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For the occasion, she’d chosen a pink dress that she knew drove Hunt to distraction. It had been either that or leggings and a T-shirt, and given that she wanted to avoid anything taking away from what she was actually doing, she’d opted for formal.
Of course, settling on the pink dress had been an ordeal in itself. There was now a giant heap of clothing in her bedroom for her to put away when she got home, which was incentive enough to draw this out for as long as possible.
But she took one look at Sathia and Flynn’s sneering parents, the Lord and Lady Hawthorne having recently returned from Avallen, and decided to Hel with waiting. To Hel with all the other Fae nobility who had gathered at her invitation this morning.
She’d set foot in the city late last night, had gone right to the ruins of Asphodel Meadows, and called for this meeting the next day.
She would have done it last night, but Hunt had told her to take the time to sort out what she wanted to say. To let Marc get the paperwork ready.
The leopard shifter and Declan now stood beside the desk that had been hauled into the foyer, Ruhn and Flynn with them.
She glanced to Hunt, and he nodded subtly. It was time.
So Bryce stepped up to the desk and said to the cameras, to the Fae aristocrats, “I’ll make this short and sweet, for all the busy nobles here who have to get back to champagne lunches and spa treatments.”
Silence, and a frantic clicking of cameras. The videographers pressed in closer, angling their mics to pick up her every breath. One of the camera guys—a draki male—was smirking.
But Bryce kept her gaze on the cameras, on the world listening. “This is my first and only decree as the Fae Queen of Valbara and Avallen: the royal houses are ended.”
She ignored the gasps and protests, and tapped the paperwork on the desk. “I’ve had the documents drawn up. Allow me to be perfectly clear: I am not abdicating either throne. I am no longer queen, but with this document, no one shall ever wear the crown again. The Fae monarchy is abolished. Forever.”
From the corner of her eye, she could see Hunt grinning broadly. She wished her mom was here, but they’d decided that Ember Quinlan’s presence might cause too much speculation that her human mother had pushed her to do this.
“I am donating all the Autumn King’s residences in this city,” Bryce said, gesturing to the elegant space around them, “to house those displaced by the attack on Asphodel Meadows. This villa in particular will be used to house children orphaned by the massacre.”
One of the Fae nobles choked.
“As for the royal properties elsewhere—in Valbara and on Avallen—they will be sold to anyone who can stomach their tacky-ass decor, and the profits will go toward rebuilding Asphodel Meadows.”
Bryce picked up the golden fountain pen she’d swiped from the Autumn King’s study after chucking all his prisms into the trash. She planned to dismantle the orrery and sell it for scrap metal. She knew enough about how light traveled and formed—how it could break apart and come back together. She never wanted to learn another thing about light again, even her own.
“The Asteri are gone,” Bryce said to the listening world, “and the Fae kingdoms with them. In their place, we will build a government built on equality and fairness. This document grants me the right to represent the Fae in the building of such a government. And nothing more.”
“Traitor,” hissed a Fae noble who Bryce could have sworn had sneered at her once in a restaurant, years ago.
Bryce hummed to herself, flipping the Autumn King’s beloved pen between her fingers. “You guys shouldn’t have granted your royals such absolute power in your quest to keep everyone else down in the dirt.” She leaned over the documents. “Maybe then you could have stopped me from doing this.”
The golden pen touched paper, ink blooming on the parchment.
“But you’re in the mud with the rest of us now,” Bryce said to the Fae as she signed her name. “Better get used to the smell.”
Thus, with the stroke of the Autumn King’s golden pen, the royal bloodlines of the Fae were wiped from existence.
* * *
Ruhn flicked on the lights in the apartment—for however long the place would even have power. “Bryce is going to throw a fit, but I swear it was the only one available furnished on short notice,” he said to Lidia as they stepped inside the home literally a floor below Bryce’s.
Lidia smiled, though, surveying the apartment that was the mirror image of Bryce’s layout save for the furniture. She approached the white, gleaming kitchen. “It’s lovely—really. I’ll get the money wired to your account.”
“Nah,” Ruhn said. “Consider it a thank-you present. For bailing me out of the dungeons.”
Lidia turned from the kitchen, brows high. “I think we’re even by now. After … everything.” After that shit with Pollux, which he knew would haunt his dreams for a long fucking time.
But there would be joy to light the dark memories. When he’d gone with her to return the boys to their parents, Ruhn had been content to watch the happy reunion, especially as Lidia was hugged with equal welcome and love by the boys’ parents. As the boys had, in their own ways, made it clear that Lidia would be welcome in their lives.
Brann, he had no doubt, would be the easier one. But Ace …
Ruhn smiled to himself at the memory of how Ace had looked over at Ruhn before leaving, his dark eyes knowing. Sharp. As if to say, Take care of my mom.
