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“And that’s that?”
“To sit in the throne of the Ever King makes one an equal of the king,” Erik said. “She was placed on the throne. I bowed the knee. The title has never been known in the Ever. We do not have a custom for it.”
“Made one up as you went, Bloodsinger.” Jonas lifted a tin filled with the king’s mead, grinning. “I respect that sort of brazen initiative.”
“It was quite a spectacle,” Alek said, tapping a knife back and forth on the tabletop.
“Most accepted my word,” Erik went on, “but clearly there are folk who resist every word I speak.”
My father frowned, but it seemed the disquiet rose more from being tossed into a new culture than disappointment. After a pause, he slapped his palm on the table. “Well, if this is my daughter’s kingdom, then we are here to fight for it. I take it you have no plans to let this bastard simply disappear into the sea, Bloodsinger.”
Erik’s fist tightened by his leg. “Not until he’s nothing more than bone.”
“Then, we need to know how to lure him back out and finish this.” My father turned to me. “We need to know everything about this isle, Liv. No matter how troubling you think it will be for us to hear, tell us.”
Us. I knew Valen Ferus well enough to know he did not mean the room. He spoke of himself and the man at my side. Affection, warmand heady, swelled in my chest. In a small way, it was my father’s way of accepting House Ferus had grown by one more.
And he was right. There was no time to speak gently to spare emotions. Larsson and Fione had too much potential for power on Natthaven, and it needed to be quashed. I began from the moment I awoke in that chamber. Talk of Skadi drew out a great deal of intrigue (particularly from Sander), and Erik sent for Alistair to bring any writings on elven folk he could find within the palace walls.
By the time I finished my description of Larsson’s confessions about his lineage, the darkening being a mark of their bloodthirsty spells, then onto his attack, my father was pacing, and Erik’s eyes had grown dark with hate.
“I must stop you,” Gavyn said, holding up a hand. “You left out my favorite detail—she bit off his damn ear.”
Celine’s expression shifted from one of fear and pity to jubilation. “Of course, she did. She’s of the Ever!”
“Sharp bites, deep strikes, little fox,” Sewell said with a wink.
I regaled the escape; Gavyn added his own input on the guards, the weapons, and the layout of the palace at Natthaven.
“Fury kept me safe.” I slipped my fingers through Erik’s. “Until I saw you. Larsson and Fione took the heartbond to shatter whatever keeps him from the blood crown—spells I don’t understand—but something called to me. Something brought me to the shore. It was like my fury, or that isle, knew you were mine.”
The burn of red flashed in Erik’s eyes. “I told you, they took nothing, Songbird. I will simply need to say all the sultry things I’ve told you privately, not so privately now.”
“I would rather you didn’t,” Aleksi grumbled.
“My palace, Bloodsummoner.”
Strange, but my father’s face did not contort in rage or grimace in disdain to have a man speak such things about me. He even chuckled when Stieg leaned over and murmured under his breath.
“What, Daj?”
“Nothing, little love.”
Stieg’s eyes brightened. “I was reminding the king of the many times he and your mother cleared us from the room during such talks as these, all to be alone. I said I’m waiting for you to do the same and toss us out.”
My face boiled in a shock of embarrassment that matched the flush of my father’s face. It was only made worse when Erik said, “Gladly.”
I elbowed the king in the ribs. “Now that I’ve learned more about my mother and father than I would like to know, where do we go from here?”
The room sobered.
Erik reached beneath his throne, removing a sheath wrapped around a blade that looked like white gold. “I don’t know if you recall, but the woman, right before the shore broke away, she dropped this. Seemed to appear out of nothing.”
The escape from Natthaven had been a blurred moment in time, I’d not noticed Skadi gave up a weapon, but my chest tightened with affection for a woman I hardly had a chance to know. Lost to whatever spell had taken her, she still offered aid, still fought.
Sleek, strange runes were etched along the edges with a hilt made of pale crystal.
“She called it white iron,” Erik said.
