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“Aura.” My name came out of his mouth like a curse. “You are not presenting yourself to our guests from the Court of Wind looking like someone you are not. Wash it off before you come downstairs, or I’ll put a glamour over you.”

Face flushing a shade of absolute rage, I balled my fists at my sides.

We were both bound to the High King of Faerie, and earlier the very same day, our exchange had been tense but amicable. I was prepared to deal with him as part of the bargain with Lucais, but the brute behaviour would have to stop.

Or I am going to strangle Wren in his sleep.

“Do those human ears of yours still work?” he jeered.

I might’ve strangled him right there in the hallway.

Tears welled up behind my eyes, and even though my mind was a dizzying cyclone of insults and hateful threats alldirected at Wren, my voice had disappeared. I couldn’t even feel my way down my throat to find it and drag the words up as a chilling, empty numbness began to spread across my body.

Before the first drop of moisture trickled over my lower lid, I rushed past him and slammed my bedroom door closed between us.

I hate him.

I hate himso much.

He hadno rightto treat me so poorly. There wasno reason.

Leaning against the door for support, I sank to the floor and wrapped my arms around my legs as I brought my knees to my chest.

By the time my brain was able to send out the command to hold steady against the wave of emotions wrecking my body, it was too late. The tears streamed down my face freely, and I would have to wipe the rest of the makeup off when I was done crying.

Wren ruined everything.

He ruinedeverything.

From the moment I went to close the stair gate in Dante’s Bookstore that fateful night until the moment I picked myself up off the floor and wiped all traces of joy and sadness from my face, Wren flaunted his continued existence in my mind. A dark, looming presence tainting every single memory he touched.

I hated him.

I hated him even more than I hated myself.

The hateful brute was standing outside of my bedroom door when I opened it again, red-eyed but fresh-faced.

I shot him a disdainful glare, my stomach twisting in protest at the very sight of his beautiful, cruel eyes. “What do you want?”

He glanced up at me without tilting his head away from the floor, strands of his blond hair tangling with his thick eyebrows. “I’m sorry.”

The door slammed closed behind me, but it was his words that startled me. I blinked at him, the knot in my belly tightening. “You’re…what?”

He lifted his head and rolled his eyes skyward. “You didlook ridiculous,” he began, holding up a hand to stop me as I opened my mouth to curse him. “But I should not have spoken to you like that.”

Closing my eyes, I blew out a sharp breath through my nose, and then fixed him with a hard look. “I don’t care.”

His eyes roved over my face, no doubt marking the tear-stained redness that couldn’t be washed off, and he nodded—slowly, like he didn’t believe me, and was recalculating his next move. “The birthmark above your eye,” he said, lifting his chin towards me. “You shouldn’t be ashamed of it.”

I shook my head at him. “I don’t understand you. Since when do you apologise for anything?”

Wren’s eyes dropped to the floor. “It doesn’t happen often. But I know when I’ve crossed a line, and for that I’m sorry.”

That he thinksthiswas crossing a line, after everything else that has happened—

“Okay.”

He raised an eyebrow at me, folding his arms over his chest. “Okay?”