AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I sat at the dressing table, ready to begin taming my hair, when I noticed the burgundy dress laid out next to me. Aisling’s dress.
The sun told me it was already mid-morning, and she hadn’t come. Worry twisted in my stomach. “Did you find Aisling?” I spun on the cushioned bench, already trying to read Tiernan’s expression.
He nodded, “We did. She was still in Valin’s room when we went to look for her. Kade heard her from Valin’s balcony. He said it sounded like she was laughing.”
My shoulders relaxed, “Good. That’s good. I hope she comes by soon.”
“I’m sure she will,” was his reply.
Tiernan was oddly quiet as I combed through the matted tangle at the back of my head—yet another side-effect of spending too much time on your back.
Through the mirror, I saw him, looking off into the room, but at nothing. His jaw tight, and eyes hard.
“What are you thinking about?” I asked him, “Is everything alright?”
He pursed his full lips, “No. Not really.”
My smile faltered, “What is it?”
Tiernan looked to the still-closed door to my chambers, “Finn should explain it all to you. He’s the one who figured it out.”
An icy fist gripped my lungs, though it quickly burned to nothing more than steam as my frustration took over. Could I not have just one day—one dayof peace in this godsforsaken place?
I tempered the rising heat with a glance at my crown. It sat atop a deep purple cushion, tucked away above my armoire. I never wore it, but the weight of it seemed particularly heavy lately.
I nodded to Tiernan, disrobing to pull on a proper gown. Tugging my hair into a twist and knotting it into a ball at the nape of my neck. Imagining all sorts of vile things that could have happened. Was it to do with Valin? The Mad King? Perhaps they’d learned something more about the blade, or the stone reflecting the morning sunlight on my finger. I supposed I’d have to wait to find out. “Then let’s go see Finn.”
The guards’barracks weren’t as I had imagined them. I wasn’t sure what I had imaged, or rather, if I had given much thought to it at all.
It was quaint. Simple. A central living area with horribly poor lighting was what one walked into upon going through the door, furnished with nothing more than some chairs and a table. A half-empty decanter atop it with three glasses strewn around.
Beyond that were three hallways—leading, I assumed to three bedchambers.
Tiernan didn’t bother knocking before entering Finn’s chamber. We found the Draconian in bed, but not asleep. Scrolls and tomes were open around him, a parchment wreath around a Finn center, sitting cross legged and shirtless atop blankets of fur. Trimmer than his twin, but not by much, the Draconian exuded power just as much as Kade. In every glorious muscle.
That’s not why you’re here, Liana.
It took a moment for his gaze to focus on us, but then he was shaking his head, and setting the scroll in his hand back down atop his bed, “What are you—”
“Tell her what you told us last night,” Tiernan said, shoving a pile of parchment out of the way so he could sit down.
The room was made up of nothing but a bed and armoire. I could walk from one end of the bedchamber to the other in no more than six or seven paces. Without disturbing his work, I sat down too, pulse pounding as I waited to hear what he would say.
“It’s a theory,” Finn said solemnly, “But one that seems to make sense no matter how you look at it.”
“What is it?”
Finn pulled out a tome and flipped through the pages until he settled on a drawing of the Blessed Blade. A sharp dagger with an ornate hilt. The hilt set with four—not five—stones. A depiction made before the Mad King had it altered.
“We know what the Blessed Blade does. It steals Graces,” Finn said, pointing to the drawing, “So it would be safe to assume that is the Mad King’s goal. To steal the Graces of other Fae for himself. To get stronger. Or to strengthen any followers he may have.”
I nodded.
“Okay, well a few days ago a female from the North came here to submit a request to the palace guard to help find her missing daughter.”
Why hadn’t I heard about this?
As though he could read my thoughts, Tiernan interrupted Finn, “With everything that was going on with Valin’s return and your training, we thought it best to let the palace guard deal with it.”
