He smiled and nodded, before sliding into the booth next to me. Zahruk stood at my right with a guarded look in his eyes, which was doing little to ease the uneasiness I felt with in this group’s presence. Dristan was standing across the club, observing, and I wasn’t stupid. They were here to guard and protect me in Ryder’s absence.
“There are a few things I would like to discuss with you, if that is permissible?” Dark King asked gently.
“Okay,” I replied, straightening in my seat.
“Ryder said that he believes you might be the Light Heir. Do you understand what that would entail?”
“That I stand to rule the Light Fae, which won't happen.” I was so going to strangle Ryder for going against my wishes. If he reached out to the Light Fae too, there was gonna be some fried Fairy for dinner tonight.
“You think it would be so easy to just say no?” he countered, folding his massive hands on the table in front of him.
“No, but the current Queen is healthy, as is her King. I see no reason why I would be forced to claim the crown. They abandoned me. Oh, yeah—I heard the stories when I was in the Guild, that the Light Princess was stolen, but I don’t believe it. If I am her, they got rid of me because I'm more than likely illegitimate, since they have quite a few children they kept, and, personally, I'm okay with that.”
“Your mother has been known to be unfaithful, and her king also has a wild streak.” He nodded as if it was nothing new.
“The Light Fae are not a faithful caste. They think that they’re above tradition and above any other caste of Fae for that matter. To put it bluntly, they are self-absorbed asshats.”
He smiled and nodded, before looking past me to Adam. “I see why you like her, my son. She is blunt and doesn't play with words. Straight to the point, and doesn’t beat the bushes.”
Adam smiled and grabbed my hand softly. I beamed at him and noticed something was missing in his eyes. He was the same Adam I'd grown up with, but he'd lost the innocence he'd had. Maybe we all had after losing Larissa. I prayed that he would be able to come back from this. I missed my wisecracking best friend.
“If I may, I'd like to explain some of our traditions, politics, and a bit of history so you can better understand my true purpose here today. I am not sure how much you have learned from Ryder and his men over the past few weeks; however, Adam has been going through an intense crash course in everything he missed out on since he has been gone. If our speculations are correct, it is important to bring you as up to speed as fast as we can.” The Dark King took a deep breath before he continued. “Synthia, if you are the Light Heir, it stands to reason that you’ll gain the crown. Normally, children of royal families in Faery are betrothed early in life, and some even before birth.”
I nodded.
“I believe you met Adam, and he became your familiar, at one of the Harvest Festivals. It's a huge celebration held on Samhain where truce is declared, and all castes of Fae come together for a few days to celebrate the birth of new children, riches, and other developing things such as strength of a realm. At least it makes sense that you and my Adam became linked there, based on everything I have heard about you and your history.”
“Why would she take me there if she planned on ditching me?” I interrupted, pointing out the obvious.
“I don’t think your mother did. She has many children. I think she wouldn’t have cared who the father was, but I do think if the Light Heir was birthed of another caste, the Light King would have wanted you gone immediately. You see, an Heir is first identified when a Fae child of royal birth begins using magic at a very early age, usually under the age of one. Most Fae children do not begin showing magic until they are older, about ten or so. You can feel the magic’s presence within Fae children, but they are unable to use it until they are a little older. She may have intended to keep you, as she has done with her other illegitimate children, until you showed signs of being the Heir. Once that happened, they would have wanted your death at the first opportunity. Placing you in a human setting would have assured that you would perish without having the blood of their child on their hands. Or it should have; but the people who raised you, took certain steps to keep you thriving, which the Light King couldn’t have counted on. I think when he found out you hadn't died, he sent those Fae in to kill you.”
The hair on the back of my neck stood up. “Because another heir wouldn't be born until I was dead.”
He smiled. “Smart as well. Impressive. Not many born outside of our world would have put that together.”
“I've spent a large part of my life learning anything I could to kill those who killed my parents.”
“I don’t blame you for that. I do blame the Light King, as his actions stole Adam from us as well. He disappeared from his bedroom one night—one minute he was there, and the next he was gone. The pain you felt had to have been tremendous for you to take him. It breached the barrier of Faery to bring him to you, and could have killed him at that age. It would be easy to blame you, but you were no more than an infant yourself at the time.”