Avoiding his gaze at all cost—I slid my blade to the side, widening the hole. Leaning over, Endymion wrapped his fingers over the hilt, careful not to touch me whilestopping the movement.
“Please.” The softness in the plea had my eyes searching for his; when they collided, he said, “Artton has good reason to feel the way he does, but it has nothing to do with you.”
Abandoning the dagger to his grip, I leaned back and glowered at him. “That doesn’t change the fact that he’s right.”
“He’s not.”
“How can you possibly say that?”
“Nyleeria,” he said, expression pained, “I’ve lived through two of your nightmares. One real, one born of fear. And those are only fragments of the trauma you’ve been through. You’ve lived from one terror to the next since your parents were murdered; of course, you fucken trusted the man who is your monarch and begging you to save your people. You shouldn’t have been burdened with this. With any of it.” His fists tightened around the hilt. “Artton is wrong because he thinks you made a choice, and you believe him because it’s what you think too—that’s why his words hurt. But you didn’t, Nyleeria, in any of this.”
“I did, though.”
He shook his head. “No. You didn’t. Don’t you understand, it didn’t matter if you went to his palace, let him siphon your powers, or shared his bed,” he said, clearly trying to hold his composure with the last few words, “because he would’ve taken what he wanted from you regardless.”
I paused at his words, and everything seemed to still as if Lady Time herself had laid a hand on my shoulder, the touch shifting my world so fast that my head began to spin. My eyes shut tight enough against the sensation that crinkles formed at their edges. But no matter how long she held time at bay, I couldn’t help seeing things through Endymion’s eyes, my mouth quivering from the emotional overwhelm of realizing he was right.
Tucking my knees in close to my chest, I wrapped my arms around them, then rested my chin atop them before looking to Endymion through blurry eyes. “I didn’t matter,” I said in a whisper.
His mouth softened into a smile as he slowly shook his head. “I didn’t matter.”
Relief and denial continued to oscillate, and I knew it would take more than a few minutes for acceptance to join the fray.
“Endymion?” I said after a long moment.
“Yes?”
“What’s in it for you and Caius? I need to know.”
“You already know the answer.”
I shook my head. “No, I don’t.”
“Nyleeria, we didn’t know Thaddeus was a spellcaster when you visited, but we knew you were the spark.”
I raised my head from my knees a fraction. “That doesn’t answer my question.”
“It does, I promise. Think about it.”
I mulled his words over and over, trying to sort out how those two pieces of information uncovered their motives. I was the spark,andthey didn’t know that Thaddeus was a powerful immortal seeking revenge, which meant?—
I looked up at him with wide eyes. “You let me leave.”
He nodded, his smile growing.
“There was nothing stopping you from keeping me here when I visited during solstice. Thaddeus doesn’t even know how to enter this realm,” I added.
“Exactly.” He released my dagger and leaned back, and I wasn’t sure if it was the genuine smile lighting up his features or the revelations, but a tiny fragment of the ice wrapped around my heart slipped away.
I mulled over everything I’d learned in the past day.
“Endymion?” I asked again, breaking the silence.
“Yes?” he said, the corner of his mouth ticking up in amusement.
“I understand I’m High Fae—” I paused as if needing his confirmation. His brows pulled in a fraction, but he nodded once. “In the palace…the way the others treat me, it’s like they…” I faltered, trying to grasp the right word.
“Revere you,” he supplied.
