I stopped in my tracks, staring at the back of my bedroom door. “What do you expect in return?”
“Nothing.”
“I don’t believe you.” I faced him again and Archer stood with his hands in his pockets, looking bored as usual. “Gods always want something. It’s how you survive. You exist because of the prayers mortals make. You literally need them to need you in order to be here, so don’t bullshit me.”
That was the part mortals didn’t know about. If they did, I wondered how the scales would tip. And that was with mortals. When it came to their own kind, they didn’t ask for prayers, but there were similarities to the exchanges. There was always a deal. Always a catch. I’d never be stupid enough again to believe that any of them did something out of kindness.
“Nothing,” he repeated. There was a flicker across his features before he sighed. “Quentin, let me be frank with you, if you’ll allow me.” He took my silence as his sign to continue. “I have been around for centuries, and I am exhausted. All I have wanted for the last few decades is justice for my Elara. But she would never have wanted anyone else’s suffering as a result.” Archer dropped his gaze to the floor, and I noticed the lines that were etched into his face. “Do you know what her gift was?”
“No,” I whispered, racking my brains to see if I could remember anyone mentioning it.
“Hope. She was responsible for hope.” A smile appeared and left so quickly I could have imagined it. “That was her gift.”
“It sounds like a beautiful one.”
“It was,” he agreed. “She’d be ashamed to have seen what happened to you and to know that I had a part in it.”
I stood silently, unsure of what to say. Archer had brought up Elara so sparingly, protective of the memory of his soulbound. Selfishly keeping her to himself, and I couldn’t blame him. Having never met her, I couldn’t add anything to the comments he had just made.
“So.” He rubbed a hand through his hair and the dark strands stood up in different directions. “It’s about time I did something to make her proud. You wanted help, and I’m here.”
How was I meant to trust him? One story that tugged at the heart and then I was meant to spill everything to him?
My delay caused him to look up. “You don’t trust me?”
“I have no reason to, Archer.”
He raised an eyebrow and let out another sigh. “Understandable. But you have trusted far worse than me. What exactly is my crime?”
“You knew exactly what Hunter was up to and you let him do it!” I hissed.
“I had no idea that he planned to marry you, which was a misstep on my part. I should have paid more attention to my conversations with him. I should have known there was something bigger at play. You’ll have to forgive my lapse in judgement. Tell me your plan and I’ll help you.”
“You already know what I want to do. You’ve seen it.”
I couldn’t bring myself to say the words aloud even though the visions of me getting rid of Hunter grew more vivid and violent with each passing day.
“I have.” A twisted smile spread across his lips. “You’re a bloodthirsty little thing when backed into a corner.”
I ignored the way the comment made me uncomfortable in myself. Ambition had always driven me and there were decisions I’d made in my life that I wasn’t always proud of. But none of them compared to the choice that faced me now—kill or be killed.
“The oleander,” I said, choosing not to respond to his comment. “I need to know where it is. I couldn’t find a single sprig of it at Hunter’s place.”
“He wouldn’t keep it there. He wouldn’t risk anyone coming in and seeing it. There’s no excuse under the sun that would have anyone accept the fact that he has something lethal at his home. It was never meant to enter Elysia again.”
“But you have some,” I pointed out. “You were happy to grow it.”
“Keep it,” he corrected me. “I never grew it.”
“I’m not going to argue with you over semantics, Archer. You still have it, and I need it.”
Archer shook his head. “I don’t.”
“What do you mean, you don’t? I need it. This isn’t?—”
“I don’t have it anymore. Tobias came to look at it. You remember, it wasn’t exactly healthy. He took it away to nurse it and I haven’t seen it since.”
That was a spanner in the works. When I’d come up empty-handed at Hunter’s home, I’d banked on Archer still having his supply.
