Page 76 of Taken By Shadows

I let the silence stretch for a second. “But.”

“I’d be disappointed if there wasn’t a caveat, I suppose.” His lips restrained a smile, and something wriggled low in me, seeing his lips do that.

“But you cannot keep me here longer. You cannot keep me. You will let me go at the end of my time here. Regardless of what the council keeps you for. Regardless of Hayden’s position. And you will not threaten Audrie’s position here again.” I tacked on that last one, knowing it wasn’t my place to demand her future as well as mine. But while I held the winning hand and key, I felt emboldened. Despite knowing who I was now talking to, I had not been able to rein in my demands.

Kaed sighed. “Anything else?”

“Yes, actually. I want to know about your family and your brother, Hart. If I’m to play a part in your game, in this charade, I want to know the players.”

I had heard so little about the heirs to the Northern Crown. Heirs weren’t something people regularly talked about. Fae Crowns tended to last centuries, so heirs were not important until they were called.

Kaed went silent. His grip loosened on me more, and a look came across him like suddenly this cage was actually more comfortable than leaving.

“I’ll just leave you to your thoughts if there’s no deal here. I might even go back up to the council and mention how I ended up here in the first place.”

Kaed chuckled. “You’re good, peach. Far better than I could have dreamt.”

“Dream about me a lot?” I threw back over my shoulder as I ducked out from under his arms.

In a flash, Kaed was crowding me again, his citrus and amber scent engulfing me in the heat of the room. “Wouldn’t you like to know what I dream?” he murmured.

Why did I feel like the one who was caged and bound when he leaned into me like that …

“I will tell you about my family. But not here. Not yet.”

I hadn’t actually expected him to concede on most of what I’d asked for.

“And Audrie?”

Kaed grumbled low in his throat.

Standing on my toes, I whispered into his ear. “Don’t like being beaten?”

A muscle in his jaw popped and flexed as I pulled away.

“She is safe. Her position is safe.”

That eased a knot that had been growing in my chest.

“But I need assurance that you will actually try your best to search for faebane. If no one has found sources of it in decades, there is little chance you will find any in two moons. Miss Stairlor will help you. And you will report to me on what you’ve found.”

“That’s a lot of demands for a male in such a position.” He made good points. How was I going to find any faebane? It had been sheer luck that I found it in the Banes. But I had two moons to find another way out of this. Out from under the Prince of Hayden’s grasp.

“It’s negotiating.” He pulled back, to allow me free him from the cage.

If Kaed—and by extension, me—were to be kept here in the city, which would be solidified by his father’s actions, I had just now secured a new exit plan.

I unlocked the manacles at Kaed’s wrists, and the ponderous metal clattered to the floor.

Chapter twenty-four

I’d lost Audrie as she darted under the carved arches of the towering library. Its structure was immensely tall, and its tip vanished into the puffy white clouds of the day. Audrie had whisper-shouted something about meeting us … somewhere. That girl was chaos incarnate.

But it made me smile, nonetheless.

A few days ago, Kaed had enlisted Gavrin as our escort once he’d been freed from the Cage. He’d insisted it was for my protection. I knew, at least in part, he didn’t yet trust our new bargain.

But I could, in fact, live with our new arrangement. Two lunar cycles. Not that long in the scheme of things. And I would spend most of it here, my nose buried in any number of musty leather-bound tomes. They weren’t the books I wanted to read. Not the stories and legends I would get lost in when I was younger, wishing I were somewhere else, far away from Shadowfall. Somewhere filled with adventures and creatures. My own adventure had taken a turn I hadn’t anticipated. But I was here, in the most vast library in the Four Corners, and I would at least enjoy that.