Page 40 of Prince of the Sun

“You have the honor,” says Berendir, “of being in His Royal Exquisiteness’ own chambers.”

Figures.

“How long have I been out?”

“Just an hour or two,” Daerios says.

“Anhour?” I whip my head back to look at him. “Are you joking?”

“An hour is nothing, given how much of that anaimean root tea you drank. Especially for a human.” He pauses, then adds, “You must be pretty strong.”

I briefly consider punching him in the face.

Instead, I mumble something about where Daerios can shove that backhanded compliment, which Cara and Berendir take as their cue to leave. “I’ll see you back at the room?” Cara asks. I nod. On the way out the door, Berendir sings, “Don’t do drugs, kids!” Then the hinges creak, and Daerios and I are alone yet again.

I push myself up onto my elbows. The bed undulates beneath me, and I realize for the first time how soft it is. Sheesh. Even elvishmattressesare superior to our own.

Adjusted, I glare squarely at Daerios. “What,” I ask, “exactly, is anaimean root?”

“It’s a flowering herb that grows on both Earth and Elaërion. Elves harvest it for its abilities to relax both the body and mind. It’s completely natural,” he adds quickly, as if this fact should comfort me.

“And you handed it over to me, knowing full well what it would do.”

“Well, I didn’t expect you tochugthe thing.”

“But you drink that,” I say, “for fun.”

His lips twitch. “Not for fun. For its relaxation and anti-anxiety properties.”

“Anti-anxiety,” I repeat. “What could a Prince of the Sun possibly have to be anxious about?”

The corners of his eyes tighten, though his smirk stays in place. “You’d be surprised.”

Maybe it’s the lingering effects of the anaimean root. Maybe I’m groggy and incapable of making rational decisions. That is all I can think of to explain why the next words out of my mouth are: “Such as the mysterious search for the mysterious book that has kept elves on Earth for over a hundred years?”

I regret the question as soon as I ask it.

All the air vanishes from the room at once, as if the vines sucked it up into their leaves. With the air goes any trace of a smile from Daerios’s face. His eyes darken. Sink to twin pits of swirling grey shadow.

Whenever I approached this topic in the past, I did so with the utmost delicacy, tip-toeing toward the subject matter as if it were a bomb that would detonate at the slightest movement. What I just did was the opposite of tip-toeing. That was diving straight at the bomb and slamming my stomach on top.

When Daerios speaks, it is with deadly calm. “Who said we were looking for a book?”

Shit. Shit, shit,shit.

I’m not supposed to know it’s a book. I heard that when I was flat-bellied on the roof of the Ikarith. I need to fake a way out of this.Now.

“When the elves came to Earth, they targetedlibrariesanduniversities,” I say. Then I muster up my best version of a scoff. “It wasn’t that far of a leap to guess you’re looking for a book.”

“We could be looking for anything. A document. A photograph. A recipe. Even one simple sentence from one specific text.” He leans forward, voice lowering to a whisper. “Maybe we aren’t looking for something physical at all. Maybe all we need is a fact, a clue—one piece of information to lead usto something bigger.”

At this point, our noses are so close, I could lick the tip of his if I just tilted my head back a bit. I swallow. Try to keep the waver out of my voice. “Is that an admission? That this search is, in fact, leading to something much larger?”

He smirks. “We’ve been here for over a hundred years, Kallister. It isn’tthat far of a leapto assume that whatever we’re looking for is nothing short of world-changing.”

I want to hit him for mocking me. Instead, I whisper, “Your world or mine?”

This question is one push too far. His smirk disappears, flattening his entire expression to a detached neutral. “This subject bores me.” He pulls away, settling back into his chair and throwing one arm over its back. “Let’s just be glad you didn’t die today, or my brother would have given me one hell of a reaming the next time I saw him.”