Chapter 27
CHAPTER 27
Farron
I feel oddly light as I walk through the halls, hands in my pockets. Of course, my heart aches for Rosie, for the betrayal she was so certain would never be done to her. But my mind, on the other hand, feels alight.
The Queen is alive, and Caspian knows where she is .
It’s like finding a textbook that’s fallen through the cracks, the one that has exactly the chapter you need. Or finally translating the last cipher and the whole puzzle becoming clear. The information is here . There are answers to be had.
It’s just a matter of clicking the pieces into place.
After Rosalina gave her ultimatum, the Prince of the Below had skulked off, and the rest of us had separated.
No one will go looking for him, I know that. Dayton hates him, Rosie’s furious, and Kel’s loyalty has been proven misplaced once again.
So, if anyone’s going to turn the Prince of Thorns to our side, it’s going to have to be me.
I remember when he cornered me at his birthday party down in Cryptgarden. You and I are alike, Farron , he had told me. I hadn’t wanted to believe it. Wouldn’t accept that I could be anything like that traitor. But now I understand that it goes beyond who lives above or below the surface.
Maybe Caspian wasn’t wrong.
I’m not sure why I decide to try the library first, but that’s where I find him. He’s lying on a table, staring up at the mural on the ceiling, and tossing an apple up and down in the air.
He doesn’t fit here, his sharp edges too shadowy for the bright oranges and yellows of the library. I quiet my steps so as not to alert him to my presence and lean an elbow against a bookshelf.
Caspian has dropped his black cloak, which lies like pooled oil on the floor. In contrast to his usual attire, his shirt seems too casual, just a loose black shift, the laces undone to his breastbone. Dark hair spills over the edges of the table. His mouth, usually twisted in a smirk of some kind, is set in a firm line.
He looks … sad.
I can understand what drew Kel and Rosie to him in the first place. Even for the fae, he is an otherworldly beauty.
One of the books I’m leaning against slides out from under my elbow and clatters to the floor. I lose my balance, barely catching myself on the shelf.
Caspian sits up, startled. When he sees me, he rolls his eyes then lies back down, continuing his game of catch with the apple. “Has the great High Prince of Autumn come to chastise me?”
“No,” I say, attempting to regain my composure. “I happen to like libraries.”
“Sure, sure, that’s why you’re here.” His sigh seems to reverberate throughout the entire library. “It’s a hopeless cause.”
“What?” I walk over and lean against the table he’s on.
“Saving the Queen.” Caspian doesn’t look at me, still focused on his apple. Up, down. Up, down. “I know it’s so much more entertaining to imagine me as your perfect villain, entrapping the bloody Queen of the Vale in my dungeons Below and manipulating all of your gnat-like minds. But that’s not why I kept the truth from Rosalina. From any of you.” He catches the apple, and his fingers turn white around it. “Saving her is a hopeless cause. I should know. I’ve tried.”
I stare at him. All these long decades, I’ve hated this man. Hated him for how he lied to Kel, for the war he brought upon the Vale, for the lives of so many of our loved ones who paid the price for his deception.
At the same time, he’s kept Castletree standing where we could not. He’s saved Rosalina’s life and he’s here, pouting on a table in a castle of monsters that want to kill him, instead of running back to Below and telling his mother everything he knows.
He reminds me of someone. A boy who hid in an alder tree. But his hideaway is not a place, but a mask he wears around everyone to keep them from understanding who he truly is.
“Nothing to say?” Caspian throws the apple up in the air again.
I catch it, bring it to my lips, and take a bite. “I understand now.”
“Understand what?” he spits.
“You, Caspian, are afraid.”
He sits up, scoffing. “If you’re not, then you’re more foolish than I thought, little pup. You have no idea what my mother is planning.”
I duck in front of him. “Then enlighten me.”
“What good would it do? Even with your curse broken, you’re no match for her. There’s no winning this fight. Best we can do is stay alive. I’m trying to keep you fools that way, and stars know it’s no easy task.”
“So, let me get this straight.” I take another bite of apple right in Caspian’s face. “The Prince of Thorns, renowned for his love of games and wagers, is too afraid to even check the stakes?”
