I crossed my arms over my chest and lifted my chin. “Maybe I am.”
He strode closer, his chest puffing out as he took a deep breath in through flared nostrils. “You act like you want the Barmbrack Ring to be correct, but you know what it means, don’t you? You would mate withoneof us. Kael, most likely. Then, you would leave the Academy, go live in the frozen north, and rarely ever see any of us again. Finn and Roarke wouldn’t be in your life anymore.Iwouldn’t be in your life anymore. Is that really what you want?”
My heart squeezed tight. “Of course not.”
“Because that is what will happen if that damn ring is correct. And it’ll be a cold day in hell when I let you get away from me that soon.”
And there it was, words I’d been dying to hear all these weeks. The slightest hint, the smallest of confessions, the weakest of hopes that Liam still feltsomethingtoward me. That his emotions hadn’t just vanished into thin air.
My hand reached toward him out of its own volition, my body craving to feel him close to me. His pupils were dilated, and his breath was hot on my lips. Liam was fire, and I was a moth, drawn to him despite every risk of getting caught in his flames.
Liam’s fingers wrapped around my arm, and he jerked me to his chest. My breath shuddered from my lungs, and anticipation sung in my veins. He was so close. His mouth was only inches from—
Footsteps thudded on the ground outside the tent, and Liam dropped my arm like it was a chunk of molten rock. He stepped back, shook his head, and then lifted the burlap flap to peer out into the newly-autumn night.
Steel clashed with steel, and a gurgled cry echoed in the quiet. Liam cursed beneath his breath.
“What’s wrong?” I whispered as my heart thudded hard in my chest.
“Looks as though the Autumn fae came prepared,” he murmured softly. “A few of them are out there fighting the Hunters. They’re close, so stay quiet.”
“Royals?”
He shook his head. “Lesser Fae.”
Why would the Lesser Fae—as much as I hated to think of them like that—bring weapons to the Feast? It was a celebration, a festival, a happy time in this realm where darkness and danger seemed to lurk in every corner.
“Wait here,” Liam said. “I’m going to go see what’s happened.”
Before I could object, Liam disappeared through the tent’s flap. Heart trembling in my chest, I lifted the heavy material just enough to keep one eye on his retreating form. He was heading toward a cluster of three Hunters. Around their feet, bloodied Autumn fae had fallen like broken puppets, their limbs askew and twisted into strange shapes.
The Hunters stiffened as Liam approached, but relaxed when they saw who it was. He and the other instructors at the Academy had worked tirelessly with the Hunters on their ambush plan, one that seemed as though it was beginning to unravel.
“What’s happened?” Liam asked, gesturing at the Autumn fae weapons on the ground. “Have the Autumn Royals been captured?”
One of the Hunters, a Summer fae with red hair and corded muscles, gave Liam a strange look. “You mean, you don’t know?”
Liam’s back tightened. “No, I daresay I don’t know, given the looks on your faces. Tell me now.”
“The Autumn fae were better prepared than we expected,” the Hunter said. “Did you happen to notice that the festival exploded into chaos far sooner than we planned to attack?”
Liam gave a nod. “I just assumed that you had decided to make your move early.”
The male fae let out a bitter laugh. “If only.”
“What’s happened, Alastar?”
“The Autumn Court attacked first, Liam,” Alastar said with a weary sigh. “All the Summer Royals are dead. Poisoned by blackberries, it looks like. Many of the Lesser Autumn Fae came with weapons. We’ve been fighting them off for the past twenty minutes. Where in the name of the forest have you been?”
“Protecting that changeling girl no doubt,” one of the other male fae muttered.
Alastar frowned. “Perhaps you should stop putting the welfare of one girl over the safety of us all. If you hadn’t been distracted by the changeling, if you’d been watching the Autumn Royals like we’d asked, then maybe none of this would have happened.”
I blinked and dropped the flap, taking two big strides away from the tent’s entrance. Fear and confusion burned through my gut. The Summer Royals were dead. All those months ago, Liam and I had discovered that the Autumn Court was planning an assassination. And now they’d truly done it. We’d thought we’d set a trap for them, but really, they’d set a trap for us.
And what had Alastar meant? Liam had stuck to me like glue all day. He’d told me that he’d been assigned to be my bodyguard. Surely he couldn’t have lied. The fae liked to twist things, yes, but their words always held the truth, even if it was difficult to see it.
Suddenly, two gold-cloaked fae rushed toward Liam and his group of Hunters. My heart leapt into my throat, and I stormed out of the tent with my arms open wide.
