Chapter 33
Zadé
The sun was a finger-width lower in the sky as Tsara led Zadé to a tent in the middle of the elven camp outside the city.
There was a guard stationed at each corner, like they expected Elsan to cut his way out of the back canvas or something.
Even though there was no way Roland hadn’t disarmed him before tossing him in there.
But whatever. With the princess at her side, none of the guards would dare challenge Zadé.
She strode to the entrance with a confidence she didn’t have, but she’d been correct—the sentries didn’t bat an eye as she sauntered past. At a snap of Tsara’s fingers, they marched away.
There were benefits to being the general, and in the company of royalty, after all. Who would’ve thought?
Elsan was leaning against the pole in the middle of the tent, slumped over, his hands tied behind his back.
“Elessan!” Tsara breezed by Zadé, falling to her knees in front of him. Taking his arms, she shook him.
Valek. Whoever struck Elsan and knocked him out must’ve hit him hard. He’d be lucky not to end up permanently damaged like she’d been.
Circling him, Zadé bent and examined the knots securing his wrists. They were tight enough they were digging into his skin, turning his fingers purple. She rolled her eyes and sighed. One of the downsides of being so intimidating was people tended to go overboard with their restraints.
She worked the bindings loose, the fibers from the rough weave jabbing beneath her fingernails.
The ropes fell away. Elsan slumped forward. Princess Tsara caught him.
Working her way in a circle until she could see his face, Zadé pulled her hand back and slapped him across the cheek. “Elsan! Wake up!”
“Hey!” Tsara shoved her away.
Zadé tumbled to the ground as Elsan blinked. His gaze was unfocused as he stared into the distance. “Elsan!” She tapped his arm.
He turned his blurry eyes to her. “Zadé?” His forehead furrowed.
Blast it. She scooted around and brushed his hair away to examine at the lump on the back of his head. It was bigger than her thumb, and should be seen by a healer, but they didn’t have time. Bastard King Roland likely wouldn’t allow it, anyways.
“Shake it off, Elsan. It’s just a little head bump. Princess needs our help.”
“Princess?” His gaze swung between her and Tsara.
“Not her!” Zadé grabbed his chin and tilted his face so they were eye-to-eye. “Aliya! Brooks has her ‘n he’ll kill her if’n he figures out who she is!”
“Now, wait a minute.” Tsara spun on Zadé, her eyes flashing silver as her face contorted in rage. She ripped Zadé’s hand off Elsan’s arm and tried to push her away.
But Zadé had a lot more hand-to-hand combat experience than Tsara, and the move only made her muscles tense as an invisible vice clenched around her ribcage.
She was so done with spoiled royals who bullied their way into getting what they wanted, who didn’t understand the meaning of the word no or when to stand back and let the adults do the talking.
Keeping her weight low, Zadé spun on her heel, using the force of her turn to land a vicious backhand across Tsara’s cheek.
The other woman’s eyes went round, her hand going to her face as if she could press away the pain. Tsara’s jaw dropped. “How dare you!”
“Me?” Zadé stepped forward, jamming her finger into Tsara’s sternum hard enough to knock her on her ass.
“How dare you! I don’t know whatcha did ta convince yer father ta letcha marry Elsan here, but whatever it was, you’ve been nothin’ but vile since yer father’s arrived and I’m sick of it.
Yer gunna help me free Princess—” She caught herself.
“Aliya, ‘cuz that is the least yeh can do after the shit yeh’ve pulled here.”
Tsara blinked at her, jaw lax.
To her left, Elsan groaned as he lifted one hand to rub the back of his head. “Yes, Tsara, how did you manage to convince your father to agree to our union?” He raised his eyes to hers. “He made it clear when we first became friends he’d never entertain such a thing. So what changed?”
Tsara chewed the inside of her cheek, her eyes falling to the ground under the pressure of his scrutiny.
Shifting so she was between Tsara and the exit, Zadé pulled a dagger from her hip and twirled it in her fingers.
Dropping her voice, she murmured, “Yeh may as well tell us.” She met Elsan’s gaze for a heartbeat, enough to confirm he was on board, before continuing, “We’ll get it outta yeh one way or another.
” Threatening royalty wasn’t the smartest thing she could be doing, what with it being treason and all, but valek, they needed some answers.
