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Even the glamour when we rode through Sthiara made more sense.

Because they all knew the truth. Even the Banshee on the road into town had known it, had scented him on me. I was the only person in Faerie who didn’t know that he was the High King, and I was his mate.

I amhis mate.

And that makes him…mine.

A scream coiled in my chest, ready to tear free from my body, and I forced the magic in my veins to be quiet for a little while longer.

For every memory I dredged up and every piece of the puzzle I put into place, it was wriggling free from its constraints.

Is it time, is it time yet?

And I was letting it.

Almost.

“Let me explain before you explode and take the whole of Sthiara down with you,” the High King said.

Chapter forty-seven

Fate

My gaze snapped towardsthe true High King of Faerie.

He was awake and alert.

“You son of a bitch,” I breathed.

He rolled his eyes, grunting as he pushed himself up into a sitting position on my bed. “Considering she’s Malum now, you’re not wrong.”

I took a mental shovel out on the relief that rushed through me at the sight of him sitting up, clear-eyed and skin healed, and tried to bury it beneath my rage.

His blond hair was matted with crusted blood, as was the diamond hoop in his earlobe, but the fire had cleansed the rest of his face, chest and the chain tying the insignia to him. He was still wearing his leather pants, splattered with mud and blood, and I hadn’t bothered to pull the covers over him.

“What is your name?” My voice threatened to shake, threatened to break into a million little pieces.

He held my gaze, some of the fire returning to his eyes. “Try again.”

The healer had propped him up with three of my pillows, but there was one on the bed next to him. If I was fast, I probably could have grabbed it and held it down over his head until he stopped breathing.

I lifted myself off my perch on the window and began to walk towards it, moving slowly as the blood trickled back down into my stiff legs. It had grown dark outside, barely a streak of light left in the sky.

“What is your full, real name?” I asked, leaning down with my hands on the bed so we were eye-to-eye. “What is the name that your parents gave you, the name that the other faeries know you as?”

He didn’t blink. Even as molten gold swirled in his irises. “Lucais Starfire.”

The impact his answer had on me was unprecedented. I felt like I was going to die, but I ploughed onwards.

“Are you, Lucais Starfire, the High King of Faerie?”

“Yes.”

Breathe,I told myself.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “Am I your mate?”

“No.”