I cast my attention on one of the torches hooked into the stone wall, pretending the royal monster isn’t standing there, mere breaths away.
“Don’t mind her.” Phoebus pats my hand. “Her mood’s always rotten before she eats.”
I ferry my widened gaze over to my friend.
Formerfriend.
Phoebus pins my arm under his to keep me from shooting back into my cell. “We were about to remedy that.”
If he invites him to join us, I will—
Another Crow lands beside Lorcan and shifts into skin. My heart holds still again, and I pray to the Fae gods—even though they probably won’t listen to me since I’m not one of their children—that it isn’t my father.
Lo and behold, it isn’t.
A woman with long black hair that gleams sapphire like Lorcan’s, and features as sharp as her alter ego, rises from a crouch, and although her shoulders don’t graze her king’s, she stands close.
A little too close for a subject, if you ask me.
Which, I’m aware, no oneisasking me.
She doesn’t smile at me or thank me for being instrumental in her return. Maybe she hasn’t regained the use of her voice. She pivots toward Lore and says something in their tongue, proving that her vocal folds are, in fact, in tip-top shape.
He nods, eyes not leaving mine. “Imogen, meet Fallon. Cathal’s child.”
Her eyes taper on me, so I narrow mine right back. Childish, I’m aware. Finally, she nods; I don’t.
He steps toward the archway under which Phoebus and I stand. “I hope you’ll find our food to your liking, Fallon.”
I smile up at him, making sure it’s all teeth. “You know my love for carrion.”
A slow smile spreads over his mouth, and although he shows no teeth, I can feel them pressing into the curve of his lips. “We stock plenty of birdseeds. Phoebus, make sure she gets a generous ration?”
My friend, who isn’t my friend anymore, grins.
“Imogen, my chambers. Now. We’ve work to do.” I don’t watch him leave, but I do watch her follow.
She sticks so close that if he were in his other form, her head would be up his tail, lodged somewhere in that indent I once mistook for a detonating switch. I shove the visual aside and yank Phoebus forward. “Let’s leave them to theirwork.”
“Someone sounds—”
I elbow him in the ribs, cutting off both his speech and breath. Even though a door claps shut, these shapeshifters have exceptional hearing.
Besides, I’mnotjealous.
I’d have to care about the winged male, and I absolutely don’t.
Two
The Sky Tavern, orAwhawbenas Phoebus tells me it’s called, is excavated in the gray rock of Monteluce. Wooden beams support thick ropes strung with rows of glass lanterns. Every wick burns with a flame, providing light in the otherwise dusky cavern. Yes, there are windows, but they’re as minute as the ones in my cell.
Like the mural behind my bed, the walls are decorated with landscapes of chalk and ink. I study them thoroughly, and not because I find them pretty; I don’t. Just like I don’t find the wooden mezzanine with its driftwood furniture lovely in the least.
This prison may sit in the sky, but it’s still a prison. No amount of starlight will ever make it sparkle. To think I begged Lorcan for a glimpse of it the day we crested the mountain.
“Oh my Gods, you got her to come out of her room!” Sybille’s voice bangs against my eardrums.
I find her waving from a table in the corner—if an egg-shaped room can be considered to have corners. I’m glad to see the table sits under the mezzanine and not smack-dab in the middle for all to peer at, becauseallare peering. The room grows so quiet I can hear the sweeps of eyelashes amidst the charcoal-streaked faces twisted toward me.
