “Do they know you’re here?”
“No. I mean … they could. It’s not a secret I’m in Alfheim with Draven.” I’m stunned to silence as she hugs herself, looking to the door as though enemies will burst through at any moment. “Mom … what do I not know?”
“You’ve led the seraphs to the doorstep.” She stares at the floor, her voice a disconnected thing, as if she doesn’t even know she’s speaking. “They cannot find me. It’ll put all mortals in danger. You and your brother won’t be safe.”
“What’re you talking about?” Has she lost her mind? Has being here broken her?
“Rune, I never wanted you to know this—” She stops as the door opens by magic.
“There you are.” Draven slips into the room, locking it, and I breathe a sigh of relief. He makes it two steps in before he stops. His head tilts as he stares at my mother, and then his gaze flashes from sapphire to red in a dizzying speed. “Well, I didn’t expect to seeyourface again.”
She blinks, and her expression changes in an instant. “Youare the prince of darkness?” Thrusting me behind her, she stands tall, hands curled to fists, snarling.
Draven’s fangs have descended, wings spreading to the point he fills all empty space. I haven’t seen such hatred from him since he squared off with King Altair.
Judgment fills her eyes, a sour, scorned thing. She spits at him, “Your father would be rolling in his grave if he knew this is what became of you.”
“Well, you’d know, you helped put him there.”
“What’s going on, Mom?” I demand, hating the panic lining my voice.
My mom’s gaze snaps back to me before she looks to him again.
“This is your mother?” Draven looks me up and down, as if he didn’t see it before, the accusation obvious.
My back slickens with sweat, legs shaking. What am I missing? “How the hells do you two know each other?”
He glares as though I’m fucking with him, then looks at her incredulously. His hand hovers over his cards and my mother flinches.
My heart is hammering in my chest, this moment a horrible, warped version of what I imagined. This must be some kind of mistake …
“Wait … Kal … just hold on—” my mother pleads.
“Who’s Kal?” But neither seems to hear me. All right, that’s enough. I growl at them, “Will you both just explain what’s going on?”
Draven looks to me, nodding in resignation, then draws the Hierophant. Suddenly a past version of my mother stands between us. Her younger self leans down to a small boy with indigo eyes. He’s maybe five years old, his dark hair holding a little curl to it, hanging below his rounded ears. The echo of her past self says, “We’ll make sure they pay. The immortals will never again forget who we are, or what we’re capable of.”
“You want to tell her, or should I?” Draven snarls.
My mother holds a finger up to him, as if she can stop all this with that simple gesture.
Anger burns a trail through me at all this waffling. “Tell me. Now.”
“Rune, your father and I were part of the uprising.” She stares into my eyes. There’s no hint of a lie there.
But all I can do is laugh. “No, you weren’t.” But I don’t know what else to add to that soft rebuttal. My parents? They were no one. Merchants and craftspeople, always too poor, barely scraping by. We were nobodies; all we had was each other.
But she just holds my gaze, apology lining her head to toe.
“And how do you know each other?” I glance at the space where those phantom images still stand, frozen in time.
My mother levels a look of fury at Draven now, seeming to draw some satisfaction as she spits back.
“You’re looking at Kieran Ceres’s youngest son. Though he was called Kallos then.”
27Traitors
