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“What food?” Cyara said sharply, turning and placing her hands on her hips. For all that she was tiny, she was fearsome. I always enjoyed watching her square off against Veyka. My mate would fight with me to the death, but her handmaiden could cow her in a matter of seconds.
“I will go fetch some.” I was already standing. The short walk to the main atrium, the heart of the faerie caves, would give me a chance to think. To ponder what Veyka had told me—visions of wings, mysterious faeries.
But as I grabbed the bench by the open doorway to crawl through, a bright flash of white appeared. Isolde.
“I beg your pardon, Majesty.” Her white braids swung as she bowed, shrinking her already tiny stature. She didn’t wait for a response—moving right past me for her target—Lyrena.
Isolde was among the faeries who acknowledged Veyka and I as their rulers, even after seven thousand years in the human realm. But it wasn’t the same sort of acknowledgment I’d experienced in the goldstone palace. None of the faeries were afraid of us. Their awe wasn’t of our powers, but the fact that we’d somehow appeared in their hidden home after millennia.
In Annwyn, my power was what set me apart. Here, it seemed inconsequential.
What did my power over vines and trees matter to the beings who were responsible for the season that allowed those plants to even sprout into existence?
It was unnerving.
If Isolde noticed, she was unbothered. She swung a knapsack off her back and began unpacking food onto the bench, along with a collection of herbs.
“Have you applied the ointment?” she asked Lyrena.
Lyrena snapped her fingers, letting fire dance at the tips. A distraction—for herself or the healer, I was not sure. “I have been busy.”
Isolde lifted her smaller, claw-tipped hands and mimicked the motion. Made pure while flames dance in an effortless facsimile of Lyrena’s magic.
Lyrena’s flames winked out.
“Trousers off.”
This time, Lyrena did as she was bidden. Her smile was nowhere to be seen.
Cyara began preparing the food Isolde had brought—the two of them seemed to understand one another implicitly. Maybe because they were both… other. Faerie. Harpy.
Harpy. I still couldn’t quite believe it.
Veyka’s quiet, observant handmaiden could transform into the harbinger of female rage and cruelty.
“It would be faster if you used your claws,” Isolde observed drolly.
Cyara paused over the block of cheese she’d been cutting—with the little dagger from her belt. “I cannot summon them at will.”
Isolde knew.
Had she seen in the clearing, during the battle with the nightwalkers? The succubus.
We didn’t know how long she’d watched before offering aid. Maybe she’d seen everything. My stomach tightened. Maybe she’d heard my nightmare and screams in the night.
“How can you summon them at all?”
Veyka sat cross legged, framed in the small archway to our quarters. She’d managed to get herself there without anyone noticing—or at least, anyone saying. She hadn’t bothered with the intricate gold brassiere that usually held her tunic tight. Instead, it was loose around her shoulders and breasts, concealing the soft rolls of her stomach.
Not her tunic.
Mine.
Fucking Ancestors. My cock hardened instantly. Thank the Ancestors all eyes were on her.
I resisted the urge to stalk over there and drag her into my lap. I settled for the bench beside the main alcove opening. The few feet of space between us weren’t enough. Not nearly. But I wanted to hear Cyara’s answer.
Veyka dragged her tongue over her lower lip. Just for me.
