Chapter 27
MAX
The palace is silent when I return, the sun high above. The birds chirp and frogs croak in the woods. Dropping from the saddle, I pace between two oaks, trying to still my heart. And my nerves.
Returning to the castle is foolish. But what is logic when faced with the reality of losing the only person you’ve ever loved?
A branch breaks behind me and a pounding heart echoes in my ears. The Hadeon appears, three heads looking at me with guarded expressions.
“Now you come,” I mutter, going back to pacing. “You know, for a protector, you’re not exactly the most diligent. How often have you stalked away or left me to fight off trouble? Aren’t you supposed to have my back or lay down your life for mine?”
One set of eyes blinks at me while another head lets out a yawn. Clearly, he doesn’t care.
“Where were you when Kaden was bonded to Aoife, hm?” It’s stupid to ask. The Hadeon’s loyalty is to me. But it feels good to shout. “What about when I was put in the dungeon? Either time?”
He sits, quietly judging me. I hate it.
“I could’ve used you. What task do you have here if not to protect me?”
As I say it, I know there is something else. He watched the tunnel for Wulf’s grandfather, stopping trouble from getting to the village. I doubt he left his post to settle disagreements or duels.
“Why are you here?” I collapse into the grass, the mud soaking my knees. “What purpose do you bring? Is it to mock me?” A head bumps my shoulder and I exhale loudly.
“You’re here because I’m going to do something stupid, aren’t you?” One head licks me, the tongue like sandpaper and gravel. “But you won’t stop me. I assume because the Gods would love to see me exhibit that free will they imbued us with.”
He huffs. He knows it’s a joke. Free will compared to Gods’ Will doesn’t stand a chance.
Whatever I’m to do, was decreed long before I was a speckle of dust of Neevea. The Hadeon knows this. That’s why he’s here, patient, waiting for me to do what I must.
“I can’t kill him.” Forget that it would end my life—it would kill Kaden.
He stares at me. No judgement in any of his eyes, just quiet reserve.
“No, I don’t have a plan.” I don’t. I thought one would come to me on the ride back. Instead, my mind is blank and my heart aches something fierce. “If I did, I wouldn’t be out here, hiding in the shadows, speaking to you.”
The spell book gave us the only clue. Only someone pure can end it. I saw how it ends in the ritual. I don’t have any other choice.
No. I refuse to believe that. I can rely on the one thing that helped break the curse the first time—true love. I have a strong feeling that everything else was not needed.
Love will have to be enough again.
Standing, I brush my hands over my pants and feel for the daggers on my hips. It’s too bright to walk across the field, but the trees wrap around the Veridian Palace like it was made from the natural boundary. I glance around.
I can easily enter from the side.
With the Hadeon at my side, I slink through a servant’s entrance at the far back corner. Weaving through halls and spare rooms, I make my way to the center hall. I know I’ll be recognized, so I wait behind a tapestry until night falls.
It’s a tight fit with the Hadeon on my feet, but I force myself to be patient. I count the tiles overhead, listen to the gossip of maid passing by. I ignore the grumbling of my stomach, too sick to actually think about eating.
When the moon rises, I slip out and walk to the upper floors. I listen for steps and dart into rooms to avoid detection when some come too close. The beast at my side is quiet, keeping in line with my movements. Once we’re higher up, I try to figure out the layout of the palace.
If Kaden is here, where would Aoife put him?
Revulsion sweeps through me even as I know it’s true. Her bedroom.
It takes three wrong turns and an entirely different floor before I’m on the right level for Aoife’s room. I’ve never been here, but all royals keep the ruler in the same spot—high above, away from the trouble down below with an eye over all the kingdom.
It doesn’t take long to find it. It lacks guards, but the doors are bigger than the rest, with red and purple gems melted into the frame. The gold doors are carved with the faintest lines of clouds, blue stones set into their surface to resemble the sky.
Swallowing, I push inside, the Hadeon keeping close.
The cloying scent of roses surround me and I gag. It’s overpowering and horrible. I can taste it on my tongue. Across the room is a large bed made of gold, with cream linen draped across it. It looks slept in.
Bile wets my tongue and I gulp. Now’s not the time to throw up.
I’ll draw out Aoife’s death for this.
I check the entire room—behind the curtains, through the washroom, everywhere for Kaden. But no one is here and worry gnaws at my gut like a vicious panther. If he’s not here, where can he be?