Tsara’s throat bobbed as she glanced at Elsan. Her lips pinched tight as a pained expression crossed her face, complete with furrowed brows.
“If’n yer not careful,” Zadé said, “yer face’ll freeze and yeh’ll get perma-wrinkles a‘fore yer time.”
Tsara scrunched her nose and bared her teeth as she lunged at Zadé, her fingers hooked into claws as she reached for Zadé’s eyes.
Elsan was between them before Zadé could do more than roll to the side.
“Tsara, stop!” His tone was deep, the threat in it sending a shiver up Zadé’s spine. It’d been centuries since someone’d made her react like that.
Princess Tsara froze, her skin pale. “Elessan?” Her voice was thin and Zadé’s insides reveled in how it trembled.
“Answer the question.” If glares could kill, Elsan’s would’ve murdered Tsara a hundred times over. Wrapping his hand around her throat, he spun her until her back was against the pole he’d been tied to.
Tsara’s mouth flopped open and closed like a fish.
The muscles along Elsan’s jaw twitched.
After several heartbeats, the fight went out of Tsara with a sigh. Her shoulders dropped as her eyes found his feet. “I was going back through our genealogy for… reasons, and I stumbled across proof one of Roland’s ancestors was,” she swallowed, dropping her volume, “human.”
Zadé blinked. No way… She was so stunned, she forgot to slur her words. “Roland, the epitome of racial purity and whatnot, is a half-breed?” But his ears were so… pointy.
Tsara shifted. “Well, no. It’s far enough back in his lineage few would count it, but…it’s still there.”
Elessan raised an eyebrow and tilted his head. “So, what, you threatened to tell everyone he wasn’t a pure blood?” He shook his head. “No, it’d take more than that.”
Nodding, Tsara swallowed. “I told him I would expose him, and then I’d take his troops, leaving him to the mercy of his nobles.” Tsara’s voice was so small, it could’ve been a child’s.
Zadé pursed her lips as she chewed on that tidbit of info.
The army was loyal to Tsara, as was evident by their following her to rescue Princess—Aliya—from King Malkov, despite not having official orders to do so.
If Roland didn’t have the support of his military and guards, and they learned he was a half-breed like her, his advisors would turn against him and throw him out like the trash he was.
The aristocracy might not want Tsara in charge, but with the full might of the elven forces at her back, she’d easily hold on to power while her father lost everything he held dear.
“Smart plan,” Zadé said, nodding. It reminded her of something she’d have concocted, back before she’d been hit on the head. The elven gentry were experts at manipulating others to get what they wanted.
“And you used that to get him to agree to let you marry me?” Elessan’s words were strained, as if he didn’t believe what he was hearing.
“Of course,” Tsara said, turning the full intensity of her gaze on him. “I love you.”
He shook his head. “No, you don’t. There’s never been anything beyond friendship between us.
” Holding up his hand when she opened her mouth to object, he continued, “If you love someone, you don’t coerce them into doing things they don’t want to do.
You don’t force them to marry you. That’s not love. ” His face hardened. “It’s obsession.”
“It can be both!”
“No.” He sliced one hand through the air. “It can’t. Obsession pollutes everything it touches, twists it until it becomes the antithesis of love.”
Zadé raised an eyebrow, wishing for all the world she could read Elsan’s mind right then. His blank expression gave her no clue what he was thinking.
Pushing his arm away, Tsara twisted to her left, trying to break his grip on her throat.
Zadé lunged, hands scrabbling at the princess’ shoulders to hold her in place. Her fingers caught on the fine golden chain Tsara wore around her neck, wrenching it free.
A flash of light lit up the tent as a jolt of static raced over Zadé’s skin, flinging her to her back.
Tsara froze, her eyes wide as she stared at the delicate woven string in Zadé’s hand.
Her silver eyes… The same quicksilver shade as Aliya’s.
Zadé’s jaw went slack. “You’re a shapeshifter!” If they weren’t careful, everybody would be changing shape, and they wouldn’t be able to trust that anyone was who they said they were.
“No.” Elessan’s face went a sickly green. “What have you done with Tsara?” He picked up Zadé’s dagger which she’d dropped at some point during their interrogation and pressed the sharpened edge beneath the shapeshifter’s chin.
The imposter’s eyes hardened as she glared at Elsan. “Disposed of her.”
