Chapter Fifteen
MASON
I SHOOT KIE a sharp look, beyond annoyed, but he only shrugs and continues forward.
“She’ll turn around once the magic begins to thin,” he says.
It’s already begun to thin, and the dawdler is still meandering about, galivanting through the forest. I can tell by the uneven footsteps that she’s trying to remain quiet—sneaky, even—but she’s unsuccessful.
Does she know I can sense her? That I can hear her jagged footsteps and smell her sweat? Probably not.
Faeries have little to no experience with my kind, and they continually miscalculate my abilities. They think shifters are below them, always have, and that assumption will be their downfall. Without magic, they’re nothing, but my kind don’t need it. We don’t rely on some flying dust to keep us alive, and that will always give us an advantage over them.
It’s why we expected the dawdler to return to the wall once the magic began to thin.
Kie walks several steps ahead of me, leading the way. His dark hair stands out against his unusually pale skin. He’s been keeping to himself these past few months, too busy preparing for his ascension to spend any sort of meaningful time outside. He’s beginning to look sickly. I should tell him that.
I should also tell him his pale skin makes his hair appear darker. He does a poor job pretending he doesn’t hate his black hair, and if it weren’t for his violet eyes and slightly pointed ears, people might confuse him for a shifter.
He sidesteps a tree, his fingers grazing against the rough bark. There are deep, horizontal gouges across the trunk with thick, yellow sap still seeping out. A shifter, maybe several, recently passed through here.
“She’s going to get us killed,” I point out.
She’s too loud, and she’s guaranteed to draw unwanted attention. We should just kill her and be done with it.
Kie frowns, peering at me over his shoulder. “She’ll turn around soon.”
He’s been saying that for the better part of thirty minutes, and it’s yet to be true. What’s she even doing out here? Faeries never venture into the forest, not without reason.
We’ve gotten some recent reports regarding a small faction of faeries working for the shifters. They’ve aligned themselves with my father, but we’ve yet to uncover their identities. Maybe she’s one of them.
We should question her. I packed several sedatives in my travel bag, and I should have enough to keep a faerie unconscious until after we’ve met with Zaha and returned to the capital. We’ll have to carry her, which is less than ideal, but I’ll manage.
We could get some useful information from her.
“I can just—”
Kie cuts me off. “No.”
Bullshit . I drag my fingers through my hair, pushing the strands away from my face. It’s about time for a trim, but I like how the brown waves curl around my ears. It leaves no question as to who I am.
I want every faerie I come across to know I’m a shifter—not that I make it easy to forget. It’s the reason Kie’s being so prissy about this woman. I’ve been too violent toward the faeries, and with his ascension rapidly approaching, it’s time to make amends. I need to issue apologies, issue promises, issue my fucking cock up on a silver platter.
I’m not much interested in any of it.
This woman chose to enter the forest of her own volition, and it’s of no consequence what happens to her. Faeries don’t rule this land—shifters do. Nobody will come looking for her, and her death won’t be traced back to us. To me.
My lips curl as I recall the first time I met Kie. Our parents were heavily engaged in peace talks, but I wasn’t interested. No. I was out for blood. Royal faerie blood.
I was nine, just old enough to understand the hatred between our kinds, and the second my family arrived at court, I went straight for Kie. I thought I could shift into my animal form and kill him. My parents would’ve been pissed, but the other shifters would have regarded me as a hero.
I wasn’t anticipating a forked mate bond to snap into place the second I touched him, though. He’s the mate of my mate, and that bond is the only thing that kept him alive.
My smile falls as I recall how every adult in court saw it happen. The faeries enjoyed watching the wild shifter fail at killing their beloved prince. The mate bond is a tricky bitch, and I feel nothing short of humiliation as I recall how my execution attempt ended in me frantically trying to heal the bloody neck of a sobbing six-year-old Kie.
I was terrified, and I’ll never forget the fiery agony that spread through my bones as I slapped a hand over Kie’s neck to try to clog the puncture wounds. Even as a young boy, my animal form was large.
It was just too easy to wrap my jaws around Kie’s neck and give a little shake.
A twig snaps ahead of us, the dawdler making way too much noise. It’s a woman—I can tell by the footfalls—and probably a commoner. If she’s not working for my father, I assume she’s aiming to get Kie and me alone, probably hoping to lay a hand on either of us and ignite our mate bond. She wouldn’t be the first to try, and I doubt she’ll be the last.
I can’t fathom why else she’d be out here. Faeries are rightfully terrified of the creatures that live inside the forest. If a shifter doesn’t find her, a troll will. The stout, nasty, green fuckers are always lingering around, and while they’re generally weak, they’re dangerous in groups. They also have a particular interest in torturing and raping faerie women.
I drag my fingers through my hair when the dawdler trips. The stumble is followed by a clatter and a low grunt. The pitch confirms it’s a female, and my lips twitch as Kie’s shoulders grow rigid.
“She’s persistent,” he mumbles. “I’ll give her that.”
Persistent isn’t the word I’d use to describe her. Fucking annoying is more like it.
We haven’t been following her for too long, maybe fifteen minutes, and the magic surrounding us has already grown thin. It won’t be long until it’s gone entirely. I hope she takes that as her cue to return to Farbay. She should do it before it’s too late. It might already be.
I flick a branch out of my way, my black gloves capturing my attention.
