Chapter 2
HEMMING
I had no idea how long I’d been unconscious when my heavy eyelids managed to open and reveal a darkened room. Ariel was nowhere to be found, and panic surged through me as I shot up in the bed. Though the lancing pain was gone, I would have welcomed its return over the fear that drove me to my feet and had me crashing into the hallway.
The grand corridor was empty as I stormed the length of it, searching for any sign of Ariel or Shayfer. I wanted to believe she wouldn’t have attempted to leave without me again—not after she’d promised—but she’d always been rash when fixated on something she wanted.
And she wanted the truth. That much was plain.
Not wishing to arouse suspicion, I slowed my pace as some of Kaplyn’s staff walked by and refrained from bellowing Ariel’s name until she appeared—or until it became clear she wasn’t there.
I knew Kaplyn would have wanted to speak with her after we returned to the mansion, so I headed toward his office, wondering how long their discussion might have gone on. Perhaps my arrival would cut it short. I was sure he’d likely rejoice in my voluntary presence, given his obvious guilt regarding me, but I was far from ready to deal with that. Maybe I would be after we returned from Anemosia.
Or maybe I’d still be just as raw and confused about it all.
My relationship with my father paled in comparison to the issue at hand, however, so I swallowed whatever feelings I had about him and my abandonment and headed to his office. The longer I wended my way through the halls, the sharper the stabbing in my chest felt, and I rubbed at the bare flesh with the heel of my hand, trying to escape the implications of what it meant. The pain it represented. But the longer it lingered, the more it grew.
Then a tiny, high-pitched voice cut through that anxiety like a fiery blade, cauterizing my emotional wound in an instant.
“Hemming!” Sophitiya cried from behind me, and I turned to find the young girl running as fast as she could, arms wide like she was trying to take flight. I squatted down just in time for her to crash into me with all her might and wrap her arms and legs around me. The ferocity in her embrace washed away any trace of the anger I’d just felt. “You’re all right!”
“Yes,” I whispered in her ear as I cupped the back of her head and stroked her golden hair. “I’m sorry I wasn’t able to come see you earlier.” The shoulder she’d buried her face against grew wet with her tears, and I fought hard to keep my emotions at bay. “I saw the present you left for me.”
“Ariel told me what happened—that your wings were cut off. I didn’t want you to not have any, so I gave you mine.” She pulled away from me and rubbed her tear-stained face with the backs of her hands. “I’m not sure they’ll fit, but maybe my auntie can alter them for you.”
“Your auntie could most definitely do that,” a female voice called from the dim light of the hall, “but I’m not sure they’ll help him the way you want them to, dear.”
Delphyne walked briskly toward us, the stiff hem of her black dress dragging along the wood behind her. I tried to release Sophitiya so I could greet her aunt properly, but the young girl wouldn’t have it. She held on tightly as I slowly rose.
“Delphyne,” I said with a nod.
It earned me one in return. “Hemming.”
Hemming , not warrior . That was a start.
“I was looking for Ariel when Sophitiya tackled me.”
“I didn’t tackle you,” she corrected with a giggle. “I hugged you.”
“You’re still hugging me, if you want to be precise.”
“Perhaps you should climb down now, Sophitiya.” Delphyne’s tone was not unkind, but it left little room for argument all the same. The little girl looked back at her aunt, clearly weighing her options. “I just need to speak to Hemming for a moment, child. That’s all.”
“Are you going to be mean to him again?” she asked, narrowing her eyes in a way that reminded me so much of Ariel, I nearly laughed.
Delphyne’s cheeks flushed with what I assumed was embarrassment. “I’ll do my best not to. Now, get down and wait over there.” She pointed to a plush chair in a tiny alcove, and Sophitiya let out a frustrated sigh.
“Fine, but be nice. We wouldn't have Ariel back if it wasn’t for Hemming.”
Delphyne’s rosy cheeks paled in an instant. “I know.” The softness of her voice was something I hadn’t expected; neither were the tears welling in her eyes. “Over there, please, Sophitiya.”
“Better listen to your aunt,” I told her as I bent over to put her down. The girl's reluctance was plain, but she eventually relented her hold and skipped over to the chair that seemed to swallow her delicate frame when she sat upon it. Once she occupied herself with the beaded details on the cushion, I turned my attention to Delphyne.
“I….” She cleared her throat of emotion, then tried again. “I want to thank you for bringing Ariel home.”
“You don’t need to thank me,” I said with a soft smile. “I’d do anything for her.”
Delphyne’s eyes lifted past my shoulders to where my wings should have been. “And so you did.” A single tear slipped down her cheek before she quickly wiped it away. “I owe you an apology, Hemming. I misjudged you. I should have trusted Ariel’s opinion of you, and I didn’t. For that, I am sorry. It’s clear now just how much you love her?—”
“ YOU LOVE ARIEL ?” Sophitiya shouted as she launched herself from the plush blue chair, smiling mischievously. “Are you going to marry her?”
“Sophitiya!” Delphyne exclaimed in mild horror, but my booming laughter eclipsed it.
The wide-eyed girl, bubbling with excitement, stopped at my feet and beamed up at me. “Are you? Are you going to marry Ariel?”
“Well,” I said, crouching down in front of her, “I’ll have to find her first. That’s what I was trying to do when you tackled me.” I smiled wickedly at her, and she laughed.
“I hugged you,” she replied, feigning annoyance. “And if you want to see Ariel so you can ask her to marry you, I saw her go into Shayfer’s room, so she’s probably still in there.”
“I knocked on his door a moment ago,” Delphyne added, her brows pinching together with suspicion. “It was locked, and no one answered.”
