Which was why he’d postponed his original trip so that he could help his brother. No one wanted to deal with them. They slipped in when one least expected.
“Who sent them?”
Candara shrugged. “You’d probably know quicker than I would. His enemies are everywhere.”
“Is Gisela one of them?”
She nodded slowly. “But at least she’s torn. While she fears her master, she hates her, too. She can be turned against the one holding her leash.”
“How?”
“How do you win over any feral beast? Kindness.”
The same for him and his brother. The rarest of all qualities. Betrayal. Cruelty. Viciousness. Those were the staples of most creatures.
But kindness…
“I wish we were dealing with unicorns.”
Her frown deepened. “Why?”
“You can tell by the color of their horns if they’re assholes or not.”
She laughed. “True. They can’t hide their natures from others.”
Indeed. They wore them as trophies on their foreheads.
“And you just reminded me of something.” Candara left his side to head for a small chest in the far corner.
After a few seconds of rummaging, she returned with a slender, thin wooden box.
Before he could ask her what she had, she opened it to display a long, twisted gold wand.
A bad feeling went through him. “What’s that?”
“Relax. I haven’t been killing unicorns. It’s the wand of Amandine.”
He sucked his breath in sharply at the name of the mythical queen of the unicorns. It was said that she was the mother of their entire race. “How?”
“Legend says that when she lay dying, she begged her daughter to cut her horn so that her powers would always be preserved. That way she could always protect her family and people.”
That sounded like something the great queen would have ordered done.
Candara handed him the wand. “Since Xaydin is on an errand for her descendant, you should carry this to help him protect the last of her line.”
The wand heated in his hand as if in agreement. “What can this do?”
She gripped his hand in hers. “You’ll know when you need it. And when this journey is over, see it back to the ones who should be its caretakers.”
King Dash. She didn’t say his name, but Masakage knew who she meant. There was no one else who could do right by such a sacred object.
With a sad smile, she kissed his cheek. “Be safe.”
“You, too.”
She gave a last squeeze to his hands before she released him and stepped back.
His heart sad, he left her there and went outside to join the other two.
