That somewhat surprised me.
Seelie and unseelie Courts were much smaller and far less powerful. They typically only presided over a single city or even a portion of a city, and didn’t often attack a regional Court like the Night Court or any of the seasonal Courts…exceptwhen they thought the regional Court was weakened and they could beat it and jockey for a new level of power.
Which was probably the case here.
It seems I’ll have to send a message.
The fae turned around in the middle of the parking lot, peering blindly at the shadows as he practically shouted into his cellphone. “No, I don’t see a sign of him anywhere. No body, either.”
Silence.
“Yes, I set up the trap as instructed, Your Majesty, and made contact with him. He should have come already. I’ll look for the statue.”
The fae folded in half as he tried to look for the statue in the dim light the stars produced, unknowingly walking through the remnants of the statue he was seeking.
“Yes, he could have caught wind of it, but my advice remains the same to you—we need to eliminate the Wraith before you can kill the new Night Queen and secure more power.”
Leila? They want to kill Leila?
Something foreign squeezed my chest, and I moved without thinking.
“Else, as her consort, the Wraith will inherit the crown, and he’ll be far harder to—”
One careful strike—a blade to the neck—was all it took to kill him.
He collapsed, dead before his body hit the ground.
I found the cellphone—it had slipped from his grasp and skittered a foot away.
The foreign—and unwanted—sensation continued to roam around my chest as I picked up the cellphone.
“I say, Drust—what happened?” a stuffy voice demanded through the phone line.
“Drust is indisposed,” I said. “Permanently.”
The caller wheezed and released a gurgle of fear.
Good. He knows who I am.
“Listenverycarefully.” I glanced up at the sky. The moon was starting to rise, lightening the sky from fathomless black to a deep blue. “Leave the Night Queen and her Court alone, or I’ll come for you.”
“Apologies, Lord Rigel,” the unseelie fae babbled. “This was my subject’s plan! I have no wish—I would never—”
In his fear, the fae couldn’t spit out a reply that would be a truth that wouldn’t get him killed.
“This is your only chance,” I said. “Inform the other unseelie and seelie Courts, or I’ll wipe you out.”
I tossed the phone on the ground then stabbed it through with one of my daggers. It sliced through the phone—killing it instantly—but the twinge in my chest was still bothering me. “Aer.” I activated the dagger, and it sparked with magic, frying the phone until it sputtered with fire and was little more than twisted metal and melting plastics.
I pulled the dagger free of the wreckage and frowned.
The twinge was mostly gone, thankfully, but I still wasn’t pleased.
It was uncomfortable—both the sensation itself and the knowledge that I had experienced something that made me break my iron control.
I had acted—killing the unseelie fae on instinct alone—after hearing the threat against Leila.
Why? What about her would drive me to act irrationally?
