* * *
The stench hit me before the darkness did. Gaven led me down the winding steps to the tunnels beneath the castle while my guards waited for me in the meeting room. He carried a flickering torch that cast dancing shadows on the slick stone walls and illuminated the top of his silver hair. Admittedly, despite the disinterest I’d shown to Gaven, I was curious to find out what Morgan wanted with me. I wouldn’t have come all the way here in the middle of the rebuild if I weren’t, a fact I was certain Gaven had noted.
I’d told him the truth when I said Morgan and I had never been close. Yes, sometimes she’d done things for my siblings and me—at the request of my father—but normally childcare and nothing more. She looked after us when he was busy with meetings and my mother was feeling dizzy, which had been fairly often. That would have been a maidservant’s job in any other castle, but he’d forced it on his most loyal of servants. Sometimes, I’d wondered if it was just to prove a point.
But Morgan had never been particularly fond of me, nor I of her. When she looked at me, I could see the glint of anger, as if she blamedmefor the trap my father had set for her. And I supposed that was partially true. The tales said that my mother’s first pregnancy had paled his face in a way that nothing else ever had. He’d been terrified that something would go horribly, horribly wrong—that it was pushing the boundaries of what the bond between my mother’s soul and her foreign mortal body could withstand.
And so he’d whipped Morgan while my mother had been in labor. It had been his cruel way of releasing his pent-up terror, and he hadn’t stopped until he knew my mother had survived the delivery.
With a sigh, I followed Gaven the rest of the way down the steps. Morgan had rarely spoken to me in the past few years. I truly couldn’t imagine what she wanted with me now. It wouldn’t be to offer condolences. For one, she hated my father even more than I did.
We reached the bottom of the stairwell, and Gaven turned down a corridor full of must and sweat and mist. Our booted feet tapped against the stone as we wandered further into the dark. At the first turn, he swung the torch to the left, and the light illuminated a row of barred cells.
They were all empty save one. A shuffle of feet cracked like lightning, and a dirtied pair of hands gripped the bars. As we approached, a woman’s face melted into view. Silver hair hung loose and ragged around her shoulders. She was clad in a plain linen tunic—I’d never seen Morgan in anything other than her armor in all the years I’d known her.
That was the first thing to catch me off guard.
But then it was her eyes—those flickering silver eyes—that did me in.
They were more familiar to me than my own, deep-set beneath a thick, furrowed brow. Her eyes roamed across me, taking me in, measuring me up just like she’d always done for as long as I could remember. My hands tensed beside me, but I kept my face blank, holding my breath tight in my throat.
I had seenherstaring out at me from so many pairs of eyes over the years that I could recognize her no matter what skin she wore.
“Hello, Ruari,” she said with a bright, wicked smile that curdled the blood in my veins.
Because the woman who stared at me now, I knew with every bone in my body, was not Morgan. It was Bellicent Denare Emed.My mother.
Seventeen
Tessa
“Kalen Denare,” a ginger-haired fae said, striding forward from the gathered enemies. Unlike the others, he held no bow, and there was a green pin attached to the collar of his leather armor. An elite fae, then. According to Kalen, the elite storm fae liked to designate themselves as separate from the common fae—those without power. “The infamous Mist King who lurks in the darkness of the mountains above, ready to unleash his monstrous power on us all. For a long time, I thought you were nothing but a tall tale, but…” He gazed around the fallen war camp. “It turns out the stories were true.”
Toryn cleared his throat and steered his horse to the front. Bold, considering all those arrows that could be loosed at any moment. “Hello, Finley. It’s been a long time.”
Finley swept his gaze across Toryn, and his eyes lingered for a moment too long on his face. “Prince Toryn. I have to admit, I never thought I’d again see you on this side of the border.”
“We’re here to see my mother.”
Finley clucked his tongue. “Withhim?”
“It’s important. I’m sure you saw the comet in the sky.”
Finley narrowed his eyes, considering Toryn’s words. I took a moment to examine him—some kind of captain or leader—and the others. They did not carry that same hollowness in their eyes that I’d seen in the storm fae who had attacked us in Itchen, and their armor was different. The others had been wearing brown leathers topped with silver bracers, but the fae before us now wore dyed leathers in a deep emerald green. They didn’t have the branded mark on their necks, either. Odd.
“It’s growing larger,” Finley finally answered.
“It’s a portent of doom, and my mother will want to know exactly what it means. Take us to her.”
Finley swore, scowling at Kalen before his gaze slid my way. “You keep odd company these days, Prince Toryn. You’ve come after all these years, bringing with you our enemy shadow king, two mortals, and…” He sniffed the air and glanced at Fenella and Caedmon. “Two light fae.”
Toryn sighed and then dismounted his horse with a grace and speed that rivaled even the most powerful of fae. With determination flashing in his emerald eyes, he strode up to Finley. Where Toryn was the smallest of the Mist Guard, save for Gaven, he towered over Finley now. And there was something about him—an aura of strength—that made the storm fae warrior lower his gaze.
“The comet concerns all of us,” Toryn said, raising his voice so his words reached the archers waiting in the swaying grass with their arrows still locked on our party. “Heritage does not matter. Borders do not matter. Grievances must be put into the past. And even if you do not believe any of that—even if you don’t care—I am still your prince. Take me to my mother.”
* * *
Toryn’s short speech was all it took to get Finley moving. After he went to command the storm fae archers to stand down, he gathered their cluster of hidden horses and led us away from the eerie war camp and into the grassy fields beyond the foothills blanketed in sapphire flowers. They rode hard, as if a wave of unyielding fire nipped at their heels. It was all I could do to hang on to the horse’s reins. My teeth knocked together, and my thighs burned. My eyes blurring from the wind, I almost called out to ask if we could stop to rest when a glorious city rose up before us.
