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“That spirit was my mother. I’m not sure why she came to you. I’m the only one who has seen her so far. She doesn’t reveal herself to my father.”
“What do you mean, that was your mother?” The images of the woman dying still churned inside her. Nava leaned against the desk, lest she drop to the ground again.
A month ago, Arkimedes had shown her the spot in the forest where his mother had died. A centuries-old tree burned into lifelessness.
Had Arkimedes known how his mother died because she’d shown him, exactly like she’d shown Nava just now?
A long silence fell. Nava vaguely registered the sound of rain pattering against the broken glass of the window. As if this morning could get any gloomier.
Tears welled up in her eyes. “I saw her dying…”
Ark sucked in a sharp breath. “You saw the burning tree?”
“I did.” Nava fought off a wave of nausea. “Has she been visiting you for long? How does it work?”
When Arkimedes told her how his mother had died that day in the woods, she’d never dreamed that he’d seen it. But if he’d witnessed the same visions the spirit had shared with her…no wonder he was fighting to find answers.
Arkimedes stopped pacing across the worn rug. “When I first visited the Copper Kingdom, Fael brought me to the castle to meet my father. I didn’t know I was the lost prince. I thought I was in trouble somehow, and I put up a fight.”
“Did you kill someone?”
“Initially, Fael and the other guards assumed I had abandoned my royal mandate.” Arkimedes stared vacantly out of the window. “I already knew that using my power to kill would mean I’d hear their voices for the rest of my life, so I was trying not to use it. Still, the guard noticed that my magic was not like theirs.”
“The Curse of the Fallen.”
Arkimedes met Nava’s eyes and nodded. “My father recognized me immediately.”
Undoubtedly. Arkimedes was an exact copy of his father, down to the straight nose and full lips. And even though Ark was half fae, half human, he possessed that otherworldly beauty that only the fae could lay claim to.
Arkimedes walked toward the table, paging through the Book of the Dead, although Nava doubted he was actually paying attention to the obituaries. “I wasn’t sure I was ready to stay, and when he saw me hesitate, the king offered me information about my past. He also promised to help me get a better handle on my curse.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“That my shadows speak to me, and I thought I was going mad.” He closed the book with a thump and frowned. “Now I only hear them when I’m overwhelmed, or if I lose my temper.”
“So, the king promising to help you is what made you decide to stay?”
“No, it was the mystery surrounding my mother’s death that tipped the scales. When I inquired about her, I was told the same lie they spin to everyone else.” Arkimedes gripped the edges of the desk so tightly, his knuckles whitened with the pressure. “That she stole me away when I was a one-year-old boy and took me to a place where my father couldn’t follow.”
“The Iron Kingdom. Because the fae are allergic to iron.” Arkimedes was half fae, so he could live there. “But why would she return? Surely, she would have expected to get in trouble?”
“I wondered about that, too,” Arkimedes said, and something dark flickered over his expression. “My father told me she denied what she’d done, but he felt like she returned for something. They had no proof, and she claimed that someone else had stolen me.”
Nava tucked a few errant strands of hair behind her ear. “But everyone at the castle claims that she took you. And back on the island, you told me she abandoned you at the orphanage.”
“She did, Nava. The records say so, and so does everyone here. The castle workers, the citizens—everyone hated her. Her official postmortem report states that a few disgruntled citizens killed her in a fire in the castle’s library and then killed themselves before the king could get to them.” Arkimedes dragged a palm over his face and pushed away from the desk, reaching for her hand.
She took it, knowing deep inside he needed the physical touch. “But that’s a lie.”
“The night I learned about her supposed death, my mother’s spirit visited for the first time. She showed me the day they burned her alive in the forest.” His voice cracked with emotion, and that alone nearly broke Nava.
She pressed her lips tightly together as a heavy sorrow swarmed through her—an emotion that belonged to both of them. It wasn’t the right time to bring out the stupid rumors about the fae she'd been teasing him with lately, but it was the first thing that crossed her mind.
“If the fae can’t lie, how is any of this possible?”
Arkimedes blinked. Then his stern features softened. At least he continued to find this amusing. “Contrary to what you believe, full fae can lie—just not easily. They have to spin this kind of deceit carefully.”
Nava hummed, not quite sure she believed him. “What happened after your mother revealed the truth to you?”
