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“No, I’m not. I truly couldn’t sleep.”

“Why have you taken the Mortal Blade from my bag?”

My muscles tensed. “What makes you think I did that?”

“Do not take me for a fool,” he growled, pushing away from the door to close the distance between us. I sucked in a breath and stumbled a few steps back, knocking my backside against the edge of his bed. Fumbling, I whipped the dagger around to my front. And just as he reached me, I pointed it at his heart.

He froze. Pain flickered in his eyes. Rage and hurt tangled together like thorny vines around my heart.No.I couldn’t be weak now when it mattered the most. He was the one who’d caused this. All of this was his fault. If I did not do what had to be done, my people would not survive.

He’d lied to me.

“What are you doing, Tessa?” he asked in a low, dangerous voice. “You want to train? Is that it? Because you want to go find your family? That’s fine. Just remember that if you even so much as graze my skin with that, I die.”

“I know exactly what it does,” I whispered fiercely, tears building in my eyes. “That’s why I’m here, Mist King. To do what I should have done the first time I saw it in your bag.”

His sapphire eyes widened with a flash of pain, but then his expression went flat. “So, you’ve come here to kill me. I don’t suppose you want to explain why.”

“Why do you think?” My hand shook, the dagger point whispering against his unbuttoned tunic. Just one little push up, that was all it would take. The knife would graze his skin, and he’d be gone. “Morgan sent me a letter. She told me Oberon has had my family all this time. I used a communication stone to see my mother, so don’t even pretend like it’s not true. They’ve been trapped in his dungeons while you’ve led me around in the mists like an idiot, tricking me into... They’remy family.” My voice cut off as an unwanted sob shook me. “All this time, they’ve been trapped there. All this time, you knew. Oberon could have easily killed them, and I wouldn’t have been able to do a damn thing to save them because I was stuck wandering the mists because of your lies. You’re exactly what I thought you were. You’re the Mist King.” I lifted my eyes so that he could see the true depths of my hatred for him. “And you betrayed me.”

Understanding lifted his brows, but the rest of his face remained blank. As if he’d checked out, as if this conversation was beneath him. “I see.”

“You see?” Tears blurred my vision. Heart roaring with pain, I angled the blade so that all it would take was one tiny shove to hit his heart. “After everything that’s happened between us, that’s all you have to say to me?You see?”

His hand wound around my wrist as anger blazed in his eyes. Tears streaming down my cheeks, I pulled against him.

“You did the one thing I could never forgive, Kalen.The one thing.The women in my life mean more to me than anything else in the world, and that includes men who whisper sweet words with their poisoned tongues. And if they fall,I fall.”

“Let go of the blade,” he said, reaching out his other hand to try to snatch the weapon from me.

He was stronger than me. So much stronger. If he grabbed my other hand, he’d have the dagger, and there would be nothing I could do to save my family. He’d keep me here.

It would all be over. Desperation raked through me.

And so I shoved.

The blade inched into his chest, slicing right into his left abs. Something within me shattered, the pain so great I gasped. Gritting my teeth, I let go, horror twisting my gut. The Mist King’s eyes widened in shock. Shadows fled. The gemstone cracked, light spilling out. As a storm of mist blasted me in the face, his entire body shuddered.

The most powerful fae alive thundered to the ground.

My hands flew to my mouth. Shaking, I knelt and pulled the blade from his chest before wiping the blood against the bed. I couldn’t look at him as I grabbed his pack and stuffed the knife back in. I couldn’t watch the life leave his eyes. Despite how horribly he’d betrayed me, despite knowing he’d wanted to use me for his own gain, pain tore my heart into a million tattered ribbons.

I had cared for him. Kalen, the shadow fae who was willing to do anything to save the world, who had looked at me and saw the truth of my heart. But that wasn’t the real him. Kalen had been nothing but a lie.

Brushing away the tears, I threw open the door and ran.

Thirty-Nine

Tessa

Footsteps echoed through the castle. They came from just around the next bend. I pressed myself up against the wall and listened. My heart was still pounding, and I couldn’t get the look on the Mist King’s face out of my head. All the life had fled from his eyes. Those eyes that had once looked at me andseenme—

No. I shook my head at myself. Thinking that way would not get me out of this castle alive. The Mist King had betrayed me. I could not forget that.

I crept out into the hallway, slinging the pack over my shoulder. The castle was silent and empty, like it always was. No one had sounded the alarm. No one had witnessed what I’d done.

Thank the light for that.

For a moment, I paused, halfway between the Mist King’s door and the entrance to the war room. My gut twisted, a vision of his vacant eyes haunting me. A part of me wanted to turn back, to try to revive him, to try and stop the power of the blade.