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His face relaxed into a happy smile. “You want to see me naked?”
What if she did? What if she said yes? But she didn’t want to encourage his smug smile. “Right now I want you to tell me what happened.”
“Exactly. I don’t want to distract you—or get distracted.” He looked at the basket she had. “What did you bring?”
“Bread and jam. We don’t have a lot of stuff here. Not yet, at least.”
“It’s great.”
He took a piece of bread and stuffed it in his mouth, then put jam on another and ate it, almost all at once. Naia realized she’d been starving as well, so she also ate, hopefully with more grace than River. Well, he had gotten seriously hurt, so his lack of manners was understandable.
“So?” she asked once she thought he had filled at least part of his stomach.
His pretty reddish eyes were set on her, and then he finally started speaking. He told her how Ironhold had been planning to make Aluria fear the Ancients again, as a pretext to gain power. His words implied that they were still planning it, that it was something in the future, and Naia had to correct him.
“King Harold contacted the other kingdoms, including us. They just decreed that Aluria would become the Ironhold Empire.”
River tensed. “What did you say?”
She chuckled. “I said sure, lovely idea! But let’s wait a little.”
“You’re joking.”
“I’m not. That’s exactly what I said. Now it’s all going to be decided in three days. Two, actually. An emergency gathering in the Iron Citadel.”
He squeezed the piece of bread he was holding. “No, no, no. You’re not getting anywhere near that dreadful castle, and nobody from your family should go there.”
Naia tilted her head. “Oh. Really? It’s annoying when someone you like goes to enemy territory, isn’t it? You get worried.”
He stared at her, his eyes like burning hot coals.“It’s worse. Much worse than any of us thought.”
“Speak for yourself. I knew they were bad.”
“You didn’t, Naia. You don’t know half of it.”
“Well, tell me, then.”
12
The Breaker
It was as if the light went out of Iona when Leah told her that the white fae had disappeared, not that she had been any kind of beacon before.
“But I saw a fae once,” Leah added quickly. “So I’m sure your people are only hiding or something.” She would never have imagined that she would be relieved to say that the white fae weren’t all dead. The fact that humans in Aluria had been celebrating their demise felt sick now that she thought about it.
“Where did you see him?”
“In the Iron Citadel. He helped me for some reason, and made me walk in the hollow from one room to a different one, where I could hide.”
The fae shook her head. “No ancient can walk in that castle. Too much iron magic. It must have been a spirit.”
That didn’t seem likely. “He was solid and held my arm—or hand.”
“It couldn’t have been a real fae. Not in the Ironhold castle.”
Leah was pretty sure it had been a fae, but didn’t want to argue. “Still, your people might be hiding, or maybe they moved. At least there’s no more war.”
The fae looked away and shook her head.
