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“You’re alive,” his father pulled him away, hands holding his son’s face.
“I’m alive.” The prince offered a wet grin. “Where’s Daj?”
“In the North, guarding the borders with your grandparents. There . . . there’s been chaos across the realms since you were lost.”
Alek’s brow furrowed. My insides tightened. It explained why the fort was less guarded than I’d expected. Warriors and royals seemed to be scattered. Why? What had happened here?
Aleksi stepped around his father. His face was painted with dirt, sweat, and hair that stuck to his stubbled jaw. He glanced at me on the ground, then faced the room.
“Have the Rave grown so desperate they lose all sense?” Alek’s voice rose, fierce and rough. He strode to Jonas. The otherprince blinked until Alek cupped the back of his head and drew his forehead to his own. “Use your head, my friend.”
“I thought you were gone,” Jonas whispered; a simple, breathless declaration.
Alek clapped the side of Jonas’s neck, then clasped arms with his brother, and embraced the woman between them. She clung to Aleksi, saying nothing, but her slender shoulders shook with silent tears.
To get a glimpse at their anguish settled in my chest like heavy stones stacked atop one another. Bitterness, vengeance, a singular focus in my own dark mind had uprooted friends, family. It had left them to imagine the dreariest of things until their unified warriors acted first before strategy.
Alek turned toward his uncle. “Ask yourself, why would Bloodsinger come to our shores without a full crew after what he did? Don’t kill him, Uncle. It would be the worst mistake you could make in this moment.”
Valen rose, eyes wide as though he were still locked in a bit of stun. “I saw you get dragged under. How did you survive the Chasm?”
“Because of him.” He gestured in my direction. Alek cleared his throat, raising his voice again. “The Chasm tore me to pieces. I would not have survived if Erik Bloodsinger had not saved me. The way he saved my father.”
“Aleksi.” Alek’s other father gripped his arm. “You know?”
“I’ve always known,” Alek said, then faced the hall again. “Be the warriors I admire and use your damn heads. He is not here for blood and does not deserve to have his spilled. After seeing the Ever Kingdom, I learned swiftly that despite the pain of that night, the sea fae came for a reason.”
“You think I give a damn about his reasons?Where is she?” Valen Ferus was losing his grip on patience with each heartbeat.
Aleksi dropped his chin. “Livia was . . . she was well in the Ever. Isaw her, spoke with her. But the Ever is under attack and . . . their enemies have taken her.”
I’d barely staggered back to my feet before Valen Ferus wheeled on me again. “Youlostmy daughter?”
If he hesitated to kill me before, he looked wholly prepared to do it now.
“It was a betrayal none of us saw,” Aleksi said. One of his mud-caked hands pressed against Valen’s chest. “Livia was betrayed by a friend of us all.”
No one spoke for a breath, then another, until Valen let out a deep, wretched shout of anger. He let an axe fly. The blade dug into the wooden slats of the back wall.
“I want him out of my sight!”
The king raged, but the queen approached with a chilling silence, as though she were made of ice. Livia’s mother drank me in with unwavering scrutiny. She, perhaps, was more frightening than the king. If I had to guess, I would not be surprised if Livia’s mother knew how to kill without her victim even knowing they were wounded.
“Take the Ever King away while we hear our prince’s tale.” The queen leaned close, voice rough. “Then we’ll decide his fate.”
It happened swiftly. Fae guards took hold of my arms, then more surrounded Tait, dragging both of us toward a side door.
“No.” For the first time, I resisted. A bit of panicked madness dug into my brain. “There is no time for this! I must lead you through the Chasm. Do not waste time due to hatred of me. She will pay for it!”
The king and queen wouldn’t look at me, like I’d become nothing more than a haunt in the room.
Cruel, burning panic tugged at my throat. How long would the earth fae leave me in a cell while Livia was tortured, battered, or worse, beneath Larsson’s search for power?
Guards yanked me toward the corridor.
Aleksi frantically spoke to his uncle, his father, to his aunt, toanyone. They muttered something I could not hear, and he groaned, shaking his head.
A frenzy of horrid possibilities took hold of my mind. By the time they dragged me into the doorway, sweat coated my brow, and my leg ached from thrashing.
