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That explains why Nick and Sebastian never really worry about Mack. If they truly remembered all the awful things that transpired, they would have moved heaven and earth to buy off her Fae contract somehow.
The human world has no idea how cruel the Fae really are.
“That’s not a new rule,” a male Dusk Court Fae calls.
I blink, pulling myself out of my ragey thoughts to see the spring bastard’s stare still parked on me.
“No,” Prince Hellebore admits. “But up until now, it hasn’t been enforced.”
My forehead furrows as I scowl. Ugh. Why are you singling me out, jerkwad?
I clench and unclench my fists as the murmurs and stares grow. Mack tries to grab my hand, but I gently pull away.
I don’t want her tainted by association with me.
“Now that we’re clear on how shadows are to behave, let’s discuss the trials. At Whitehall, we ensure only the best shadows attend beside us by holding three gauntlets. These trials are meant not to simply cull the deserving from the undeserving, but to remind them of their place in Everwilde. They are beneath us. Slaves bound by magic to do our bidding and enhance all of Faerie.”
They. He’s talking about us like we’re not here. Like we’re non-entities.
I thought there was no one I could despise more than Inara.
I was so fricking wrong.
“Because of its mortality rate, the final gauntlet is required for fourth years only,” Hellebore adds, as if this somehow makes him a hero.
The Unseelie Evermore Courts look rather ambivalent about the whole speech. As long as their favorite form of entertainment—watching us die—is still in place, they don’t seem to care one way or another who’s in charge. The Seelie Courts glance around, shocked but not exactly disappointed.
Prince Hellebore is a Seelie Fae, after all.
“One last thing.” Prince Hellebore smiles. “Fail any of the gauntlets and you’ll be expelled from the academy and sent to fight the scourge.”
Well, crap.
In one sentence, this Spring Court jerkwad just jeopardized my entire future.
My hand flutters to my throat where a giant lump forms. Expelled? Sent to an almost certain death fighting the scourge?
That can never happen.
7
The rest of the school day passes in a blur of nervous chatter as everyone scrambles to learn what they can about the Spring Court gauntlets. Even the fourth years are worried.
What sort of contest will the trials be? How dangerous are they? How many students pass, on average?
No one seems to know anything, but I can’t help assuming the worst. All my plans, all my grand ambitions for my future, and this Spring Court pretty boy dickwad comes and ruins everything.
If the contest was fair, I would pull my crap together and do whatever it took to succeed. But after Inara’s threat, everyone has a vested interest in seeing me fail.
The only bright spot in my day is that Mack shares every class after lunch with me. Since the last four periods are when shadows attend school with the Evermore, I prepare myself for more hazing, but Inara and her homicidal gang don’t show up until the last class, Advanced Properties of Magic.
I can’t help but grin as I watch Inara, Kimber, and Lyra slip quietly into the auditorium right as Professor Lambert begins to talk. Rhaegar and Basil follow.
All of them file into the back row, subdued, missing their usual arrogant I-own-the-school grins.
No one even notices them. The entire classroom’s focus is riveted on Hellebore and the girl he sits next to. Like him, she’s dressed casually in black leggings and an oversized gray tee, artfully ripped at the shoulders and frayed in the hem. Her hair is a shade lighter than his, the uneven ends tinted pastel purple, making her gray eyes pop. o;As you’re all aware, the highest ranking Evermore of the reigning season traditionally gives a speech at the beginning of each year. Please give a warm welcome to the Spring Court Prince, Hellebore Narcissus.”
I look to Eclipsa, prepared to pepper her with a million questions—