A renewed sense of dread washed over me. “Can you show me where his room is?” I asked, fighting hard to keep my tone neutral.
Sophitiya jumped out of her chair. “You think they’re up to something,” the wise girl replied.
Apparently, I hadn't hidden my concern well enough. “I think whenever Shayfer is involved, trouble follows.”
“That’s because Shayfer is trouble,” the girl said with a sigh. She’d clearly heard that accusation from her aunt enough times to imitate it with perfect accuracy. “Follow me. You can’t be Ariel’s guardian if you can’t find her.”
“I know,” I said, shooting Delphyne a sideward glance as Sophitiya led the way down the hall. My father’s fierce seamstress met my gaze with concern in her own.
We rounded the corner to a wing of the home I’d never been in, and Sophitiya pointed at a jade-green door at the far end. “That’s Shayfer’s room.”
“Thank you, Soph,” I said, smoothing her hair as I walked past her. “You two can go. I’ll take it from here.”
“Are you going to ask her to marry you? Because I want to be there if you are?—”
“Hemming will find us later and tell us how it all went,” Delphyne said, ushering the girl away by the shoulders, but her razor-sharp stare was all for me. “Won’t you, Hemming? You and Ariel both ?”
“We’ll find you soon,” was my only response before I refocused my energy on the bright green door before me. Delphyne’s rushed footsteps faded into the background as I gripped the doorknob, heart hammering in my chest. Without knocking, I wrenched the locked door open to find the room empty.
The beast inside me let loose a howl that shook my father’s estate.
ARIEL
T he sickly feeling I always got after Shayfer used his magic churned in my gut as I looked at him. The moment my system righted itself, anger raged through me.
“What did you do?” I shouted, shoving him away from me.
“Ariel, it’s not what you think?—”
“ Where are we ?”
“At the eastern edge of Kaplyn’s lands, just inside the barrier.” My eyes darted around the wooded area, taking in the familiar trees and landscape—features I would have recognized right away had my anger not blinded me. “I had no intention of being found again, so I removed us from that possibility.”
“Who was at the door?”
His perfect lips pulled down. “I don’t know, but they seemed rather enthusiastic in their knocking. In my experience, that’s rarely a good sign.”
I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Shayfer was right; getting caught colluding in his bedroom after our awkward encounter with Kaplyn earlier would not have gone well for either of us. Which made Shayfer’s point about leaving right away more valid; the longer we lingered, the more likely we were to lose our opportunity.
Unfortunately for us, Shayfer wasn’t the only spy in Kaplyn’s employ.
“You’re right,” I said with a sigh. “I’m sorry.”
“For yelling at me or pushing me?” he replied with a sly smile. “I just want to be sure to apply the apology to the appropriate affront.”
“Both, you cheeky bastard.”
His smile widened. “I’ll add in the name-calling so we can call it even. Now, what do you want to do, Ariel? Steal away now to get your answers ‘at any cost,’ or wait for your beloved to wake and attempt our incursion at a later time—provided Kaplyn has not thwarted our intentions by then?”
My mind and my heart warred within me. One knew that it was best to leave now; the other couldn’t bear the thought of leaving Hemming behind.
Again.
I opened my mouth to answer the looming question when an unholy sound rent the air, shaking the very ground we stood upon. I knew that savage cry, had heard it before. Hemming’s beast was awake—and angry.
I could think of only two possible reasons.
Without wasting a moment, I took to the air, flying toward the mansion as my heart pounded in my chest. I prayed to the gods that Hemming’s outburst had been a response to not finding me at his bedside when he awoke, and not because he’d gone back on his promise to me and decided to kill his father. Without me there to buffer the tension between them, anything was possible. Hemming had been playing along with Kaplyn when he’d found us earlier—I could see it in his eyes.
Now I feared he wasn’t playing at all.
The cool night air whipped at my face as I neared the mansion, another ferocious howl ringing through the halls to greet me. I was still too far out to land when an enormous black beast crashed through the doors of the kitchen wing, heading in my direction as if he could sense me. His pale eyes drifted up to the sky, and the sound that escaped him rattled me to the core.
Heart in my throat, I shot toward the ground and landed hard a few strides from where Hemming’s beast was headed. He slammed his clawed hands into the ground and skidded across the lawn until he finally stopped only feet away from me, nostrils flaring wide in anger as he huffed and snorted. I’d seen the beast act like this before, but never toward me.
“I’m sorry,” I said softly. “I didn’t mean to leave?—”
A low, warning growl cut me off as he inched closer, leveling his massive head with mine. Then a twig snapped behind me and yanked his attention away.
His growling deepened immediately.
“Might I suggest we save whatever this is for later?” Shayfer said. “After your rather indiscreet outburst, Kaplyn is sure to be here any moment.” Despite the clear danger before him, Shayfer walked up to my side and took my hand in his, then reached for Hemming. The beast’s lip curled as he snarled at the sneaky fae, but he quieted when I placed my free hand on his face.
“You can be mad at us later, Hemming—when we’re in Anemosia.”
“I’m not sure I would have put it quite like that, Ariel,” Shayfer said as he rested his hand on the beast’s huge shoulder. “I’d prefer it if he were just mad at you , since your feminine wiles seem to charm him. But we can sort out the details once we’re in Anemosia.”
No sooner had those words left his mouth than the ornate wooden doors to the main wing of the mansion blasted open. Black, swirling shadows shot toward us, ensnaring us one by one. The cold, inky tether snaked around my body, cinching my arms and wings tight to my sides before I even realized what was happening, then hoisted us all up into the air as Kaplyn stepped outside. A cloak of shadow danced around him, and anger that nearly matched his son’s brewed in his blinding white stare.
“You are not going anywhere .”