Chapter 33 #2
“Hmm.” I pursed my lips, feigning mulling it over and trying to remember. “Perhaps so. Centuries have passed, but I do not think I misremember my feelings at the time. If I could see our agreement, as you have the only copy, that would help me remember.”
“It is locked safely in my office under magical enchantment. It might take me some time to retrieve it for your perusal.” He pretended to make to stand.
I shook my head and held my hand up, stopping him. “Do not trouble yourself. Do not worry about retrieving it right now. You raised another very interesting point, one which has plagued me for some time now.”
“Oh, and that is?” He eased back onto his throne and looked down at me. Expectantly. Warily.
“You agreed to an accord that prevented me from making the Summer Court bleed, and that is the reason they have not suffered for their sins, and yet you continue to hold me to our agreement, even when my vengeance is apparently impossible.” It was a struggle to keep my pulse steady as a heady combination of nerves, fear and hope clashed inside me.
It was not my place to speak to Elduin like this, and he would have every right to put me in my place for questioning him like this.
I was playing a dangerous, if very satisfying, game with him right now.
Would he let me continue being so open and almost disobedient, or would he remind me who was high king?
“Impossible?” Elduin arched a brow at me, his tone as calm as still waters as he lowered his eyebrow again.
Too calm. There was my warning sign that I was pushing too hard and would pay the price if I was not careful, and Elduin backed up that feeling as he said, “Your vengeance was within your reach all this time and you were fool enough to think you might name her queen. I have heard the wolf you are willing to risk your entire court to have is no longer with you… and that she bears the blood of a royal seelie—the fallen Summer King, Sylas.”
He had spies in my court then.
Kalyn had known Oberon had become my advisor, and had undoubtedly been responsible for informing Elduin of that, but I had only told the Nightmare King that Saphira was part seelie.
The only people who knew she was the daughter of the fallen Summer King were my council.
Darkness swirled through me, rousing my shadows, but I held them in check, refusing to reveal anything to him. I would weed out the traitors when I returned to Falkyr. All was well and proceeding as expected.
I calmly brushed off his words with a smile. “I allowed her to go to the Summer Court. It was planned. I knew the seelie were hunting her, and now she has been welcomed into their fold with open arms. A wolf among the lambs. My wolf.”
Elduin slowly clapped, the sound mocking as he grinned at me.
“Congratulations on stumbling upon a way around the accord… but I must warn you… there are many wolves in that court more vicious than the one you unleashed upon it. I do not believe your wolven is capable of being the one to finish this hunt, and if she does surprise me and claims the throat of the one responsible for the tragedy that occurred in Belkarthen, what would she have to return to?” He ceased clapping and spread his arms wide.
“A king wed to a female more suited to be his queen.”
I reined in the dark urges that came over me, caging them within my body as I absorbed that information, refusing to rise to the bait as Elduin wanted.
The high king had just let slip that the architect of the deaths of my parents and abduction of my brother was alive, and that he knew who it was.
The glass doors off to my right opened before I could respond, and Vaeleryn strolled inside, the hem of her black corseted dress skimming the floor with each light step she took towards me.
“Kaeleron,” she murmured sweetly, her silver-violet eyes bright and warm as she greeted me. She held both hands out to me, and normally I would have taken them and bowed to her.
This time, I did not take them and only half bowed before I turned from her to stare at her father, locked in a brief battle of wills with him before I pivoted on my heel and walked away.
Without bending the knee before taking my leave as expected of me.
I did not close the doors behind me as I exited the great hall.
I did not slow as I traversed the entrance hall, or even as I stepped out into the twilight.
The ancient elkyn awaited me in the courtyard, two attendants from the stables attempting to calm him as he scared several highborn males and females away. Apparently, he had not wanted to wait for my signal and was enjoying himself tormenting the poor Ereborne unseelie.
One of the males reached for his antlers.
“Leave him,” I snarled and grabbed the male, hauling him away from the elkyn with enough force that he lost balance and landed on his rear.
I mounted the beast and he took off immediately, thundering for the edge of the courtyard, and I savoured the wind against my face as the world dropped away, the city that sprawled across the island below the palace beautifully silent from this height.
I guided the elkyn left, towards the great tower that formed one end of a bridge to another section of the castle, and waited until we were behind it before I dropped off his back, landing in a crouch on the walkway that encircled that tower just below the conical roof.
He thundered onwards without me, heading back towards the Shadow Court as planned.
Malachi stepped out of the shadowy alcove that resembled a door at a distance.
“Many in the court speak of your unplanned visit, and of Saphira. Kalyn has been visiting more frequently, and the Night King was seen here three days ago. There are whispers that Elduin has moved two of his legions into the Nightmare Court across the water, and that his fleet has been stationed off the Twilight Court.”
I was not happy that the Twilight Court had allowed it, but I did not know the full details without hearing it from my own spies.
There was a chance the vessels were in open water, merely anchored far enough from my court not to be noticed by me, and that Beleron was still my ally and was not playing me.
“I expected Valenyr to side with Ereborne. Kalyn requested a price I would not pay, and I doubted he would have remained loyal to me even if I had chosen to pay it. He likely came to act as spy for Elduin.” I remained in a crouch, studying the city of white buildings and pale squares spotted with green, contemplating everything I had learned and forming a new plan.
“Elduin revealed my vengeance is not yet done, but he also acted as if I had included making the entire Summer Court bleed in our agreement.”
An agreement I had told everyone about when I had announced my decision to come to Ereborne.
“And you do not think you did.” Mal came to tower beside me, his dark gaze following the line of the river that cut through the city directly below us.
“I do not think I did.” I lifted my hand and rubbed one cold claw across my lower lip as I considered my next move.