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Bright and Death moved quickly, climbing higher into the branches, and my eyes widened when I caught my first glimpse of the city.
It was literally built into the trees, with branches and bridges working as pathways, and buildingscarvedinto the living giants around us.
The vines thickened as we neared them, slowly crawling further over the branches and trunks. Kierden muttered curses in his mind loudly enough that I could hear him damning my magic, and my lips curved upward.
“Don’t destroy my city,”he growled into my mind.
“Did you figure out how to control my magic while I wasn’t looking?”I shot back.
He didn’t answer.
The bastard knew I had no control over it, hadn’t attempted to teach me any control, and had failed in every effort to gain control of it himself. He’d decided that he didn’t think we would be able to use each other’s magic unless we sealed the bond, which we agreed wasnotgoing to happen.
So yeah, whatever happened to his city was his own fault.
He added,“Hide the handprint. If anyone asks why I brought you here, tell them the kings have planned an event in their competition that requires humans.”
My forehead knitted.“An event? I’m not doing an event. What does that even mean?”
As much as I liked to argue with him, I wasn’t taking the risk of getting murdered by some cultist. I wrapped my non-glowing arm over my glowing wrist, so it covered the silver handprint entirely.
“The three fae kingdoms have been at war for centuries. The other kings and I finally settled on a peace treaty a few weeks ago, and had our people put together a bunch of violent events to turn the tension into entertainment. That’s why there are so many fae here right now—I was the only one willing to host it.”
My eyes scanned the trees around us with some amount of interest as we passed group after group of fae, as well as a ton of trees carved into buildings. There was ice scattered in the trees too, used as bridges or decorations, though most of it seemed to be in some stage of melting.
“So there are three cities-worth of fae here?”I asked him.
I had no idea how many fae there usually were to a city, so that didn’t really mean much to me.
“Three kingdoms’-worth. Each kingdom has only one massive city, which is always given the surname of its current king. There used to be more before the war according to the legends, but very few of us remember those times.”
“And you left the other kings to run this whole thing so you could come find me?”My skepticism was heavy.
“No. All three of us were targeted by the assassins so we all left to hunt humans with life magic. There were enough people I trusted here to run the city while I was gone and the events were already planned, so it should’ve gone smoothly.”
I felt likeshould’vewas the most important word there.
“No one’s fighting, so it seems to have worked,”Kierden added, looking past me as we continued.
“I guess that’s a good sign…”
“It is. My people are fine.”
I nodded, like I believed him. Maybe I did. I supposed that would be determined when I met whoever he trusted.
Assuming he didn’t lock me up in his castle.
My body went stiff at the realization that was a possibility.“Do you think he’ll trap me again?”I asked Bright.
“I don’t know,”she admitted.“I can eat him, if he does.”
I tried to smile but failed.
Veil, I hoped he didn’t try to lock me up.
If he did, the reluctant peace we had established was going to change drastically. I’d make that bastard regret picking me as his temporary mate, somehow.
The esu carried us through the city for nearly an hour before we reached the largest tree I’d ever seen. It had to be nearly as big as my town, with a house-sized entrance carved into the front. The tree’s trunk was dotted with what appeared to be windows, and there were thick vines wrapped around many of its branches, growing toward the tree as if trying to reach out and touch it.
