Chapter 10 #2
Unless magic could do that.
I really should have asked Kael more about magic.
I touched the brand on the left side of my chest, smiling as I felt him in it, feeling far brighter and more hopeful now that I had managed to complete one task.
Danica was safe.
Now I just needed to get her away from here.
I doubted that was going to be as easy as it sounded.
I settled in my armchair, falling into the books I had selected, scribbling notes about this court and the origin story of the seelie and unseelie. The more I learned about this court and the seelie, the better chance I had of surviving.
Only I didn’t seem to have much luck on my side.
Hours trickled past, and I didn’t learn anything new about the seelie.
They seemed to possess the same general powers as the unseelie, wielding the same magic that came from the lands, and their rites were the same.
The only thing I really learned was that each court in Lucia possessed its own particular power, and that it was only possible for the more powerful among the court to wield it.
The royals.
Which had me wondering.
Had Luthryn been of royal blood? He had wielded the solar power and invisibility of the Summer Court royals.
Sylvan hadn’t seemed to care that he had been killed though. The steward had looked at Luthryn as if he had been a waste of space and was glad to be rid of him.
When the light dimmed, I moved to one of the long bench tables beneath the chandeliers, taking my book on the origins of the seelie courts with me. I sank into the wooden upholstered seat and leaned over the book, scanning the colourful painted pages for anything that might be useful.
The doors of the library opened and I lifted my head, a greeting rising to the tip of my tongue.
Only it was Lorien filling the doorway.
A sneer curling his lip as he stared at me.
Meiryn’s warning rang in my mind, clanging like alarm bells as I went back to my book, trying to ignore him as my senses charted his movements as he stepped into the room. He wasn’t alone. Two males followed him inside. My pulse jacked up.
This wasn’t good.
“You know the library is only for those with royal blood, right?” I didn’t take my eyes off the page.
Lorien stopped right beside me.
“Do you need something?” I flipped the page, pretending that the extremely boring chapter about the exports of every court in the seelie side of Lucia was incredibly engrossing.
He slapped his hand down on the pages, right in the middle of the book, and twisted it towards him.
Laughter burst from his lips.
Mocking. Cold.
“She is reading children’s books.” He tossed those words over his shoulder to his lackeys, who laughed on cue. “Do you not know how to read?”
I swatted his hand away. “I read perfectly fine, thank you.”
Before I could move my book back in front of me, he snatched it up, holding it hostage like the prick he was as he propped a hip against the heavy wooden table.
“And how is it you speak and read the fae tongue, but write in another language?” He pointed to my notes with the book, arching a brow at my scribblings.
“English. I write in English, because that’s my native tongue.” I snatched the book from him, scowling at him as I did so, letting my eyes glow with my wolf side as it paced within me, and that oily darkness purred at me, whispering words about putting him in his place and that I was heir now.
I had the power.
I also had enough common sense to know that if I attacked him, I wouldn’t be fighting just him, and he had appeared skilled with his bare hands when he had been sparring in the courtyard. The two males with him had been almost equally as skilled.
So if I attacked him, I would probably end up on the losing side, and he would know he was stronger than me. I would be handing him any power I had right now.
“But you speak and read fae.” Lorien eyed the book again.
I shrugged. “I had plenty of time to learn some of it in the Shadow Court.”
He didn’t look as if he believed me, but he also didn’t look as if he knew about the spell Kaeleron had cast on me, unlike Meiryn.
“A wolf just picked up enough fae to understand everyone she speaks to?” His voice dripped with derision and disgust. “I doubt that. You are nothing but a common mutt. No better than that lowborn.”
I presumed he was talking about Meiryn.
“I’m not a mutt. I’m a wolf, and the daughter of an alpha. That’s the fae equivalent of a king, in case you didn’t know.” I pushed my book away, wolf side firmly at the fore now, the urge to put him in his place too strong to ignore as he provoked me.
He grinned in my face. “But you are not the daughter of an alpha, are you? You are the daughter of a king. Or maybe Sylvan was wrong about you and you are just a filthy little bitch who does not deserve to sit on the throne of a noble fae court.”
“I’m the heir now. Sylvan has proof of it,” I growled, refusing to shrink away from him, rising to the threat before me and standing my ground.
I didn’t know if the steward had proof or not, but it was better to bluff than put up with Lorien’s bullshit.
“So, if you don’t mind, get out of my face. I have work to do.”
He scoffed, spraying me with spittle as he motioned to his friends. The larger of the two males tossed one of the books from the pile I had left near my armchair to his precious master. Lorien read the spine and looked as if he might laugh, but settled for sneering at me again.
“Work to do like learning how to run a court? I doubt you can pick that up from books.” He waggled the book at me and I caught the writing on the spine.
A brief history of the Summer Court. The book I had earmarked as my next read.
Lorien leaned in close, until his nose almost touched mine and I was sorely tempted to bite it off.
“I have had it bred into me from birth and have spent the last three years preparing for it. There are other things you cannot pick up from a book… like being a full-blooded highborn fae of the Summer Court, and a male.”
Great.
He was one of those males.
Worse than Elanaluvyr and some of my pack combined. A male who thought he had all the rights to power just because of his gender and his blood. I was so over that.
I wanted to kick him off his high horse, but instead held my tongue, trying to remain nice and not snap my fangs in his face.
I had already kicked him off that high horse in a way, and now I was going to pay for it.
No wonder he was angry with me. He had spent three years preparing to rule this court, had killed his way to the top to defend his claim to the throne, only for me to come along and shove him down a step, replacing him.
Making myself his enemy.
And his new target for assassination.
Wonderful.
“I happen to be a very quick and clever wolf, and I’m sure I can pick up how to run a court before my one hundredth birthday.” I shoved my nose back into the book, wishing he would fuck off.
He leaned down into my view, casually resting on one elbow, his voice calm and even, masking his threat.
“How quick and clever?” The dark glint in his azure eyes as he smiled at me had my hackles rising. “Shall we find out?”
I snapped fangs at him, making him rear back to avoid being bitten.
His lackeys grabbed me from behind, appearing there before I could move, each one seizing an arm to hold me in place.
“Not quite as quick as you need to be apparently,” Lorien drawled.
A feral snarl pealed from my lips as I wrestled against their hold, that darkness that had started purring at me from the second I had set foot in Lucia whispering in my ear, goading me into fighting them.
Lorien pursed his lips and perused me.
“If I shaved your head, would your wolf form suffer the same loss of fur?”
He drew a short blade from the sheath hanging from his belt, his smile wicked.