Page 108 of Foundling

It went without saying that Attalus was totally, utterly, incandescently enraged. While Leita insisted otherwise, he knew for a fact that the crushed bones and spattered viscera of the traitor between his teeth would’ve made him feel a modicum better. Instead, the former attendant and accursed assassin now sat in a dungeon cell. Alive.

Oh, she might be miserable. She might be in pain. But Attalus could make it so much worse. So bad that she pleaded for a bite to end her suffering.

When Attalus explained this to his mate, she and the other fae gathered—Charis, Tamerlan, and several healers—had looked upon him with horror. At least Marcades nodded in approval from where he stood vigil, but Attalus didn’t give a fuck what the captain thought. After Ondra, he blamed Marcades the most.

Why had they given in to Leita’s request for fewer guards? Why were they letting her into the city at all?

It didn’t matter now that they meant to keep him a secret—that secret was out, and Attalus was all the happier for it. Now, he could ensure Leita’s safety himself.

“This fucking city’s supposed to be safe!” he fumed, pacing back and forth across their chambers.

Leita watched on from where she sat, the healers fussing over her even though she insisted she was fine. Every time she dismissed them, Attalus commanded them back, unsatisfied. The wound might be closed, but a vicious scar still marred her beautiful skin. The fabric of her bodice had been irreparably damaged, the side of her clothing drenched in her own blood.

“The city is safe,” Leita assured him after no one else dared do it.

Good. He wanted them scared.

Charis was a Meringor too and would need to be scrutinized. Her mother had already gone into voluntary house arrest pending an investigation. Carenza, the other attendant, was currently undergoing questioning, and Attalus would see that every single one of the palace staff and council were vetted twice over.

“Then why did this happen? It’s no mistake she waited until you were out of the palace.” Attalus’s tail lashed angrily behind him, ensuring no one came within several paces of him.

“We’ll get answers,” Charis spoke up. Brave of her.

Attalus turned his withering gaze onto the chancellor-right-now-but-that-remained-to-be-seen. He credited her nerve; she met that gaze even while keeping her expression and body language submissive, ashamed even. From their bent heads and downturned mouths, it seemed she and every other fae here understood that the smallest thing would set Attalus off.

He wasn’t out of control. Not yet. His rage burned inside him as blue as the hottest flames, a restrained force that grew behind a façade of calm.

But let them think that one wrong word or errant sneeze would set him to burning down the other half of the palace. Every fae alive needed to understand that Leita was his mate, and before anyone thought again to harm her, they would have to contend with him.

Attalus had spent his time in Fallorian charming the palace fae, and he didn’t think it arrogant to count some as friends and allies already. However, it suited him just as well to have them cower, to remind them that he wasn’t a mere bauble to adorn the Queen’s bedchamber. He was her shield and her teeth, her sword and her fire.

He wasn’t a fae, he was Savrakae, and it was well all fae should know and remember.

To trifle with a dragon’s mate was to invite disaster and ruin.

Attalus snarled in Charis’s face, uncaring that earlier in the day, they’d been friends. “She’s your cousin, is she not? How was this allowed to happen? How did you not know?”

“I want those answers even more than you do,” Charis said.

“I doubt that.”

“Attalus,” his mate entreated, “don’t blame Charis. She didn’t know.”

“We can’t know that.”

“I know.” Leita looked at him significantly. Attalus searched her gaze, trying to discover if she just meant to mollify him, but as usual, his little doe was guileless. “Charis can be trusted. Everyone here can be.”

Attalus’s jaw clenched, working hard to hold back the accusation that she’d thought that of Ondra, too. He would just have to assume that this was some sort of Queen’s knowledge and trust his mate, even if he couldn’t trust anyone around her.

Under Leita’s silent insistence, Attalus took up a spot nearby and stood with arms crossed, staring down the small party as the healers finished tending to her. His patience was running dangerously thin, and they were all lucky it’d held out this long. He ensured all of them knew it by each loud thwack of his tail on the carpet as it lashed behind him, a metronome of his dwindling tolerance.

His instinct was to grab Leita and fly—somewhere far away where he could keep her safe. A small island would be ideal, one he’d already fitted with soft blankets and chests of gold. His mother had kept such an island for her and Karik, and eventually Briseis, where the little family was safe. For a time.

Fuck, he didn’t like that thought at all.

Wherever Theron had gotten off to with Briseis seemed safe enough. No one had heard a whisper of their whereabouts in years. Maybe he should seek Theron out again, take Leita there and live simple lives, where no one knew of royalty or assassins or—

“The palace is secure and everyone is in their assigned waiting area for questioning,” Tamerlan reported.