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Gwydion sidled up beside me, nursing his own glass, and grinned. “Well played, my queen.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“No? Would you prefer I use your name?”
I looked up at him sharply, knowing exactly what he meant.
I’d been doing my best to sit quietly and watch. Following Thalia’s advice—and Bael’s, too, I supposed—and treating information like treasure. Now that I was looking for it, I could guess that Gwydion was employing that strategy as well.
Gwydion knew my true name and was the only one in the castle who did. Until yesterday, he may have been the only one left alive who knew it. He’d coerced it out of me after my friend Iola was poisoned in exchange for saving her, though now, I wondered if he might have saved her anyway since she was one of Thalia’s ladies.
Perhaps I would feed Gwydion to the snake instead.
“What do you want?” I snapped.
“Nothing. I merely appreciate a well-thought-out plan. Anyone who really was a rebel wouldn’t be fucking stupid enough to say that name to Scion in his own castle, much less within arm’s reach. Congratulations, I believe you just cleared your name.”
“That was hardly a plan,” I said vehemently. “And I don’t know anything about Dullahan, except that he leads the rebels, so if any of you would care to fill me in, I would greatly appreciate it.”
Gwydion’s smile told me clearly that he didn’t believe me, but it seemed that the others did. Scion certainly did because, yet again, his mood had shifted, and he was being pleasant again. Or as pleasant as he was capable of being. He was not actively trying to murder me, and his smirk had gone from condescending to dangerously flirtatious.
I could swear if this family didn’t kill me outright, I would die from emotional whiplash.
Clearly listening to us, Scion glanced up, still clutching the note in his fist. “There is no simple way to answer that question, rebel.”
Did he realize what he said—if he no longer believed me to be a rebel, then why say it? I supposed it did not matter. “Fine, what is the simplest explanation?”
He chewed on that as if choosing his words carefully. Asking a fairy to give a short answer was paramount to asking the sun to rise in the west. “Most families have at least one black sheep,” he said finally. “We have many.”
“If there are many black sheep, at what point is the white sheep the odd one out?” I asked.
Aine laughed, catching my eye across the room. “Perhaps it would be better explained as a wolf among the flock.”
“So, you’re related?”
Scion leaned against the nearest post of the four-poster bed, petting Quill, who perched on the baseboard beside him. He fixed me with a long look and finally nodded gravely. “Ambrose is my brother, but we have never known each other well.”
I blinked at him, feeling suddenly a bit numb,
That wasn’t the right reaction. I should be swearing, shouting, fainting,something, but I didn’t so much as gasp. I wondered if perhaps my ability to feel surprise had been somewhat damaged by every other impossible thing I’d been told lately. In a way, the leader of the rebellion being a part of the Everlast family was poetic.
If I was upset by anything, it was that Bael hadn’t told me himself when we’d read Rosey’s journals. Had that not been the ideal opportunity to bring it up? He’d clearly known.
“How did this happen?” I asked.
“No scathing remark, rebel?” Scion asked. “I’ve come to anticipate your ill-mannered observations.”
“I’m sure I’ll think of one if you’ll only give me a moment to consider.”
“Ambrose is the oldest of our generation, but in layman’s terms, he’s Gwydion’s age,” Aine said before Scion could snipe back at me. “It’s common in immortal families for children to have friends of their own age group, even among siblings, cousins, or aunts and uncles. So, while we are siblings”—she pointed to herself and Gwydion—“wewere raised together.” She pointed to herself and Scion.
“How old are you, then?” I asked Gwydion, if only to get a full understanding.
I had to crane my neck to look back at him, and he did me the courtesy of stepping around my armchair to face me as the others did. For a moment, I had the oddest sense of sitting on a throne while they all stood before me, giving their report. I shook my head—it’s the wine.
“Two hundred and thirty or so,” Gwydion said thoughtfully. “We don’t keep careful track after maturity. Only the centuries start to matter.”
My eyebrows rose. “So what happened?”
