Chapter 13
Chapter
Thirteen
ANDREIEN
W e burned precious minutes organizing the theater staff to clear and cordon off the building. The moments that ticked by until my duty allowed me to go after my bonded threatened to tug on the unraveling strands of my sanity.
But this was what it meant to be Heir.
This was what it meant to rule.
I could not see to my own heart before I saw to my people, and when this was over honor would compel me to sit Hasannah down and explain this to her. She knew I would protect her, and she was right. I would protect her with everything in me. But she wasn't the only one I was oath bound to protect. Or the only one I had failed. That Ixnie was in my city proved I had failed.
I was going to take that failure out on every Lord of the High Court.
There was no doubt in my mind that Dartanyon was behind this, and where there was one Lord, there were always others. The Ninephene female would find me and report, but I set one of my warriors on her trail as well, to watch and lend aid if need be.
Constin, Mathen, and my luudthen went after Anah.
“He's insane, not stupid,” Constin said grimly as we again searched the estate that until recently, Lord Dartanyon had occupied. “It would have been too simple for him to bring her here.”
I ran my finger along a side table. “He hasn't returned here since we began the hunt.”
“We already have a list of former staff,” Mathen said. “I'll begin interviewing them to see what they know.”
I nodded grimly. It was the one advantage we had at this moment, that we’d already begun an investigation into Dartanyon the day he’d first tried to take Hasannah. Much of the preliminary work was done.
This was the unglamorous, tedious truth of any hunt. No dramatic chase through the night, no cinematic skirmishes.
Dartanyon had shielded her from me. If she were fully Fae, or if she had a rudimentary grasp of the standard uses of power like glamour and shields, he wouldn't have been able to accomplish that.
But my consort was mostly human, and tactics which would never work on a Fae would work on Anah.
Dartanyon was right. I was a stupid dilettante. Instead of training her in self-defense, I’d obsessed over creating her nest.
Filling her wardrobe with clothing and jewelry, providing her lavish meals, stroking her body into an inferno every night. I’d wanted to give her everything it had been glaringly obvious she lacked the night I met her, beheld the hovel she’d existed in.
I’d needed to prove she’d want for nothing, and that what she considered the dirt of my Court life wouldn’t do more than occasionally splash her ankles.
I’d wanted her to embrace the delicate cage being crafted around her. A cage meant to keep her alive , Darkness willing.
I was a fool.
Constin turned to me, his gaze piercing. “This isn’t useful, Andreien.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I know you. You can self-flagellate when Anah is safe. Rein it in.”
“I should have?—”
“This isn’t your fault. You’ve done nothing but what you thought was right. And if you’ve failed, we’ve failed as well.” His gaze sharpened. “It’s not helping us find Anah .”
I nodded, steeled myself. “No.” I glanced around the room. “Leave two to complete a search for anything useful. We’ll continue to look for his bolthole.”
I relearned the meaning of cold, of focus as I pondered the discovery of my unacknowledged privilege; little in the city challenged me, either through direct or indirect opposition. Not when the combined martial, magical, and financial power of the Sahakian-Casakraines mobilized at my command.
Almost, I’d begun to feel unassailable.
“The designer broke,” Constin said, emerging from the office I’d vacated moments before—to avoid killing the male who’d initially refused me the information I required. As if my requirement was a request, and not a command. “Though it didn’t take much.”
I traced the trail in my mind again, seeking holes. Former staff identified a secretary who worked for Dartanyon over a decade ago and had overseen an unusually active period of acquisition.
The secretary gave us the name of the individual who’d handled interior decor for several properties.
The designer had been out of the city on a job until two days ago, so we’d set aside that lead until now. It hadn’t seemed urgent enough to hunt the male down, so we’d waited.
Following the trail had been simple, though tedious. Dartanyon called me an infant Courtling behind my back, but he was sloppy. He’d ignored basic security precautions by not burying the properties he owned in layers.
After searching the first two properties, I allowed myself an internal sneer, recognizing the design period. Pastel palettes, lush furnishings, gold and silver accents everywhere, floral motifs. No taste or restraint, leaning into the whimsical and bucolic.
“We’ll split up and search each property,” I said. “If any search yields results, do not enter. Maintain position and await backup.”
Constin didn’t need me to tell him what to do, but he waited until I was done before issuing orders as I entered the coach, once again sheathing myself in a layer of ice.
