How cute that he thought it was a request. “Oh, but she is. Courtesy of Archer.”
“What?”
The unstable flicker of his aura joined us in the room. Hunter was the most composed out of the three of us. He didn’t possess the same lack of control as me, and there was never a gentle glow in the style of Erik.
“This is exactly why you shouldn’t have trusted Archer with Scott.” I seethed.
“I told him to be discreet until we’ve decided.”
“When have you known him to listen? He’s throwing her a gifting ball. Plans to show her off to lower Elysia. No doubt he’ll fill their heads with ideas. Who’s saying he hasn’t done it to her already? He has a fondness for half-breeds, if I remember correctly.”
The words tasted bitter on my tongue. Referring to Quentin as if she was something beneath me was wrong, and if she ever found out, she’d make me pay.
“He wouldn’t dare,” Hunter said. His tone brought a chill to the air.
“You have no guarantee other than his word, and he’s already broken it by hosting a ball. Do you truly believe it’ll be a small affair?”
There was a beat of silence while Hunter weighed up my words. Methodical and calculated, I would have loved to see what ran through his mind. In his eyes, regardless of the fact I was his blood, he didn’t trust me any more than he did Archer. However he chose to deal with this information meant he gave in to one of us. I needed to make sure this fell in my favour.
“The longer she remains down there in his care, the more we risk her finding out what happened to her kin,” I pointed out.
“Archer knows that conversation is off limits.”
I secretly hoped that would be the case, but had no guarantee that Archer had kept all the secrets the heavens held.
“Are you prepared to take that risk? He’s about to introduce her to the rest of them. The minor Gods have looked for an excuse to rebel for centuries. We’ve just handed them the perfect reason. Reopened old wounds.”
Hunter turned away from me, walking to his desk. The tension caused his shoulders to rise as he took in my words. The stance flooded me with memories that were becoming more difficult to escape.
“He’s going to use her,” I pressed on, “to gain an advantage over the elite. If that advantage belongs anywhere, it’s with us.”
Ego had always been the way to win Hunter over. He believed he was the most powerful and most important. If he saw value in you, he would keep you close. What else was the council, but those Hunter deemed too valuable to have their own thoughts and opinions? Humans relied on them and he collected them.
It took me an embarrassingly long time to realise that my brother didn’t place me on the council to help me like he originally claimed. The closer he kept me to him, the tighter the hold he had on me. During those years where I was naïve enough to believe the words that fell from his mouth, Hunter controlled the narrative that surrounded my life, and I did nothing about it because I wanted to stay in his graces.
Never again.
I would never allow it to happen again.
The narrative was mine to control. I just needed to twist the strings until he danced to my tune.
I opened my mouth, prepared to continue fighting my case, but it wasn’t necessary. Hunter had arrived at his decision.
“We’ll need to retrieve her.”
He moved from his desk to a small cabinet and pulled the doors open. A gentle metal clanging filled the room as he picked up an item, but with his back to me, I couldn’t see what it was.
“I requested for this to be made,” he explained. “Mortals were only too willing to help. I brought it back up here today but didn’t expect to use it so quickly.” Hunter turned to face me again. “You’ll need to fix it to her. She has too much bark for my liking. She’ll be your responsibility. If I so much as find out that she’s caused an issue up here, there will be consequences. Understood?”
He tossed the copper collar onto the table between us with a long chain link lead.
“Unless,” Hunter said, locking eyes with me, “this would prove to be a problem for you?”
Underestimating Hunter would be fatal. Despite what I thought of him most days, he wasn’t as stupid as he looked. As tired as I was of playing the long game with him, I still had to pick my battles. The option of going rogue, albeit an attractive one, would only give me temporary bliss, and I was chasing after eternal.
I picked the collar up from the table, growing accustomed to the weight of it in my hands. “Why would it cause me problems?”
Quentin was going to murder me.
