AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Fae couldn’t lie, not exactly, but somehow Cormac tasted the untruth like bitter poison.
“I would make a bargain of you, Cormac Illfinn.” Lady Elaine turned, placing her hand on his bicep. “Maeve is a lost soul; she must be taken in hand. Would you reconsider a marriage between Maeve and Tarsainn?”
“A bargain implies both sides get something of value.” Cormac shot her his signature smirk. “You wish for Maeve to be my bride. You wish for Tarsainn to be in hand. What do I get from this bargain?”
Cormac looked at Lady Elaine, meeting her eyes for the first time since his head began to ache in the castle. Bile rose in his throat as Elaine’s face melted away under the glamour she wore, revealing her true self.
“You both get to live.” The monster crooned.
Chapter Fifteen
It was a truth I had known since I had heard the news of my mother's passing twelve years before.
It didn’t matter how loved you were; we were all alone in the end.
My mother’s last mutterings, brought on by delirium, were noted by the healer and passed on. Documented in the Book of Seers. All of the subjects that professed to love her, even her own brother, left her in the end.
I had begged and pleaded to be allowed in the sick room, but I had been on the other side of the door as she turned to foam.
She hadn’t known how much I loved her in the end.
As a youngling, I hadn’t recognized the special kind of torture I had been dealt when the sick room had been cleared and given to me. A forgotten room in a tower with a taint of iron that never quite left.
I had spent as much time outside of the room as possible. Underfoot, set apart from both the staff and the courtiers alike.
Douglas hadn’t lied when he said the cleaners had used my room.
Thankfully, someone had stuffed most of my belongings in the dresser, from the plain netted dresses made of harsh waterproof fabric to the assortment of beads I’d often braided in my hair.
It seemed that I had been spoiled in my journeys across the lake. Despite the undine penchant for adornment, all the clothing I’d left behind was so plain.
Even the selkie dresses in my pack and the hunting leathers were higher quality than the dresses in my wardrobe.
I sat on my bed, a stone ledge that had once been comfortable but now seemed like a punishment. The wall behind the bed was marked with scratches made with a pearl-encrusted comb I’d stolen from my mother’s collection many years before. Each scratch marked the hundred days before magical majority.
My stomach gurgled, reminding me I hadn’t eaten since we’d left the nymph village the morning before. A tense and awkward breakfast with Finula left me reluctant to stuff myself with dried meat and bread.
Once dressed, I headed to the kitchen. I was handed a plate by one of the chefs and shooed away as if I’d never left.
In the past, I would eat in the hall of silvers, but I had yet to see Elaine, and the longer I put off seeing Irvine’s wife, the longer I would worry about the purpose of my visit. I wanted to get the entire ordeal over with as soon as possible.
Cormac Illfinn had arrived several hours before, but I hadn’t seen him, thankfully.
Returning to the Reeds with Tor and Rainn grew more appealing by the second.
I took my plate to the dining hall, nodding to the guards as they opened the doors. As I floated into the hall, with its tables spanning the length of the room, silence blossomed—spreading out from the doors until the entire hall fell victim to a stunned stupor.
I realized quickly that grabbing a plate before getting to the hall was probably a bad idea. The banquet tables were filled with food of every type.
I swept forward, searching for a seat. Ignoring the whispers. No matter what I did, some maddening narrative would be spun. I’d long since learned that it was out of my power.
“She probably thinks we’re going to poison her.”
“She doesn’t trust her fellow undine.”
“Galivanting around the lake has given her ideas.”
I fixed my eyes on my plate and shoveled food into my mouth.