“I wish to take my gloves off,” I say to Kie.
He doesn’t respond.
Most faeries choose to wear flesh-toned gloves, but the dark color symbolizes Kie’s and my disinterest in finding our true mate. We’ll marry for political gain, and we can’t take the risk of igniting our bond.
I slid my gloves back on the second I caught wind of the dawdler. Kie did the same, but he doesn’t seem nearly as annoyed as I am. He never is.
The dawdler makes another noise.
“She isn’t even trying to be discreet,” I point out.
Kie continues to ignore me. She’s probably deluded herself into believing she’s our mate. Women often get wishful thoughts about us, convincing themselves we’re destined to be together. It’s bothersome.
Kie enjoys it, though. He believes delusional women are better fucks, but I strongly disagree. Those women are challenging to get rid of once bedded, and they’re almost always trying to sneak in a touch.
The whores in the brothels of Bellmere know better than to try to skirt around the rules.
I wonder if any of Kie’s women have ever succeeded in getting a bare hand on him during a weak moment, maybe before he’s had the opportunity to put a protective sleeve over his cock, but none have been our mate. I’d know. He wouldn’t be able to keep that secret from me.
“It’s uncomfortable,” Kie says, kicking at a rock. “The lack of magic. It feels like a piece of myself is missing.”
I shrug, unable to relate. I’ve never had any use for magic, and I don’t miss it when it’s gone.
Another five minutes pass before I lose my last bit of patience with the dawdler. She’s practically a beacon for the nearby shifters, and she’s going to get us all fucking killed.
I clear my throat, alerting Kie, before dropping my bag onto the ground.
I’m glad I chose to wear all black today. Her blood won’t stain the fabric.
“Mason…” Kie warns.
Ignoring him, I march forward, heading toward the dawdler. She’s not far ahead, and it sounds as if she’s resting.
Kie lets out a muffled curse, and I hear his bag drop onto the ground a second before he grabs my shoulder and pulls me back. I let him stop me, a habit I’ve been forced to take up since moving to the capital. Kie is the crowned prince, and despite our titles indicating us to be equals, the faeries don’t see it that way. Life in court is easier when the nobles think I’m subservient to Kie.
“I’ll see to it,” he says.
I doubt that.
Kie digs his fingers into my shoulder, threatening to dislocate the joint. If he does, I’ll return the favor. We aren’t in Bellmere, and there are no nobles around watching our every interaction. I’ll break his fucking arm, our trip to the portal of the gods be damned.
Let the delysum continue growing. Let the magic continue dying. I don’t give a fuck. It doesn’t affect me in any way, shape, or form.
“You know what they’ll do if they find evidence that you killed another faerie,” Kie points out. “We can’t risk it, Mace.”
He tightens his grip, continuing until I flinch and rip my arm from his. Queen Gitta’s come to my defense dozens of times over the years, but her pardons aren’t endless. I may be tied to her son, but she has a duty to protect her people. Objectively, I know the backlash murdering this faerie will cause.
“I’ll see to it,” Kie repeats.
He heads toward the dawdler, and I listen to his footfalls as I collect our items. Kie dropped his bag onto a small patch of delysum, the fucking idiot. It’ll only harm him if ingested, but I still don’t want him coming in contact with it.
I hate the faeries, but Kie has grown on me over the years. I consider him to be the brother I lost when our forked mate bond snapped into place. My family’s visit to the faerie capital was meant to be quick, a day or two at most. I never in my wildest dreams imagined I would’ve been left there, traded away to the faeries in the name of peace.
I haven’t laid eyes on my parents or brother since. Kalix was only seven, one year older than Kie. It’s hard to imagine him as a grown man, and I can’t help but secretly hope we cross paths during this trip.
My parents can get fucked. The great Alpha Theon abandoned me, and my mother stood by and let it happen.
Kie’s footfalls vanish, but I’m unconcerned. He’s capable of protecting himself, and he knows to call for me if he runs into trouble.
I bet he’s trying to catch the woman off guard. We’re far from the wall, but a loud enough scream might still draw attention. Attention we don’t need.
I swipe my hand over his bag, brushing off the remnants of delysum. It grows wild out here, but the particular patch he disrupted is in its second bloom. The vibrant-purple leaves have already dried and shed, and the fluffy, lighter purple seeds have emerged. The wisps float up into the air before vanishing, off to kill any magic they come across.
I toss Kie’s and my bags over my shoulder, impatient to continue moving. The shifters are most active in the evening, and I faintly remember learning about several small factions of shifters who live near the wall. We’re still in their territory, and I’d like to be out of it by nightfall.
I’ll need to shift into my animal form tonight, a fact I’m not looking forward to. My second form wasn’t welcome in the faerie capital, and the transformations have grown painful after so many years of disuse. It’s nothing I can’t handle, but shifting is no longer something I do for fun.
It hasn’t been for years.
Kie’s voice travels through the forest, and I drag a hand down my face with a low sigh. Why the fuck is he talking to the dawdler? He’s not usually one to drag out his kills, and I was under the impression that was his plan. He said he’d see to it. In my book, that means snapping her neck and being done with it.
My blood boils, and I fight back the urge to shift and finish this once and for all as I storm in their direction. I should’ve known better than to trust Kie to take care of this. He’s got a soft spot for the delusional ones.