I understood my mother better now. Her distance, her cold love—but I didn’t doubt she loved us. I wouldn’t lay that accusation at her feet, though there were plenty I had. Some, perhaps, not entirely deserved. How she must have writhed, watching Mia and I careen through the city, endangering ourselves.
This situation wasn’t Anah’s fault, but it was similar. She was in danger but I could do little but watch as events fell into place, and try to exert subtle brakes from the shadows. And not go insane in the meantime.
When this was over, I’d apologize to my mother for all of the obnoxious insults I’d hurled at her as a youth.
For accusing her of not caring, when perhaps she cared too much and had to remove herself to preserve her sanity.
A day it took us to methodically search each property, and on the second a team encountered a manor on the outskirts of the city melting into the forest line surrounding Casakraine. Well but stealthily warded against both attention and invasion.
We assembled, formulated a strategy, and I began to unravel the wards one by one; careful, slow work. Alerting Dartanyon to our presence would either force him to mount a defense, or prompt him to kill Anah. At the least, smuggle her to another location, though with us surrounding the property that would be more difficult.
This wasn’t a time for flamboyance or unnecessary risk. I worked through the layered protections with creeping, painstaking care.
“Mother,” I murmured, “my apologies for my contempt with your apparent lack of speed in response to crisis.”
How many times had I taken action around her, thinking her pace betrayed a lack of boldness?
Sometimes my actions had worked out, sometimes we’d had to clean up the mess.
Sometimes she corrected me after in her icy, disappointed fashion. Other times she’d said nothing—which was almost worse, as if she was consigning me to the particular Darkness of learning from my own mistakes.
I understood better now the consequences of moving too fast. For not considering all variables and choosing the wisest if not speediest course of action. Had I focused on security rather than seduction, we might not be at this juncture. I’d been distracted by shiny things. Clothing my bonded, jeweling her, feeding her, drowning her in an endless pool of desire. Had I taken Dartanyon more seriously?—
Another layer of protection dissipated—and then the golems rose.
CONSTIN
When the fuck had Dartanyon constructed golems? I hadn’t known the bastard even had the training. Issahelle was going to be pissed, and I was not in the mood for two decades of her actively foul mood. I could probably fuck some of it out of her, but she hadn’t invited me to her bed since I’d gone to Andrei’s. She didn’t like to share. Must be where the boy got his unreasonable possessiveness.
I ground my teeth, casting a brief gaze at Drei, who stood still and unflinching, incandescent gaze unfocused as he brought down the wards one layer at a time. He trusted us to guard him and Darkness be damned if I’d fail.
I kind of wished he’d at least move to a more defensible position but I didn’t waste my time asking; he wouldn’t budge.
Everything had changed with dizzying speed in a damned month ; typical of what happened when you were stupid enough to let mortals in your life. I’d tried to get him to walk away the minute he’d set eyes on her. I’d also known it was pointless. The Sahakian-Casakraine curse striking again.
Except Anah wasn’t a curse. A complication, a difficulty, a new thing to fear because she’d burrowed her way under my skin, so quickly I suspected sorcery.
Damn me if I was able to defend against it though. She took more than she gave, but that was a defensive reflex; she’d opened a little more of herself every day and truth be told, I approved her wariness.
Only an idiot would fling themselves headlong into the situation without thoroughly sampling the benefits—and the opposite—first.
I’d spent enough time in Earth realm to understand that if human females demanded more, up front, and were as willing as Anah to cut ties and walk away, they wouldn’t be so ill-treated.
Anah was a little brutal. But she’d need to be.
We formed around Drei, and I reminded myself again that I was supposed to be the example of rational thinking and measured emotions; I wanted to pound my fist against the barriers until they fell.
Which would get me nothing but a broken hand. Like it or not, the boy was stronger than me, so I did what I did best, protected and destroyed, projected calm confidence. The warriors believed it.
We fought.
“Theland is down!” Philea screamed in fury.
I was close enough to my own rut that I wanted to snarl at her to get off the field, but that would get me a swift kick to the balls—potentially lethal in the middle of a battle with fucking golems.
I was going to rend Dartanyon to itty bitty pieces and serve the quivering flesh to Issa’s swans. Eons ago Cassanians ate our enemies after battle. Well, maybe not eons. I understood the temptation now.
Hang on, Anah, we’re coming. Turn that infernal stubbornness to surviving.
I just hoped she was in the damn house, and this wasn’t a fucking decoy.