But I didn’t. Not yet. I let the guards lead me back to my gilded cage, and I started training my body for all it was worth. I started with the obvious. Kalen had taught me to fight, but my footwork needed some practice.
So I propped a pillow on top of the chest of drawers to use as a target, and I got to work.
Eight
Kalen
There was no light in the cave, but I had long ago grown accustomed to impenetrable darkness. My eyes could pick up the shapes of stones surrounding me, as well as the small lake at the bottom of the cave. The rush of a waterfall filled the silence. It meant I struggled to hear the fae warrior—with his next dose of valerian—approach when he sneaked up behind me.
He had come four times now. One visit for each night, I assumed. The enemy clearly didn’t want me using my dreamscapes to speak to Tessa. That meant she was alive. Trapped but alive. So I would happily take on this burden if it meant they wouldn’t kill her.
This time, though, I heard the warrior coming. His footsteps were heavier, and his breathing was ragged. Or perhaps I was growing stronger, and my senses were fully back. Days had passed since Andromeda’s attack. If it weren’t for the manacles and the chains, I could have snapped this warrior’s neck before he even knew I’d heard him. He crept closer.
“Hello again,” I said, my voice scraping from my parched throat.
I heard the hitch in his breath and the scuff when his boots paused. “Stay quiet. I’m not to speak to you.”
“Afraid I’ll convince you to release me? Or are you worried I might take my mist and shove it down your throat?”
“You could try.” The warrior moved in front of me. Like most of the enemy storm fae, there was an eerie glassiness to his eyes and a mark on his throat. Andromeda’s poison had infected his mind, just as it has infected Oberon’s—and my mother’s.
My jaw clenched. I dare not think of Bellicent Denare. She had died a long time ago. The woman I’d faced here, who had trapped me and Tessa both, that wasn’t my mother.
The woman Perseus had killed…it wasn’t her. Not in any way that mattered.
Still, the thought of her death made my eyes burn.
I shook it off and focused on the onyx pillars scattered around me. When I’d awoken chained to a boulder, they were the first things I could see. They were blocking my power. It was the only reason this storm fae felt bold enough to face me.
“You’ll regret this,” I said when he stepped closer with the vial of valerian.
He gave me a skeptical look. “You’re chained. I’m not.”
“I don’t mean me, though you’ll also regret that. I mean siding with the gods. They want nothing good for you or anyone else in this world. You’re being used.”
“I know what you’re doing. You’re trying to get into my head, but—”
“And even if you don’t worry about them, you should worry about someone else. Do you have any idea who you’re up against? Her name is Tessa Baran, and she is the fiercest creature I’ve ever met.”
“Tessa Baran is currently imprisoned by the gods,” he said with a dry laugh. “So this ‘fiercest creature’ has become nothing better than a shadowfiend with all its teeth and claws cut out. Harmless.”
Inwardly, I smiled. He’d walked straight into my trap.
I cocked my head. “Tessa is imprisoned? Doubtful.”
He scoffed. “She is. In Malroch Castle, where the gods are preparing for their war against the human kingdoms.”
Ah, there it was. The information I sorely needed. Now that I knew where they’d taken her, I would crawl from this grave and paint the castle with their blood.
The warrior must have seen the glint in my eye. He paled, then took a step away. “Fuck you. This is why they told me not to let you talk. You just tricked me into telling you where she is.”
“And I thank you for the information.” I curled back my lip. “Though I’m afraid it won’t spare you when I break free from these chains.”
He swallowed. “Threaten me all you want, but you’re locked up and I’m not. Now, are you going to take this dose of valerian or are you going to make it hard? I’ll happily knock you unconscious if you try anything.”
“Go ahead and give it to me. Just know, I won’t forget.”
He lifted the vial to my lips, and I drank the poison willingly. Tonight, I would not see Tessa, but soon I would. These chains could not hold me much longer.