“When!”
“When do you think? As soon as Roland arrived.”
Zadé’s knees went weak. “How, exactly, didja do that? Is she still alive?” That was a foolish question. Of course, she wasn’t. It would take too much effort and be too risky to keep her as such, but still, she had to hope.
Shapeshifter Tsara’s upper lip curled. “You think I have the time and energy to babysit a captive?” She snorted. “Her body’s buried in the middle of the forest outside town.”
Zadé’s gut clenched, and she fell to her knees. Until this whole Elsan marriage kerfluffle, she’d never had a problem with Princess Tsara. To find she’d been murdered and dumped in a shallow unmarked grave was just… She shuddered.
Elsan’s jaw had turned rock hard. It was amazing he didn’t crack a molar or something.
He drew the tip of the blade down the shapeshifter’s neck.
“What will happen, do you think, if I slit your throat?” he asked, his tone darker than Zadé had ever heard before.
“Will you die looking like you do, or revert to your natural form?”
Zadé’s brow wrinkled. She’d had no idea shifters came with their own shape. Now she’d have to ask Princess what she really looked like. After they rescued her from Brooks, of course.
Tsara’s quicksilver eyes flashed. “What do you know about it, single-skin?”
“Not as much as I’d like to,” he muttered, his words dark. The muscles in his arms tensed.
“Wait!” Zadé yelled, lunging forward as the blade pierced the shapeshifter’s flesh.
Elsan froze, whirling on her. “What?”
Zadé turned to stare into the odd eyes that were so similar, yet so different from the real Tsara’s. “Why?”
A trickle of red wound its way down the shifter’s throat. “Why what?”
“Why’d yeh do it? Why take her place? Why manipulate yer way inta marrying Elsan? Surely there were easier ways to get whatever you were after?” Her eyes flicked to him, then back to their captive. “No offense, Elsan.”
He lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “None taken.”
“Yeh knew there’re others of yer kind here. They’d have given yeh what yeh wanted, within their ability and reason.” Princess was too big-hearted that way.
Tsara bared fangs that were longer and sharper than any fae’s had the right to be.
“You mean the human’s so-called queen?” She barked a laugh.
“She’s so deep under Shadow’s thumb, she can’t see the world beneath her nose.
Besides, any power she’s managed to cling to is slipping away. She’ll be lucky to survive the day.”
Elsan went still, as if he’d forgotten about Aliya’s imminent danger. His eyes flicked to Zadé. “Did you get all the info you need?”
Swallowing, Zadé nodded.
The shifter’s eyes bulged as his blade slashed across her throat.
Zadé watched with slack jaw as the body fell.
It morphed into a gelatinous blob of phosphorescent goop.
She inhaled, fighting the urge to step forward to investigate in case it was contagious or toxic.
A few heartbeats later, it lost cohesion and collapsed into a puddle of water which drained into the grass beneath their feet.
Zadé blinked like an idiot as she stared at the spot where Tsara had been seconds before. That explained why she’d never heard of a shapeshifter corpse, and likely why the world knew so little about them.
“Well, I suppose that answers that,” Elsan said, wiping the blade on the ground. Suddenly, he hissed, dropping his dagger as he clutched his arm to his chest. A red light flashed around him, leaving after-images glowing in Zadé’s vision.
Shaking his hand, he traced the faded scar on the skin of his palm for several heartbeats. With a grunt, he got to his feet.
“What?” Zadé grabbed his upper arm to steady him. “Yeh alright?”
Closing his eyes, he nodded. “I have a headache that could end worlds, and just found out my childhood best friend is dead. And I think that, somehow, I just fulfilled the first half of my blood vow… with my wife gone, I suppose that leaves me as next in line for Roland’s throne as he has no other heirs. Otherwise, I’m fine.”
Zadé wrinkled her forehead. She couldn’t quite tell if he was being sarcastic or not.
Now was probably not the appropriate time to ask what that nonsense about a blood vow was, or how he thought Roland would react to the news.
Accepting the dagger Elsan held out to her, she slid it back into the sheath at her waist. “Well, suppose we should getcha armed?”
He nodded. “What’s your plan?”
Zadé’s eyes sparkled as she leaned close. “We’re gunna get our hands on a Whisperer, then use it on Brooks ’n his friends.”