“Stopped at home on my way here, and the runners saw me. They knew I was heading here, so they gave me the girl to deliver to you. Said you’d asked everyone to keep an eye on her activities. Apparently, she was seen in the market on a day she doesn’t usually go, and she only went to the bookshop. One of our men applied some pressure to Rahel and learned that the princess had ordered a copy of the Book of the Fae weeks ago. This girl was picking it up for her today.”
“And did you deliver it to her?” Teague asked Cleo, his voice deadly calm even while anger boiled within.
“No,” she said with conviction, but her voice shook.
Teague wrapped his hand around her throat, feeling the rapid-bird flutter of her pulse against his skin. All births were recorded in the Leabhar na Fae. Its spelled pages automatically added births, deaths, marriages, and binding magical contracts to its pages as they happened. Only the Summer Queen and the Winter King were supposed to have copies—a safeguard to keep their subjects both loyal and safe—but there’d been talk of a third book. One that had been illegally made to magically update the births and deaths of the fae just like the original pair and had then been smuggled off Llorenyae.
The chances of the princess finding a way to use the book against him were slim, but that did nothing to stem his fury.
Leaning close, he bit off his words and spat them at Cleo. “Did you deliver it to her?”
She swallowed hard and shook her head, but it didn’t matter. She’d seen the book. She knew it was a tool to be used against him. She had to be disposed of.
And so did the princess.
His hands shook with rage as he threw Cleo to the ground. “Make her suffer,” he said to Jacob as he turned on his heel to go fetch the traitorous princess from her bed.
He’d warned her to do as she was told.
He’d break the princess, finish using her brother, take the throne, and then kill them both with such spectacular cruelty their demise would be the legend he built his kingship upon.
FORTY
ARI WOKE WITH a start, her ears straining to capture the whisper of sound that had torn her from her slumber. She was lying on her side facing her window. Clear, cold starlight drifted in past the sheer drapes and bathed the floor in silver.
She shivered and pulled the covers up around her shoulders. She was still jumpy from her conversation with Teague earlier. From the knowledge that he’d carved his pipe from the bone of the friend who’d betrayed him.
The one who’d learned how to get out of her contract.
The whisper came again, and Ari froze, her heart thundering painfully in her chest.
That wasn’t a whisper.
That was her wall breathing.
She rolled to face the doorway, certain she would find a twig reaching for her. Instead, Teague stood beside her bed, his golden eyes glaring, his lips peeled back in a terrible parody of a smile.
“What are you—”
He snatched her hair and yanked her out of bed.
“You’re hurting me!”
He leaned close. “I’m trying to.”
Her throat closed at the wild light of rage in his eyes. What had happened to put him in such a dangerous mood? Was he still drunk on fae wine? Had Thad decided he could no longer stand back and allow Teague to behave as he pleased without the interference of the city guard?
Her stomach pitched—a slow, sickening roll. Stars, he’d found the book or the bloodflower poison, and he was going to take her soul.
“What’s going on?” Her voice was tight with pain as he pulled mercilessly on her hair to guide her out of her bedroom. She stumbled at the top of the stairs, and he let go of her hair to grab her arm instead.
“I’m keeping my promises, Princess,” he said, pushing her to take the stairs faster. “That’s what I do.”
“I don’t understand,” she said, though she was terrified she did.
Why hadn’t he just said the final word to rip her soul out of her body? Maybe because he didn’t want the hassle of cleaning up her dead body afterward. Maybe because he wanted her to see the evidence of her crimes against him—the fact that she hadn’t stopped looking for a way to kill him even though he’d warned her of the consequences.
Or, stars, maybe he wanted to do it in front of Thad and Cleo. In front of Sebastian. Her entire body shook as they reached the hall and began moving toward the front door.
He wanted to kill her in front of those who would hurt the most over her death. An object lesson to keep them in line. Isn’t that what he’d promised?
“Go outside,” he snapped when she hesitated in the entryway.
She risked a quick glance at his face and then reached for the doorknob as the sharp crack of a whip stung the air. A girl’s voice cried out, and Ari’s breath left her body in a little sob.
She knew that voice.
Her palms, slick with fear sweat, slid off the knob when she tried to turn it. She scrubbed trembling fingers against her nightdress, grabbed the knob, and wrenched the door open.
A man who looked like an older version of Sebastian stood on the steps, a whip in his hand. Cleo lay shuddering on the porch, her dress torn to ribbons, blood streaming from the lashes on her back. Her eyes were closed.
“Cleo!” Ari lunged forward and dropped to her knees beside her friend. “You’re all right. You’re all right.” She wiped hair off Cleo’s face and cursed as her fingers came away bloody from a gash that had sliced through Cleo’s skin from her forehead to her jaw.
Teague laughed. “She’s hardly all right, Princess.” He crouched to look Ari in the face. “Didn’t I promise you that if I caught you interfering with me again, she’d pay the price?”
Bright, hot panic blossomed in her chest and spilled into her veins. “I didn’t interfere. You went to the trade summit. You signed contracts. You have—”
“I have a girl who fetched a copy of Leabhar na Fae for her good friend the princess.” Rage cracked the polished marble of his voice. “And a princess who thought she could hide her treachery from me. Did you really believe you could get your brother and yourself out of what you owe me? I am as close to invincible as any fae who has ever lived, and you are a liar who is going to get what you deserve.”
It was over. He knew about the book. Probably knew about the poison too. That’s why he’d killed Edwin, only he hadn’t been worried enough to track it down because he was too old for iron and bloodflower poison to kill him.
She couldn’t save her brother, her kingdom, or herself.
All that was left was to save Cleo.
“She was only involved because of me,” Ari said. Tears filled her eyes. “Please, you’ve hurt her enough. She doesn’t deserve your anger. I do.”
Teague gave the man a quick nod, and the whip whistled through the air and bit into Cleo’s exposed back. Cleo moaned and whispered, “Help me, Ari.”
Ari whirled to face the man and screamed, “Stop! You’re killing her.”
His lip curled into a sneer. “She deserves it.”
“No.” Ari turned back to Teague, her tone beseeching. “She doesn’t deserve this. Please. You’ve made your point. I’ll give you the book and the poison. You win. You don’t have to kill her.”
His eyes, full of unblinking malice, met hers. “Don’t I?”