Page 123 of Taken By Shadows

Denora sighed in contemplation. She rested her elbows on her knees and laced her fingers together. “When Kaedian lost his mother and sister, he also lost his father and brother in a way. They turned him into something else … I’d only just met him then …” A muscle flexed in her jaw, and she dipped her head until I couldn’t read her eyes. “He … Kaed found me.” Her laced fingers twitched at the memory.

It was so disarming to see Denora fracture.

“I don’t know how many hours I was there … How many times they healed me only to start again …” Denora lifted her head, eyes glassy with unshed tears of a memory she’d rather forget. “Kaed offered me a place in Hayden after he …” She didn’t need to say it. Whoever had hurt Denora would never have been able to again. “I have never been able to repay him for that.”

A lump formed in my throat that I couldn’t dislodge.

“I trained with Kaedian for years before he introduced me to his father.”

An involuntary spasm gripped me at the mention of the king. What he’d demanded of his sons in the war still clung to me.

“I hadn’t known he was going to suggest I join the Haydinian forces.” She smiled at the memory.

“You didn’t want to?” I looked to the lawn where Denora had dropped our training blades. I couldn’t imagine her not built for this life. She breathed the movements with a sword the same way others breathed air.

A cocky brow was raised to me as she dipped her head. “I had always wanted to. I just didn’t think the king would ever allow someone like me into his ranks …” Her gaze grew wistful, and I wasn’t sure what drew her thoughts like that. But it didn’t seem like disdain coloured her memory of the king’s actions that day. “He has been more to me than just my king in a way. But that day, he offered me a place in a family I thought I would never have.”

“You became Hayden’s Head Sentinel then?”

“Gods! No. Not right away. I trained. I worked for my rank. But having the king’s favour and training with Kaedian was certainly an advantage through the years.”

Before I could ask more, she stood and dusted off her tunic.

“Is the king—Kaed’s father—” It sounded strange to say still. “Is he … is he as bad as all that?”

Denora’s face slackened and then pinched. “I’m not sure I’m the person to answer that. But …” She paused and kicked at the grasses under her boot. “For years, Kaedian hid the extent of what was done to him from me.”

So Audrie was right. The king had punished him. My gut wobbled at the thought. Something worse than the Cage and faebane?

“By then, I’d already ingratiated myself with the king. We’d gotten closer. He trusted me. He became—” She swallowed and kicked once more at the grass. “He wasn’t my father. But he became something like that to me. And I know that’s wrong to say that when he stopped being that for Kaed …” Emotions Denora didn’t seem ready to let out were pushing to the surface as she stared at the divot she’d made on the manicured training lawn.

“Before, when he found me at the rock pool,” I started, and Denora regarded me. “Kaed didn’t give me an option. And it didn’t feel like it was because I am his prisoner.” I paused, thinking about that. “Well, he did threaten to—” I stopped before I said he’d tie me to him or his bed. Those thoughts were … not pertinent. I should have been terrified, but some devious part of me wanted to know if he was bluffing or not. I cleared my throat a little, suddenly dry.

Denora squinted against the sun as she looked down at me. “He has endured a lot. And he lives by his actions, even if they seem harsh.”

She clasped my hand and hauled me up without saying more.

I let out an “oomph” as I lost my balance on her.

“Maybe your footwork isn’t as good as we thought.” She laughed as I tripped on my own feet, my thoughts tangled.

Chapter thirty-eight

Audrie’s cat, Turnip, looked quite at home on her lap.

She’d snuck him to the library in her satchel and had told him to be quiet, as though he understood.

My head was heavy as I read another book on potential faebane locations; this one was delving into the world of local flora, and my eyes were drifting.

We were both buried now in every botany and botanical book we could lay our hands on. I wondered what sections of the library we would raid next week when these turned up nothing.

A small fortress had sprung up around us in the library booth. Leather-bound tomes of burnt butter, dusty terracotta and delicate fawn stood as towers around us.

Gavrin was somewhere deep in the library.

While I knew finding faebane was important and a bargain I’d made, I couldn’t focus.

“Do you think he’s ever coming back to the house?” I shoved the book in front of me across the table.