I said, “He’s just doing what you should have been willing to do.”
Jaik looked as if I’d just slapped him. “Honor has no idea what she’s done. But Caldren should understand.”
Jaik normally was so cool, but now he looked deeply shaken and it made me doubt myself.
I told him quietly, “Caldren knows how dangerous it is out there for royal girls. Alina is a wolf shifter. I have a feeling she can hold her own more than you realize and Honor isn’t exactly helpless either.”
I knew I shouldn’t defend my own honor, but, well, it’s hard. Especially when it is, after all, literally your Honor.
“Maybe she’s not helpless,” Jaik gritted. “But she is mine.”
Pain rippled across his face, before it resolved into its usual stoic expression. “Or so I thought.”
“Teris, please.” Lynx looked at Teris in genuine alarm and a ripple of unease raced through my body, wondering if I had done all the wrong thing when I was trying to help. Cal and Lucien and Alina together should be a good team; the royals were just too arrogant to realize.
“I don’t think you’re giving them enough credit,” I said.
Teris shook his head. “You know that the enchantments to tell the truth can be easily beaten with practice, by taking the potion.”
“I don’t know where they’re going. I told them not to tell me anything.” It was the truth. I hadn’t wanted to know where they were going when I was sure that I would face some kind of torture or potion.
Branok snarled at me and it was worse than Pend’s terrifying face. I’d come to like Branok lately and seeing him and Lynx hate me much as they had before was devastating.
Pend ordered coldly, “Find the girls. Bring them back.”
I knew that Pend had to have some terrible dark plan but for now I was alive. That was more than I initially expected when I faced the elder royals.
“What are we going to do with him?” Branok gestured at me. “Lucien is just likely to betray us yet again.”
“I didn’t betray you,” I said hotly. “You betrayed your sister. I was just trying to correct the injustice.”
Jaik grabbed Branok before he got to me again.
“If I don’t get my daughter back, Lucien, I’ll see you swing,” Joachim promised. “You are unworthy.”
And there it was. Would my friends let me die for my sins, if they thought that I’d hurt Alina?
Maybe this was how the Olds finally got rid of me.
Chapter
Fifty-Four
Honor
There was no dungeon in Alina’s tower, but I was pretty sure Lucien would’ve been thrown into one if it had been possible.
“We’ve got to get to the girls,” Jaik said tautly. “Arren, take Talisyn as backup and bring Lucien back to the house. Keep him under guard. I don’t trust…”
He trailed off, shaking his head curtly. “I don’t trust Honor not to double back to rescue him. Or Cal not to help her, just to piss me off.”
“I think you overestimate how important you are in other people’s plans,” I told Jaik reassuringly. “Pissing you off didn’t making it onto anyone’s priority list. It’s just a fun bonus when it happens!”
Arren had already grabbed my arm, which was the only thing that saved me as Jaik suddenly lashed out and kicked my legs out from underneath me. I slammed to my knees in front of him, looking up at his proud, handsome face.
“I’ll never understand what a woman like Honor sees in a petty, smart-mouthed, reckless fool like you,” Jaik said.
Then Jaik and the others launched themselves upward. Joachim lingered last, watching me with a hard look in his gaze as if he might just disregard Pend and murder me now, before he too turned into a dragon and rose into the air.
“What the fuck were you thinking?” Talisyn demanded.
“There’s no point in talking to Lucien,” Arren said. He’d seemed to soften toward Lucien lately—as much as Arren ever softened—but now he was back to his usual dickish self.
Arren transformed into a dragon and grabbed me in his clutches, his talons curling against my side as they might sink murderously deep.
The two of us soared into the sky, and the earth lurched sickeningly beneath us.
Chapter
Fifty-Five
Honor
As soon as Arren dragged me into the den, Talisyn burst in behind us.
“Honor,” Talisyn said urgently, looking as if he wanted to shake me. “You have to stop lying about who you are!”
I strained to break through Teris’s magical grip, but I couldn’t.
“You’re going to die!” Talisyn grabbed my shoulders. “What could possibly be worth all this!”
How was it possible that my men didn’t know about Teris’s ability to keep a grip on our minds? Had the Olds hoarded spells like they hoarded everything else?
“I don’t want to die,” I managed. “But Honor ran away with Alina. Alina had to escape Joachim, you have to understand that…”
“Shut up!” Arren snarled.
It was the most furious I’d ever seen him. Even Talisyn looked worried, and silence fell across the room.
Talisyn rubbed his hand across his forehead. “Arren, I don’t know how to convince you. You should be able to see Honor, whatever form she’s in. I know you love her too.”
Arren stared at him. “I don’t.”
Talisyn let out a sharp, bitter bark of a laugh. “You’re always so blind, my friend.”
“Shut up,” Arren warned. “We can always interrogate Lucien the old-fashioned way, if you’re so determined to find answers.”
Talisyn rolled his eyes and fell silent, perching on the edge of the sofa. His gaze met mine, his face worried, and I could tell he and I were searching for a way out just as desperately.
Branok entered the room, his every move taut with fury. Lynx and Jaik followed a heartbeat later, Lynx looking worried as if he might have to hold Branok back.
“I’m done with this.” Branok grabbed my shoulders and slammed me down into a chair. “I want answers, Lucien.”
That cruel gleam was back in his gaze. He hated me all over again.
“I don’t have any answers,” I said lightly, leaning back in the chair, looking as relaxed as I possibly could when inside, I was screaming.
Why didn’t they figure this out?
Talisyn looked around, raking his hands through his hair. “Lucien is Honor! What the hell is wrong with you all? Don’t you know her?”
“Honor ran with Alina the second she had the chance,” Branok growled. “Hoping to be with Lucien. She was lying all the time about who she wanted.” Branok glanced at Jaik. “It was never you, Jaik.”
Jaik had that deep fear of being abandoned. He thought Caldron had rejected him and that fear was his weakness now. Jaik studied me coldly, and my heart sank. He wouldn’t protect Lucien, not now.