“Do you even have a plan?” Ariel’s voice pitched low as she leaned toward Lyrae. “Var and I could smuggle you out of the city. We could all go to another continent, make up new identities and start over. I used to know a guy who can…”
“I’m not leaving.” Lyrae stared up at the face of the Citadelle, her jaw set, eyes hard. “Tempeste is my home, and I made the right decision in trusting Kaden. I just have to make Anaria understand why.”
That cinching tightness in my chest squeezed my heart like a fist.
Damn straight she’d made the right choice trusting me. A choice she would never regret, because I was going to fix this.
Ariel shrugged. “Well, it was a valid suggestion. If youchange your mind, I already have aliases picked out for us. Want to know what yours is?” Then I couldn’t hear the rest as she followed Lyrae up the steps, both sisters pale as the moon rising above the mountains.
I went to follow when Ryland’s hand clamped down over my shoulder.Hard.
“Not so fucking fast. What’s her plan?”
“I don’t know,” I told him honestly. “But she’s worried.” I stared after her. “Not for herself, of course, but for me. For her sister. Even for you two assholes. But most of all, I think she’s afraid of losing the life she has here, in this city she loves so much.”
Ryland watched her unblinkingly. “Then it’s up to us to make sure that does not happen.”
59
LYRAE
The throne chamber doors opened.
Queen Anaria sat on the high seat carved from a solid block of moonstone, set upon floors of white marble, smoother than a baby’s skin. The high, vaulted ceiling sparkled with a constellation of a thousand golden faelights in all shapes and sizes, like an entire galaxy stretched out over our heads.
Framed by an open archway thirty feet high, Anaria was outlined by the darkened mountain range separating Valarian from the windswept Pale, their snow-topped peaks sparkling beneath the rising moon.
Her eyes found me immediately, then a flicker crossed the queen’s face—something like relief—before vanishing beneath the unreadable mask she always wore at the official audiences where she had to make hard decisions. The same expression the rest of the royal court—people I’d called friends—wore as they stared down at us.
I felt small and insignificant standing down here, dwarfed by the grandeur of this place, where my self-righteous reasons for my actions suddenly seemed…lesscompellingthan they had an hour ago.
“Lyrae Antares,” Anaria murmured, voice echoingthrough the empty chamber. “We’re glad you have returned safely.”
Usually, the gallery overhead would be full, so would the rows of benches on either side of the aisle behind us, but tonight—for this—it was just us.
Torin, Zeph, Simon, and Cosimo stood to one side of the throne, Tavion, Zorander, Tristan, and Raziel on the other, in the spot where I usually stood, at the queen’s right hand.
Some part of me shriveled at the thought of never standing there again.
Never protecting this proud female who had been an enemy, an ally, and a friend—not always in that order.
Torin was chewing her bottom lip, hands tucked up into her sleeves. Her ghostly eyes skimmed over us, landing on Rooke with an unsettling intensity, brow pinched together, lips moving slightly, as if she were talking to herself.
I bent my knee, lowered my head, and sank to the floor. “Thank you, my queen. I am glad to be back.”
Ryland and Varian followed my lead. Ariel hesitated a heartbeat, then knelt as well.
Rooke sank deeply to his knees beside me, hand over his heart, wave after wave of dark power pouring off him, spilling onto the floor around us in a pool of dark, twisting water. Even the air was tinged by his magic: a faint sparkle of gold floated like stardust, tendrils of twisting darkness that seemed to form a protective shield around us.
Up on the dais, everyone shifted closer to Anaria.
Anaria’s pale, assessing gaze slid over Kaden. “You must be Lord Kaden Rooke,” her voice as cool as winter. “The heir of Frostveil Keep and Dark Prince of the Shadowlands. I have heard much about your family.”
Read:I know your bloodline goes back further than my own,the blood of the Old Gods runs in your veins, and you are my enemy.
“I am,” he replied softly.
Her chin lifted a fraction. “You are the bearer of the Triune.”
