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He was right, and I remembered how they dragged me under the water and surrounded me. But they didn’t hurt me, and they could’ve. I remembered their raspy song slicing through my oxygen-deprived mind.Come with us, they had said. But where they had wanted to take me, I wasn’t sure.
“I’m not convinced they were trying to harm me,” I told Alaric, trying to recall all the details of my encounter with the creatures. “They wanted me to come with them—I think.”
“Go with them where?” Finn asked.
“I don’t know.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Finn was back on his feet by mid-afternoon, with only a slight limp as proof of what had occurred the night before. He was the only one who agreed with me about thanking Tiernan for the role he played in helping us.
We found him in the library, intently reading a tattered scroll. “Your Majesty,” he said, rising from his seat, “Are you well?”
“I am,” I breathed, “Thanks to you.”
Tiernan straightened his jacket, and I noticed he no longer wore the colors of his own court but was dressed in the traditional Night Court colors of deepest blue, white, and starlight silver. They suited him. “When Arrow woke me, I knew something was wrong. And then when I looked outside I saw Finn fall,” he said, regarding the Draconian, “Glad to see you’re both well.”
“Arrow?”
“My falcon. He seems to be looking out for you,” Tiernan said with a nod of his head to the bird now perched in the windowsill.
“Did you know Tiernan was a sentry in the Day Court’s Royal Guard?” Finn asked me.
“You never told me that.” I said to Tiernan. I had assumed like most nobles Graced with an earth-based ability he would’ve overseen the royal gardens or held a large parcel of land which could supply his court with wheat—or given his love for wine, perhaps grapes.
His lips curved up in a devious smile, “You never asked, majesty.”
The information had my head filling with absurd ideas. A Day Court emissary, and previous protector of the Queen of Day, could never be part of my own Royal Guard, could they?
Don’t be ridiculous, Liana.He wouldn’t ever agree to that. He’d have to relinquish all ties to his home court for it to be possible. Maybe it was silly to even think such a thing. I’d only known him for little over a week… but in that time he’d shown strength, restraint, and had proved his trustworthiness. I could count the people I trusted at court on one hand, and Tiernan, whether or not he knew it, was one of them.
“Have you decided how long you’ll be staying at court?”
He looked up at me through long lashes, his glinting green eyes flashing, “As long as you’ll have me,” he answered, his words taking on a double meaning, making my body quiver.
I met his fierce stare with one of my own, taking a steadying breath, “Then you may call me Liana from now on, as a friend would.”
He licked his lips, and I felt Finn tense at my side, “Then I will endeavour to be your verybestfriend… Liana.”
Finnand I arrived in my chambers that evening to find Kade sprawled on my settee, asleep. His top half resting on the cushion, and his legs dangling to floor. The settee no where near large enough to hold his full massive form.
Funny, he looked so innocent in sleep.
After the healer finished her work on Finn’s knee and completed the healing on my ribs, he had escorted me around the palace. I stopped to talk to nobles, and other dignitaries, offering my sincere worry and condolences to Silas on the disappearance of his sister, and my wishes for her safe return.
Alaric—and Thana, thought it was of utmost importance to make myself present in the daily goings on of my court. To remind them I was their queen, and that I had no intentions of going anywhere. After hours spent placating nobles, and repeatedly lying about the great progress I was making in coaxing my Grace into developing, I was exhausted.
The stress was mounting, and if I had to see one more sour-faced noble, I would explode.
“Wake up,” Finn chastised his brother, shoving him.
With a groan, Kade stretched out, his densely corded muscles flexing with the movement. He reached up to work a kink out of his neck, “What’s wrong?” he asked me, his eyes squinting against the bright orange flare of sunset.
“Nothing,” I replied, the frustration all but vanishing at the sight of an adorable, sleepy Kade. I snuggled onto the settee next to him and he wrapped an arm around me. I nuzzled into his neck, relishing in the soothing warmth and spicy scent I found there.
He hissed, “Careful, Liana. It’s hard enough to contain myselfwithoutthe feel of your breath on my neck.”
Finn sat on the opposite side of me, his gaze faraway and his jaw clenched.
