Chapter 37
Chapter
Thirty-Seven
“Acurse?” Caelan blurted. “On an entire shifter line?”
He’d said the same thing a few minutes before.
The Lord was having a lot of trouble fathoming how a witch could have done such powerful magic.
Our working hypothesis was her mating bond with the shifter.
The bond allowed her to access the heart of the Pack’s magic, allowing her to perform the curse and make it stick.
Information like that could be deadly if it got into the wrong hands. Mating bonds couldn’t be faked, but if someone wanted to take a Pack out from the inside, accessing its magic could be effective.
We had not discussed the elephant in the room.
Our impending nuptials.
Caelan was too concerned about Nadia’s plan for me and had been hard pressed to let me out of his sight lately.
It was getting extremely annoying.
Garrett and Thalia sat in the two chairs opposite Caelan’s desk. I lounged on a couch on the other side, wishing I could sink into a deep and endless sleep. When Caelan brought me inside, I was surprised to find those two here, but Caelan told me they knew everything.
Everything being what happened and my Chimera heritage, something I’d chosen not to disclose to anyone, especially a stranger like her.
But bringing it up in front of them would be in bad taste, so I tamped down my anger and tried to focus on the next steps with the swans and how we’d handle them now that they knew what I was.
Their plans for me wouldn’t come to fruition if I had anything to say about it, and I did.
I’d wipe out the rest of their line if they came for me.
The last two weeks had been a whirlwind of wedding activities. Booking the flowers and the baker and the caterer and remembering all the tiny but necessary details was enough to make me scream.
I’d rather get married on my land in the spring, but when I brought it up, Caelan had vetoed the idea and insisted he couldn’t wait to marry me and wanted to do it as soon as possible.
He prowled back and forth across the office, barely restrained energy leashed tightly to his body.
“Caelan?” I asked.
“Hmm?”
“Have you seen my father?”
The room went so silent, we could hear a pin drop.
“Why would I see Cernunnos?”
“Just curious.” I glanced at Thalia, who wore a mysterious smile on her lips.
I wondered if I could find the spell she was supposedly under and break that rather than trying to break Caelan or my father.
But he was going to tell me about Thalia when we were married. I kept telling myself that, but the thought made me squirm. There were numerous other reasons for us to marry—the main one being I was in love with him.
“For fuck’s sake, Caelan. Just tell her,” Garrett snarled.
The Lord sent him a withering look. “You know I cannot.”
Garrett’s nostrils flared, but he stayed silent.
“You know what this is,” I accused. “My father didn’t swear you to an oath, either, did he?”
Garrett’s cheeks colored. His jaw tightened.
“Don’t you dare, Garrett.” Caelan’s voice held a touch of the wolf.
“She needs to know,” his Second said.
“She will in a couple of weeks.”
Garrett scoffed. “I’m not sure what’s going on here, but I can’t believe Evie is letting you string her along like this. Doesn’t seem like her style.”
I closed my eyes and let out a breath. “Garrett’s right.”
All eyes swung to me. Caelan stilled. “Evie.”
“Going into a marriage with secrets will kill the marriage before it even starts. I need to know so I can walk into this with my head on straight.”
Anger rolled over Caelan’s eyes. “I’ve told you that I cannot tell you.”
“Why?” I stood, my fingers trembling with anger. “This seems so stupid. Why are you clinging so hard to what might be a small secret? What does my father have on you?”
“Evie—”
“Thalia is your sister,” Garrett blurted.
All the air was sucked out of my lungs. I snapped my attention to Garrett and Thalia. The seer’s eyes were wide with stunned shock.
“Garrett!” she whispered.
“She’s Cernunnos’s child?” I asked.
Garrett nodded.
I turned to Caelan. “Is that why you were so eager to marry me before you told me? Because then I would look more appealing to my father to carry on his legacy?”
“Evie,” Garrett said.
I held a hand up to silence him, screaming in my head that surely Caelan would deny this. He’d deny he’d manipulated me into marriage in order to claim the fae crown.
But he stayed silent, and my heart crashed to the earth.
“I see,” I said quietly.
Caelan took a step forward. “Evie. This situation is a lot more complicated than your simplistic take.”
“Simplistic.” I laughed, a hoarse, croaking sound that sounded foreign coming from my throat.
He reached for me, but I stumbled back and hurried toward the door. From my peripheral, something large and green and orange launched itself through the air. With barely a thought, I reached out a hand and caught Seymour, snuggling him to my chest.
“Do not call me for a while,” I said to Caelan. “And Garrett? Thank you. If your Lord kicks you out, you will have a place with me.”
Garrett squeezed his eyes shut.
I met Thalia’s eyes, but I couldn’t read her expression. My sister.
I had a sister.
But the reveal of her heritage had revealed something uglier in my own relationship, and I couldn’t take the time to process the fact that I had a living relative outside of my parents.
“Thalia,” was all I said as I hurried out of the room.
I had a sister and a fiancé who’d just tried to trick me into marriage so he could claim half of my power.
And he hadn’t even denied it.
There was nothing complicated about that.