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“Eden,” Lux laughs.

“I SAID I’M GOING HOME!” My scream is loud enough to shake the forest. Even Castor looks a little shocked.

Lux stands at the same time I do. Ignoring my protests, he takes my arm. “Eden, I forbid you to travel like this.”

“Forbid whatever you want, I told you I don’t care.” I squirm against him.

“Stop.” He wrestles me. “This is not safe for our baby.”

“Neither is you scaring me like this!” My shout makes him release me as a crease forms between his brows.

“I’m scaring you?” he asks softly.

“Of course you are,” I cry. “You’ve lied to me, manipulated me, tricked me into accepting your faerie bond, drugged me without my consent! And now you tell me that I’m,” my voice wobbles, “that I’m pregnant? I’m terrified, Lux. I just want to go home, but you won’t let me.”

His gaze hardens.

“Let me go home,” I plead. “I just want to see my sisters again. I have to speak with them.”

He tenses.

“Please.”

“Fine.”

I gasp. “You’ll take me to them? Today?”

“We’ll have to go back and prepare a proper carriage first, but once that’s ready we’ll leave.”

“Really?” I blurt at the same time Castor asks, “You’re certain of this?”

“I am.” He nods. “The health of my future wife and child is my priority right now. If seeing her sisters would help to relax her, then what kind of man would I be to deny her that?”

I want to feel relieved, but my heart is pounding too much. I can’t trust Lux or Castor, even if a small part of me wants to.

Holding Meera’s hand, I take a shaky breath. “We’ll go now then, back to the manor,” I say as Lux smiles.

“Of course, my love.”

I ended up riding with Castor as Meera refused to go anywhere near the smirking prince. I didn’t blame her, but I also wasn’t complaining. For the entire ride back, he warmed me with a conjured heat from his palms while Lux led Meera on her stolen horse back towards the manor.

I tried to convince her to return home by herself, but she insisted on not leaving me alone with the princes, despite how much her hands shook on the reins.

I think she’s too afraid to leave. I can’t imagine her boss would exactly be thrilled if she told them that his now-pregnant sister-in-law-to-be had been left alone with the two insane princes.

Pregnant. Stars, I can hardly believe it myself.

Holding my lower belly, I force away the smile that keeps threatening my cheeks. I shouldn’t be happy about this. My sisters wouldn’t be.

The thought makes me teary, but I wipe away any tears before Lux can see.

“Are you alright?” he asks, fastening a cloak around my shoulders. He forced me to change into a much warmer purple gown with a thick fur trim, and then found me a matching fur hand warmer after kissing my hands and wincing at how cold I still was.

Lux made it very clear that if we were not leaving for my father’s palace today, that I would be spending the entire afternoon sitting by the fireplace, bundled in blankets. But thankfully, he seemed to settle for me bringing several blankets into the carriage so that I could stay warm for the journey.

A journey that I now find myself oddly nervous about.

“I’m fine,” I lie, accepting his hand as he helps me into the carriage. The snow on the ground is now at least a foot thick, but the constant downpour of snowflakes has stopped, leaving the air crisp and strangely silent.