I laughed without any real humor. Where the hell did I even begin?
“Cato’s been hiding information from me, and I decided to take matters into my own hands. It backfired.”
Ronen flapped his large black wings, flying around the castle. We passed above a drop-off and puny trees far below us that slowly grew in size.
“What kind of information?”
I peeled my eyes away from the ground and met Ronen’s puzzled frown, thinking about the deal he made with my father.
“The kind that makes me realize Cato isn’t the only one keeping things from me.”
Ronen tensed. His shadows bled from his neck, twisted erratically around his tattoos before he forced them back. They echoed his spike ofanxiety. More than that, Ronen opened his mouth, and nothing came out.
He never struggled to speak his mind. Either he did, or he didn’t. But this pause, the subtle, quiet fear tightening his jaw, told me enough.
“Were you ever going to tell me you made a deal with my father to become king?”
That when I actually began to love our bond, it could potentially be taken away?
We landed in front of the arena doors. He set me down. Mud splattered up my legs. The evergreens were stripped bare—Hell was morphing into something I didn’t recognize.
“No, I wasn’t,” he admitted.
“Why?” I demanded. “Don’t you think that’s something I’d want to know? Something that may, I don’t know, affect me?”
“Lucille.” He brushed my cheek, his expression almost pained. “I’m not going to be king.”
“You’re not?”
He shook his head.
“But your deal.”
“I don’t care about the deal anymore.” He paused, his gaze turning sad. “Any of them.”
“I don’t understand.”
What else wasn’t he telling me?
“Lucille…”
That was the second time he’d said my name with that expression.
“I…” He swallowed and glanced toward the arena doors.
I turned. Aspen, Rune, and Hadrian stepped outside.
What were they doing down here so early? Training didn’t start for at least another hour.
“That was the information Cato was hiding?” Ronen asked.
That wasn’t what he was going to say. And we both knew it. But I played along.
“Yes,” I replied as Aspen and the Soulhounds walked over. “His notes were about the Unmaking Ceremony… its cost, his suspicions about what Etan did to Lucifer, and how Lucifer wanted you to replace him.”
“Etan?” Ronen growled.
“Yes.”
