A smile twitches at the corners of Lorcan’s mouth. “It gave meperspective.”
What I wouldn’t give for a little perspective of my own…
“Isla mentioned you haven’t decided what to do with the traitress,” Cathal says, parking his mammoth frame beside me.
“What would you do?” I ask.
“What would she hate the most?” Lorcan asks.
Without hesitation, I answer: “Living.”
“In a cell, right?” Isla asks.
“Yes,” I reassure her. “A heavily guarded and warded one.”
“Daya has boarded a ship with Fallon and Arin. Once they arrive, she’ll help you ward your prison,” Cathal says.
“They’re coming here?” The eagerness sparkling in Isla’s voice warms my chilled blood.
“Do you really think they could’ve stayed away?” Lorcan murmurs.
As she frets about whether traveling is safe for her mother, her grandfather mutters, “Careful about false repentance, Korol. We had some unpleasant surprises in Shabbe.”
I stare steadily at Ksenia, who stares steadily ahead of her, at no one and nothing. “I don’t care for her repentance.”
“But what will you do if she offers it to you?” he challenges me.
I will grant her wish to fade from this world…I’m so ashamed of my thought that I cut my eyes to the star-riddled sound stretching toward the capital and toss it far.
Drown it.
Isla squeezes our palms together.
I suddenly hate that she can see into my mind…that she can touch the cruel fabric of my soul. I try to pry my fingers from hers and put a little distance between us until the noble king prevails over the monstrous one, but her grip tightens.
And then she’s pivoting to face me.Never walk away from me, Konstantin Korol, for I have wings.
Her threat to leave gives my self-loathing and embarrassment pause.
Oh, I wasn’t threatening to fly away. I was reminding you that I’d hunt you down and carry you back to sanity. Or just dangle you above a few hungry orcas until you stopped pining after oblivion. You don’t belong in the abyss. You belong above it. Between land and sky. With me.
Lorcan snorts as though he can hear his daughter scolding me. I suddenly wonder if he can. Or worse, can he readmythoughts now?
No,she says.Dádhi cannot read your thoughts or participate in our asides. He’s just very familiar with my brand of stubbornness.
Sure enough, Isla’s tenacity sinks it claws into my soul and reels it out of its wallowing.
“Where are our manners, Cathal? We didn’t even go say hello to the prisoner.” Lorcan’s voice glides through the night like a sharpened dagger.
“According to Daya, I have no manners,” Cathal grunts.
Isla snort-laughs, then pats his big arm and reassures him that he is loved just the way he is.
Before trekking toward Ksenia, the male says, “Good luck, Korol. And I don’t mean ruling your kingdom.”
“He means being ruled by my daughter,” Lorcan elucidates, as though I could’ve arrived at another conclusion.
Isla rolls her eyes as the two terrifying males stalk toward my sister.
