“I always get chastised when I have dessert before dinner,” Dayton drawls. His words are slurred. With an important meeting on the horizon, the Prince of Summer is drunk. His plate is also empty, though he’s helped himself to more than a few glasses of wine.
“Perhaps when you are as perfect as my daughter, you can get away with it,” my father says. Farron chuckles at that, and even Dayton cracks a half-smile.
Keldarion leans down to my ear. “He’s right. You are perfect.”
I certainly don’t feel perfect, but his words make me blush regardless.
My father sits at the end of the table with Farron. Surrounding their plates are rotten mushrooms, dead animal skulls, strangetrinkets, feathers, and scraps of paper, all dug out of the bag Nori instructed me to give her brother. The two of them have been having great fun going through the pieces, muttering about leaching mushrooms and ancient spells.
The table feels empty, and it’s not Caspian I’m missing (good riddance to the liar) or Wrenley (thankfully, Kel agreed that, despite being mates with Dayton, it isn’t necessary for her to be in on all Castletree business). It’s Ezryn.
I can tell through our mate bond that he’s very far away. My heart cries out for his. I need to find him soon.
May I come in?Caspian’s smooth voice caresses my mind. I jolt and Kel rubs a soothing hand up and down my back.
No, I shoot back to Caspian with as much venom as I can muster.
Well, too bad. Your princes and father are idiots, and if you ever want to play happy family, you needme.
Why bother asking if you’re just going to waltz in anyway, you pig?I think vehemently. “Kel, hand me a bread roll.”
“Would you like it buttered?” Kel asks.
“Give me the oldest, hardest one you can find.”
He shakes his head, reaching around me, and then deposits one in my hand, just as the grand doors of the dining hall open. I chuck the bread roll as hard as I can where it bounces off Caspian’s thick skull.
“Nice shot,” Kel says.
But I still glower.You let me hit you.
What can I say?His star-flecked gaze shifts to me.I’m a masochist when it comes to you.
Heat crawls up my neck, and I turn away.
“Close the doors, Caspian,” Keldarion orders. “Sit down and prepare to tell us everything you know.”
“Everything?” Caspian steps closer, his black cloak fluttering behind him like a shadow. “We’ll be here a long time.”
“Everything about my wife, you vile miscreant!” Papa says, voice gruff as he slams his palms down on the table.
Caspian raises a brow, a serpentine smile on his face. “Ah yes, the long-lost Queen of the Enchanted Vale. Aurelia.”
Caspian eyes the chair next to Kel, so I slide off my mate’s lap and onto it, so he doesn’t get any ideas about taking my seat. The Prince of Thorns gives a long sigh and sinks into a chair beside me.
“Her name is Anya,” my father says, but something glazes over his sapphire-blue eyes. “It was, wasn’t it?”
“That’s the name you always told me,” I say.
“So, you’re actually going to help us?” Farron asks.
“For now,” Caspian says, rocking back in his chair.
Papa’s eyes are wide as saucers. He’s been searching my whole life for my mother, and now to speak with someone who’s seen her … I can’t imagine what he must be thinking.
“Here are the facts. Yes, I’ve spoken with Aurelia, but not much. It’s a dangerous trek to her cell, and if I dwell too long, my mother could get suspicious,” Caspian says. “Aurelia doesn’t believe I’d ever act against Sira. Which is fair, figuring it’s my mother who trapped her in the Below.”
A collective ripple of energy pulses through the princes at the confirmation, a deep instinctual fury to protect their Queen. It surges in me too. Sira … I mark the name in my heart.
