Chapter 54
Fifty-Four
ALLETTE
Drip, drip, drip .
Water collects in a puddle beneath the stalactites hanging from the low ceiling. There is no telling how far underground they’re keeping me. I stopped counting at two hundred and thirty-eight steps.
At first, I refused to accept my fate, kicking and screaming at the door, clawing at the wood until my nails splintered and bled. I hadn’t expected anyone to come to my aid, but no one came to reprimand me either. It’s like I’m all alone down here, just me and the dripping stones.
Faint orange light glows from outside a hole in the door barely large enough for me to stick my hand through. I tried reaching for the lock or handle but felt nothing but stone.
“No sense fightin’ it, lass,” a voice as brittle as dry twigs says from somewhere on the other side.
Apparently, I’m not down here on my own after all.
“They’ll drain you of every last drop of sunlight before they put you in with the others,” the voice goes on.
“What others?”
When the owner of the voice chuckles, I have a feeling I don’t want to know.
Is this the end for me? Will I ever see daylight again? And Senan…
Will he believe I abandoned him? Even if he learns of my fate, there is no way he will be able to save me now. Not when they have irrefutable proof that I killed the guard.
I sink onto the damp floor and draw my knees to my chest. Perhaps I deserve this punishment. I took another man’s life. How could I think there wouldn’t be consequences?
A slot at the base of the door opens, and a ceramic plate and cup slide in. The slot closes with a sharp bang . My throat is so dry, I don’t care that the water inside the cup reeks of sulfur. I drink deep, the liquid sloshing in my empty belly.
I’m about to take a bite of the crusty roll when something crawls across my finger. Maggots have made their home in the bread. I screech, throwing the dry chunk against the far wall. The maggot may have fallen, but I can still feel it crawling over my skin.
If I am to die, I hope Senan learns that I didn’t abandon him. I hope he knows how much I loved him and doesn’t blame himself for what happened to me. Perhaps he will find some semblance of happiness in Nimbiss. He deserves to be happy.
Something scrapes on the other side of the door. The hinges creak as the barrier eases open. A shirtless guard stalks inside and shoves a hood over my head. Coarse rope bites into my wrists when he binds my hands behind my back. The sharp point of what I assume is a dagger digs into my spine, and the guard growls for me to start moving.
Two steps in, my shoulder collides with the doorframe. After a short walk, my slippers slam into something solid, and I pitch forward. Strong hands catch me, keeping me upright.
“If you don’t slow down or take off this hood, I’m going to end up falling and breaking my neck.” Perhaps that is the point. If I die, they won’t have to feed or house me until the trial. A win-win for everyone except me.
My captor huffs a laugh but thankfully slows his pace. I still stumble like a newborn Pegasus but manage to keep my feet beneath me.
“Where are you going with that one?” someone shouts from behind us.
“The king wants to have a little chat with her,” the man behind me says.
What fate awaits me at the castle? Will I see Senan?
“Careful,” a different man says. “Looks like she has spent a good deal of time in the sun.”
Why should that matter when I have no wings? Perhaps they don’t realize I’m no longer Scathian.
“I can handle her,” my escort assures him.
The cloying, sulfur-laced air from inside the pit slowly fades, replaced with a rank breeze smelling of death. My steps falter, my slippers finding no purchase in what feels like sand. The sand becomes more solid, and the stench becomes a cool, misty breeze.
The sharp object prodding me forward suddenly vanishes, and I’m being lifted off my feet into someone’s arms. I feel each pump of the man’s wings as we climb into the sky. I know better than to hope for mercy from the king after he ordered my exile. This is it. The beginning of the end.
Eventually, we slow, and it feels like we’re circling. When we land and he sets me down, the ground beneath my feet doesn’t feel smooth, like marble, but rather bumpy and uneven, like cobblestones.
An authoritative voice tells me to hold still. There is something familiar in its timbre, but I can’t put my finger on it. For some reason, he starts sawing at my bindings. The ropes fall away, and the man rips off my hood. I blink against the dull gray light, expecting to see a castle.
Instead, I’m staring at a sign hanging from rusted hinges above a black door.
The Nag’s Head
My breathing catches. The inn where I’m supposed to meet Senan. Does that mean?—
I whirl, but the man who saved me isn’t my prince.
“ Eason ?” It can’t be him, and yet there he is, standing so close, I can see the darker flecks in his weary gray eyes. I throw my arms around him even as a sob spills from my chest. “What are you doing here? How did you find me?”
“We must hurry, Allette. There isn’t much time. I’ll explain everything once we’re through the portal.”