Caspian pushes on my chest and shoves away from me, stalking toward the book stacks. “Listen to me. This is where you all have it wrong. You think Sira is the one who needs defeating. But it’s not her you should be afraid of.”
“Then who?”
He looks back and smiles. “It’s me.”
“Why, Caspian? If you wanted to kill us, you could do it right now. Use your thorns to crush Kel, Dayton, and Ezryn’s roses. Without them, you could take me out easily. You won’t do it, whether because you’re insane and just like to torment us or because of some sort of strange sense of loyalty you have. So why should we be afraid?”
Caspian grabs a book, flips it open, tosses it over his shoulder. “I told you to make me human. How’s that going, professor? Any spells in any of these? A curse, even? Fuck, I’ll take a bargain if it would work.” Book after book he opens, slams shut, throws behind him. I cringe each time the spines hit the hard floor.
Finally, I can’t take it anymore. I drop the apple and rush over to him. I snatch the next book he picks up out of his hands and place it back on the shelf. He goes to grab another one, but I snag his wrists and hold them still. “You don’t have to be afraid of this,” I say quietly.
He sneers down at where our skin touches. “Of what? Holding hands? ”
“Of telling me one true thing about you.” I offer him a crooked grin. “Come on. You already think we’re incompetent idiots. What am I going to do with one little secret about you?”
The moment stills between us. Neither of us moves. He’s considering it.
Then, he looks up at me and his eyes are pure green. Emerald flames flicker over where our hands touch. Instead of radiating heat, it’s like they burn with power , their fuel the very energy between us.
“There are things beyond your comprehension, Farron, son of Autumn. Entities that make queens seem like commoners. My entire existence is to be a conduit for this kind of force. I was made to bring about the end of the Vale as we know it.” His voice becomes a whispered breath, and then he blinks, eyes returning to lavender. The flames around our hands flicker out. “I cannot let this happen.”
I take a shaky inhale. “If you’re human, Sira won’t be able to use you.”
“Can you do it?”
“No.” I turn the corner and walk to a different bookshelf.
“Farron!”
Caspian runs after me, nearly bumping into my back. I pluck a book off a shelf, a very special book. The one Caspian stole from the alder tree. “There’s only one person who can.”
“I have asked her and asked her and asked her,” Caspian says. “Aurelia cannot turn me.”
“Then she’s a better liar than you.” I flip open the book, filled with lost tales of the Queen. “First evidence: the people of Aerantheis. She changed them from fae to sirens. Second evidence: the people of Calandorin. She turned them from fae to birds. Third evidence: the princes of Castletree. She changed us into something beyond fae, beyond animal.” I slam the book into his chest. “The Queen can turn you. But you’re going to have to break her out of prison first.”
I hold my breath as I walk back to the table he’d first been lying on. For a long minute, he does not follow. Then, like a skulking cat, he appears from behind me, eyes wide and questioning. “It can’t be done.”
“What? Rescuing her?”
“Yes,” he says. “It’s impossible.”
I lean back on the table in the position he previously was in. “Oh yeah? Like how making golden briars is impossible? Or thorns holding up all of Castletree? Or Kel actually admitting to someone he was wrong? I don’t know about you, but we seem to like to do the impossible.”
“It’s suicide.”
“Sounds like waiting for your mother to turn you into some evil god bomb is suicide, too.”
Caspian kneads the bridge of his nose. “You’re not listening to me. My mother is vicious. If she finds out I’m plotting against her, her vengeance could—”
I sit up, grab his wrist, and glare at him. “I don’t care what your excuse is, Cas. My mother was the bravest and most generous woman to ever live. She’s dead. Dead because of your mother and whatever magic she’s letting into the Vale. You and I may both be absent a mother’s love now. But not Rosalina. If you’re too afraid to try for yourself, then do it for her. Give her the family you and I will never have again.”
We stare at each other, matching scowls and heavy breathing. Caspian tears out of my grip and stalks to the window, looking over the Briar. I walk toward the exit. “Think about it, Cas. Work with us, break Aurelia out of prison, and take your humanhood as a reward. Then you can run away from the Vale and never think of us again. You don’t have to be a great hero. But for once in your damned life, you don’t have to be the villain.”