The Hadeon stands at alert, looking to the door. I only have a moment to turn as it opens and the scent of roses deepens.
Aoife comes in—but it’s not the Aoife I know.
Gone is the pale hair, now long and dark as sin. Her eyes, no longer green, are black jade, and just as cold. Revulsion strikes me. She and my father have the same eyes.
Dressed in a tight black gown of silk and satin, she strides inside, tripping over her feet when she sees me standing there. Can’t say I don’t enjoy that.
I’m out in the open, and without protection. Not the best plan, but worth it for her face.
“You.” She seethes. Her wings unfurl, beautiful things that make me think of butterflies in the height of summer. My father’s wings are dark and tragic, whereas Aoife’s wings are bright with bold slashes of orange, yellows, and strips of black. “How did you get in here?”
She advances but the Hadeon blocks her with a hard growl that seems to shake the room. Aoife jerks back, glaring at the beast.
“Filthy mutt.”
The smoke he blows tells me he didn’t appreciate the insult.
“Where’s Kaden?”
She sneers, turning away, walking to a cart full of various liquids. The different glass containers are bright—red, greens, purples. She pours some of the purple into a glass, ignoring me.
“Aoife.”
“Around.” She rolls her eyes. “You’ll see him soon enough.”
Pulling my daggers, I point one in her direction. “I know what you did to him.” She scoffs and I keep pushing. “You couldn’t use a love spell on him. Not when he’s bonded to me. So, you forced a bond on him. You tried to get rid of ours in order to have him, didn’t you?”
“My, aren’t you a clever one?” She toasts me.
“I know why Kaden was attracted to you. Sure, with those lips and legs you’re a tasty piece of meat.
But that brain? That’s what he fell for.
” She slams the cup down, the glass shattering in her small hand.
It cuts her but she ignores the blood. “I let him have his fun. Let him play with all those other courtesans, those servants, and peasants. Let him court whoever he wanted. I knew in the end he’d be mine. ”
“Then Sose came into the picture.”
She stalks over to me and I back up, the Hadeon still a protective shield. “Fenrir told us. You sent him to sway her away.”
Aoife snorts. “She was too gentle for my Kaden.”
“My Kaden,” I correct, glaring. “Mine.”
Running her tongue over her teeth, she paces to the left.
“She would’ve never loved him. Not all of him.
And if she had?” She shrugs, crossing her arms. “He’d marry her.
Just because she loved him—no matter if he felt the same.
That Fae has always been looking for someone to love him unconditionally, he’d marry just about anyone. ”
I swallow the lump in my throat. Kaden only wanted someone to love him—all of him. Darkness and all.
I do. All of him. I refuse to let him feel alone.
“She wouldn’t have been able to break the curse,” I remind her. “She was innocent.”
“No,” she snaps, tilting her head. Her wings flap angrily. “But you did. Tell me, blood summoner, how you did that?”
I don’t answer. The silence gets louder with each heartbeat and she break, shouting, “Who are you?!”
It’s Effy from the In-Between. The Fairy who tried to rip my heart out of my chest, who demanded to know who I was. Because how could I, someone so simple, break her curse that ravaged an entire family?
I lift my chin and smile. It’s the first smile I’ve had in days.
“My father is Baris, the High Priest of Seti,” I whisper, voice raw. “My mother was Thea, the High Priestess of Enyo, Matriarch of the Blut Coven.”
The light dims in her eyes.
“You sent Griffin to kill me when I was a child, thinking I wouldn’t ever be able to break the curse. How did you know it was me?”
Eyes wide, the queen steps back, shocked. She starts to peer at me carefully, taking in my face, the curve of my eyebrows, the end of my nose, the shape of my lips. She inhales, hand to her chest, and clears her throat.
Her pale skin turns green.
“To be fair,” she says, words jumbled, “it wasn’t personal.”
“Everything you’ve done is personal!” The Hadeon growls in warning. “Tell me how you knew.” How did she know about me, if Neith’s curse erased all magic?
“I never forgot,” she whispers, tapping her skull. “Fairies are unique, as I’m sure you know. A simple Witch curse wasn’t going to affect me, but it did everyone else. I changed tactics, used the Humans to destroy and conquer for greed instead of magic.”
She places her hands on her hips. “It was frustrating, knowing what I did and no one else. I sent the Humans out to cause havoc, and to find a blood summoner, the child of life and death.”
“You knew of the prophecy, how?”