House of Flame and Shadow (Crescent City, #3)

Sathia’s gaze simmered. An unbroken female, despite the life she’d led. “I was hoping for a Fae Queen. Someone who might change things for the better.”

“Well, you got me instead,” Bryce said, and continued into the dark, fingers curling at her sides. Maybe she’d use her laser power to wipe these carvings from the walls. As easily as Rigelus had shattered the statues in the Eternal Palace. Maybe she’d send out a blast of her light so vicious it would obliterate all the hissing ghouls around them. “The Fae dug their own graves. They can lie in them.”

Sathia let it drop.

Hunt fell into step beside Bryce, putting a hand on her shoulder as if to offer his support, but she could have sworn that even her mate was disappointed in her.

Whatever. If they wanted to preserve a long, fucked-up line of Fae tyrants, that was on them.



* * *



Flynn and Dec abandoned Ruhn the moment they called it quits at the archives, leaving him and Lidia to share a painfully quiet meal in the castle’s empty dining room.

There was so much he wanted to ask her, to talk to her about, to know. He couldn’t find the words. So he ate, fork unbearably loud against his plate, each bite like crunching glass. And when they finished, they walked back to their rooms in silence, each step echoing in the hallway, loud as a thunderclap.

But before they parted ways, as Ruhn was about to enter his room, he blurted, “You think my sister’s okay?”

“You’re the one who’s been in the Cave of Princes,” Lidia said, but turned toward him. “You tell me.”

He shook his head. “Honestly, I don’t know. Bryce has got a lot of shit going on right now. Those caves are confusing on a good day. If you’re not focused, they can be deadly.”

Lidia crossed her arms. “Well, I have faith that between her, Athalar, and Baxian, your sister will be fine.”

“Tharion will be insulted.”

“I don’t know Ketos well enough as a warrior to judge him.”

“Ithan Holstrom calls him Captain Whatever, but I think it’s selling him a bit short. Tharion’s a badass when he feels like it.”

She smiled, and damn if it didn’t do funny things to Ruhn’s chest. She said again, “Your sister will be fine.”

He nodded, blowing out a breath. “Do you and Hypaxia have any contact?”

“No. Not since the ball.”

His mouth moved before he could think through his next question. “That night … were you ever going to meet me in the garden?”

Surprise flickered in her eyes, then vanished. Her mouth pursed, like she was debating her answer. “The Harpy got there before I did,” she said finally.

He stepped toward her, the hall suddenly too small. “But were you going to show up like we’d planned?”

“Does it matter?”

He dared another step. He hadn’t realized how her hips swelled so invitingly before dipping to her waist.

His hands curled, and he hated himself for the punch of lust that went through him, nearly knocking the breath from his lungs. He wanted her. Wanted her naked and under him and moaning his name, wanted her to tell him everything, and wanted … wanted his friend back. The friend he could speak honestly to, who knew things about him that no one else knew.

He took one more step, and he could see her trembling. With fear or restraint, he had no idea.

“Lidia,” he murmured, in front of her at last, and she closed her eyes, the pulse in her throat fluttering.

Her scent shifted—like flowers unfurling under the morning sun. That scent was pure arousal. His cock tightened painfully.

He didn’t care that they were in the middle of a hallway with his awful cousins running amok. He slid a hand onto her waist, nearly groaning at the steep curve, the way it fit his hand perfectly.

She kept her eyes closed, her pulse still flickering. So he took his other hand and tilted her head to the side. Leaned down and brushed his mouth over that fluttering spot.

Her breathing hitched, and his eyes nearly rolled back in his head. She tasted … fuck. He needed more. His teeth grazed the soft skin of her throat, and his tongue skimmed along the space just under her ear. His cock throbbed in answer.

Her body loosened, pliant in his hands, and her head tipped a little further to the side. An invitation. He licked up the column of her throat, hand drifting from her waist down to her ass—

She stiffened. Pulled away.

Like she’d caught herself. Remembered who she was. Who he was.

He stood there like a fucking moron, panting slightly, cock fully hard and straining against his pants, and she just … stared at him. Wide-eyed.

“I …” He had no idea what to say. What to do.

His head swam. This female had so much blood on her hands, yet—

“Good night,” he rasped, and turned to his own room before he could make a greater fool of himself.

She didn’t stop him.





54


Bryce lay on the hard, cold ground and tried to pretend she was back in her bed, that a rock wasn’t poking into her hip bone, that her arm was the most comfortable pillow—

From Sathia’s tossing and turning nearby, she knew the female was having the same amount of success getting settled for the night.

Hunt had fallen asleep right away, his deep breathing now a gentle rhythm that she tried to focus on, to lure her to sleep. She supposed his warrior days had made him used to rougher conditions, but … no. She didn’t want to think about all the things Hunt had endured so that sleeping on this unforgiving surface was easy for him. Especially when the misplaced guilt from so many of those things was now clearly eating him alive.

It had been easier in the Fae world, as exhaustion had been riding her so hard that she’d had no choice but to pass out. But here, even well protected by Baxian on watch, sleep remained elusive.

Bryce flipped onto her back, her starlight shifting with her, broadcasting every one of her movements like a lighthouse beacon. Fuck, how she’d sleep with that blazing in her eyes—

She stared miserably up at the ceiling, carved here to resemble the branches of a forest. Beautiful, remarkable work that had never been documented, never been revealed to the world at large. Only to the few Fae royal males who’d sought the Starsword.

That blade was currently lying to her left, a thrumming, pulsing presence made worse by Truth-Teller on her right, which pulsed in a counter-beat. Like the blades were talking.

Just fucking great. It was a regular old sleepover here. Bryce ignored the chattering blades as best she could, focusing instead on the caves, the carvings.

Females had never been allowed in here. Now two Fae females had entered. She hoped all the long-dead princes buried in the caves were thrashing in their sarcophagi.

Such fear of females—such hatred. Why? Because of Theia? Pelias had been the one to found the Starborn line here on Midgard. Had all the bans and restrictions stemmed from his fear of someone like her rising again?

Bryce supposed scholars and activists had spent centuries researching and debating it, so the likelihood of finding an answer herself, even knowing the truth about Theia, was slim to none. It didn’t make it any easier to swallow, though.

So she curled on her side, gazing at the carved river of stars that her starlight illuminated. The river of her lineage, meant to last through the millennia. Her bloodline, in its literal, starry form. Her bloodline, running straight through these caves. An inheritance of cruelty and pain.

She wished Danika were with her. If there was one person who might have understood the complexity of such a fucked-up inheritance, of having the future of a people weighing on her, it would have been Danika.

Danika, who’d wanted more for this world, for Bryce.

Light it up.

But maybe the Fae and their bloodline didn’t deserve Bryce’s light. Maybe they deserved to fall forever into darkness.



* * *