The portal? I thought Senan and I were going to Stratiss. Are we meeting him there instead?
Eason pulls me into the inn and asks for a room booked under his own name. The innkeeper hands over a key, and Eason tows me up the stairs to a room at the end of the hallway. Inside is a bed, a small table, and a large trunk. When Eason kneels down to lift the lid, more gold than I’ve ever seen glitters from within.
With a mirthless chuckle, he slams the lid closed once more and catches the handles on both sides. His mammoth biceps bulge when he hefts the thing into his arms. “Let’s go.”
We can’t go yet. Not without the prince. “Where is Senan?”
Eason’s eyes narrow. “Prince Senan married Princess Leeri a few hours ago.”
“No…” That isn’t true. He is lying again. He must be.
“You have no idea what you’ve gotten yourself into.” Eason shakes his head, blowing out a ragged breath. “Of all the men in this fucking realm, why did you have to love him ? Is it because he is a prince?”
“Of course not.” If anything, Senan’s social status has been a hindrance to our relationship. If he’d been the son of a lord, we would’ve been free to be together from the very beginning.
He drops the chest onto the ground with a resounding bang . The floorboards and bed rattle with the sheer force. “Then why, Allette? I have seen him destroy lives, destroy himself, drink and dust and fuck for years. He forgot all about you, and yet here you are, about to put yourself in jeopardy once again for a man who cares only for himself.”
Hold on …
How could he have been watching Senan when he was stuck in the human realm with me? “What do you mean you’ve been watching him for years?” That is impossible…isn’t it?
He grabs for my hand, but I skirt back until my spine slams into the wall.
“We need to leave before they send someone after us,” he says. “Give me your hand.”
“First, tell me what the hell is going on.”
He breathes a low curse that sends chills racing down my spine. “The portal doesn’t only open on Samhain.”
Stars …
Is he saying that he hasn’t been stuck in the human realm after all? Did he not drain his magic by saving me? Every day he had gone to work, every time he had left me, had he actually been returning to Kumulus?
“Eason?” My voice shakes. “Look at me.”
His gaze drops to that damn chest as he curses and scrapes a hand across his bearded jaw.
“I said, look at me!”
When he does, I see a truth that shakes me to my core. “All this time, you let me waste away in another realm, knowing you could put an end to my suffering. But you never did.” He has been lying to me from the moment he saved me.
“Because he was never meant for you!” he roars.
“That wasn’t your decision to make! You lied to me.”
“I saved you.”
“How? By letting them cut off my wings? By holding me hostage?”
“Are you really that fucking na?ve?” He stalks forward, seeming to grow even larger as he towers over me. “You were the one meant to die that night. We had orders to kill you . And I spent the entire night wrestling with myself, fighting an internal battle between my duty to my king and my feelings for an innocent woman I only just met. I should’ve killed you, ended it all then and there. Instead, I chose to save you.”
I was meant to die that night, not Wynn. Eason had been sent by the king, not just to bring back Senan but to eliminate any loose ends. Eason was the one who threw my wings and my friend’s body into that fire… “How could you do this to me? To him?”
“You ask me that as if you don’t already know the answer.” His hand shoots out, wrapping around my wrist so tightly, tears prick the backs of my eyes. “I have loved you from the moment I first saw you. So, I saved you. Healed you, kept you warm and fed, worked my fucking stones off, and for what? For you to leave me for a fucking duster? Was my love not good enough for you? I have given you everything .” His grip tightens. “A good life. A safe life. I pulled you from the ashes, and yet this is how you repay me? By running straight to him ?”
“That isn’t love! You were holding me hostage!” I try to jerk free, but he refuses to let go. “You could’ve saved me, and yet you kept me as your prisoner. You lied to me, over and over again. You took away my world. My family, my friend, my life, and my love.”
“Enough! You cared for me once, and you will care for me again.”
“I won’t. I will never forgive you if you take me away. Never.”
“And yet you forgave him. If he truly wanted to find you, he should’ve looked harder. You forget that I was there.” He leans down so we’re eye to eye, but I no longer recognize the monster staring back. “He barely even looked. And the moment he returned to our realm, he drowned himself in dust and whores. That is the truth of the man you love .” Eason drops my hand and catches the door handle. The hinges scream when he throws it aside. He withdraws the short sword strapped to his hip, aiming it at my heart. “Now, I suggest you get moving, or I will finish what I started all those years ago.”
I’m about to take a step when a deep voice snarls from the hallway, “Get the fuck away from my mate.”