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Footsteps, as light as a cat, came towards us, but my eyes were locked with Wren’s, transfixed by the smouldering colour. I realised that I had stopped breathing at some point and took a sudden breath. His cologne, that intoxicating scent, had almost knocked me out, and I managed to break the stare only so I could turn my face away to find some other type of air that did not belong to him.

“What are you?” he asked, his voice low but strong enough to command an army.

“Human,” I whispered. Wren’s eyes narrowed, so I corrected myself. “Part-faerie.”

“No.Listento me.” His enunciation of each word was so perfect that I caught a glimpse of his razor-sharp canines. “Whatare you?”

A phantom hand brushed against mine. Wren hadn’t moved. Lucais was still standing a few feet away as if preparing to intercept.

I felt it again, asking for acceptance, looking for a tear in my flesh armour, and I ignored it. Shoved it away. But Wren’s face…

“Everything,” I whispered.

“And?”

“Power.” The word was a dose of poison on my mouth, but I let it out, and then I bit down on my lower lip to stop anything else from escaping its cage under his instruction.

Wren’s gaze tracked the movement straight to my mouth. “That’s more like it.” He closed his eyes and took a deep, calming breath before stepping away from me.

I remained against the glass if only to feel the sobering chill seeping into my back through the silk and lace of my shirt.

Lucais stepped forward, an embodiment of concern, as Wren turned on his heels and prowled back to the table. I allowed the High King to take my hand, allowed his warmth to flow into me through his touch, and felt the thunderous echo of my heart as it started to beat again.

“You weren’t supposed to find out like this,” Lucais murmured. “But I assume you know that the caenim were hunting you?”

I nodded, eyes darting towards Wren, who was holding up two pieces of a chair he’d broken to examine them.

“She knows about the Malum and Blythe’s Court, too,” Wren called over his shoulder, as he tried to fit the leg of the chair back into one of its splintered corners.

The High King nodded, taking a deep breath. He was less perturbed about the damage to his property than I would have expected. “The missing piece is the Oracle then,” he told me. “Would you like me to be honest with you, Auralie?”

“Don’t lie to me,” I answered, loud enough for both of them to hear. “No matter what.”

Lucais inclined his head to me. “The Oracle offers a prediction on the success of each ruler’s reign, and the whole of Faerie stands to bear witness to it. Unfortunately, the last one wasn’t very clear, and it caused some unrest across the realm, which seems to be escalating now. For as long as we’ve been a civilisation,” he went on, oblivious to Wren’s continued efforts to repair the broken chair by force, “Faerie has been ruled by a High King or Queen—or both, or two of one or the other—hailing from one Court. That Court tends to receive the most benefit from the reign, as the crown feeds into the land, so the High King’s power is strongest wherever he is.

“Mates—as in soulmates—rarely occur between two different Courts and haveneveroccurred between different Courts for the High Kings or Queens. But this time, the Oracle claimed it would be different. At first, it seemed like a union between the Court of Light and the Court of Darkness was going to happen, but then the Oracle showed us that the new High King would take a mate from the human realm.” He shook his head, laughing without humour. “That’s never happened before.”

I did not particularly like where this was going, but I let him continue.

“The Court of Darkness has since vanished, so it seems we misunderstood at least part of the Oracle’s message. Soon after, there was a dramatic increase in the number of human bodies found in various Courts.” Lucais stared down at our hands, at my limp fingers he held in his grip. He looked like he wanted to dropthem. “Most of them are discovered near the gateways. Caenim attacks, usually. We think they leave the bodies there to send a message because they’re all young women who…”

What? Who what?

“…look and smell like you.”

Like me. My genetic makeup.

Like my mother.

My hand fell out of Lucais’s hand.

“The Malum wish to create a peace pact by forcing an arranged marriage,” he added. “We can only assume that they’re aware of the prophecy and they consider a human mate—or any mate—to stand in the way of their plans. There is no world in which a union between the High King of Faerie and a Malum bride would ever take place, but you can’t reason with them.” Lucais reached for my hand again, but I pulled away.

“So, you’re telling me that I look like this girl,” I whispered. “They’re killing… It’s not half-breeds, it’s—”

The High King tilted his head down, looking up at me through thick black lashes with apologetic eyes. “It’s you, Auralie.” Lucais’s tone was gentle, but I detected a faint trace of brewing hysteria underneath. “The Oracle claimed that you would be the High King of Faerie’s mate.”

Heart beating up my throat, I braced a hand along the window behind me to steady myself as I began to sidestep away from him. Lucais looked like he was trying to find something else to say, but he knew as well as I did that there was nothing to follow.