The question appeared on the tip of my tongue. I was hesitant to ask, but… “Wards that would have been set up by the male claiming to be your father?” I asked carefully.
Rowan stiffened but bowed his head in a nod. “Yeah.”
“Any news on that?” If there was, he hadn’t told me—though when he would have gotten the chance, I wasn’t sure.
“None,” he replied with a tight smile. “Which we should have seen coming.”
“Dad is still testing him, though he’s being tight-lippedabout it,” Adrian added with a shake of his head. “He’s definitely hiding something.”
I blew out a breath, wishing I could take Rowan’s hand. “Which we probably know the reason for.”
Rowan’s jaw ticked as he stared at the map. “Well, he can’t be that good,” he declared, “because we’re better. And soon, you’re going to have that nasty little collar off, and you’ll blow all his charms up with one sweep of your hand.”
“That would be nice,” I murmured, brushing my fingers over the cool metal around my throat. “So, what do we do then? Smoke them out?”
Beside me, Elias chuckled. “Something like that.”
“Technically,” I said, pointing to the map, “he’s also super closed in. Yeah, he’s protected at his back because of the mountain. But a few soldiers with wings and weapons up there and he can’t escape out that way—that’s if he hasn’t put his own soldiers there, since he has Aither on his side.”
“She’s right,” Hawk said, leaning across the table across from me. “He got Aither Court so he could have an air force on his side. He’ll have them in the skies.”
“And the forest will be flooded with soldiers, of course, but obviously not as many as the army of House Wrath, right?” I asked, looking over at Damon.
The corners of his lips quirked as he shook his head. “Oh, certainly not. We’d only need a third of the army—a fifth, even—as well as the rest of your agents, the shifters, vampires, and witches amongst our ranks to take the palace back.”
It felt too easy—though, any time we tried to talk it through, it always sounded easy to me. But Maeve had seen two world wars in her time, more than enough skirmishes as an agent, and Damon had even more under his belt, having witnessed wars for three and a half thousand years.
If they were confident, if they thought we were on the right track, then we had to be.
I didn’t know war or strategy.
I just had to find a way to get Dante alone so I could get the skull and stop himonce and for all.
The meeting wasn’t over,the others still going at their plan and trying to assemble our forces in the Underworld, but there wasn’t much I could do to help them with that. I could come up with ideas, sure, but in the end, I was the least helpful person in the room. I couldn’t even do much about Dante’s soldiers, because Xerxes and Thor knew more about them than I did.
All I said was I needed a break, and now I was in the soon-to-be-nursery. Lightning struck the sky outside the balcony door, illuminating the grey clouds. The force made me miss my own. The resulting thunder almost had me jumping out of my skin, a curse falling from my lips.
“One day,” I murmured, hand moving to my belly, “the sun will come out. Just not while Dante has all the power.”
A flutter, one that made my heart skip a beat, responded to those words. I dropped my hand and stepped away from the window, tears burning my eyes.
I scraped a hand through my hair as I took in the almost sunset coloured room. When the lightning struck this time, it was like it lit up the room with what I imagined it could be. A place for a future I so fearfully thought I couldn’t have.
I wouldn’t dare let myself hope, not until Dante was gone.
These last couple of days showed me I could have this dream. It could be a reality.
But not with him hunting me. Not when he still had power over me.
The collar tightened like a threat. Like it knew it was running out of time. There was only one bond left, one male to accept me and complete my power.
The thought had my heart racing. I turned back to the window, fear lodged in my throat.
What if I couldn’t get the skull before Dante used it?
What if I wasn’t strong enoughto fight him?
It was easy for them to be confident in our abilities. I had no doubt our soldiers could win against Dante’s forces.
