Page 53

From inside Lord Idril’s castle. With no outside help. Does Trove know where I am? Or did he return to the sea, as I wanted?

She sagged against the wrought iron mirror that took up much of the west wall. She couldn’t do anything of importance by herself. Going off to hunt only to narrowly avoid being captured proved that. As had taking on the prince one-on-one back in Lorne. How was she supposed to get her cousin out of this purgatory? She couldn’t even take care of herself.

She needed help.

Realhelp.

And if that help couldn’t come in the form offriends,then perhaps it really was time to start looking at getting that help from the one person who’d asked it of her first.

Time to make a deal with the devil.

The lock clicking in the door caused Wren to jump to attention. She hated how her reflection in the mirror appeared startled, so she forced a level of calm onto her face that she absolutely did not feel. She slipped the shard of vase up her sleeve and waited.

Lord Idril stepped into her room like he belonged there.

She exhaled slowly and kept herself rooted to the spot, beyond temped to gut him then and there.

Easy, dragoness. Easy.

He had promised they would talk, after all, and she had publicly insulted him by protesting the slaves. But even so, it took everything she had for Wren to stop herself from backing away as the elf approached, eyes slightly red from the effects of all the drugs and alcohol he’d already consumed that evening. There was the smallest of stains upon the collar of his frothy, unbuttoned shirt, but he didn’t seem to care.

He ran a finger along her bedspread before meeting her gaze. “So what exactly wasthatdisplay all about?” Lord Idril demanded, stepping right into Wren’s personal space. “You dare step foot inside my home and disrespect me like that? Were you taught no manners from your mother whatsoever?”

“Keep my mother out of your mouth!” Wren lashed out, daring to shove Idril in the chest to push him away. Feeling his bare skin against her fingertips made Wren want to vomit.

Idril’s pupils turned to slits, incensed.

She reached for her blade as he backhanded her. Her ears rang and her cheek throbbed. It stung like the dickens but she didn’t care. If he could hit her, thenshecould hit him.

Wren swung and he caught her wrist in a surprisingly strong grip. She lashed out the other, managing to get a good hit to his gut. He wheezed but captured her other wrist. The elf lord locked them together between their bodies—his mouth all sharp-pointed teeth and rage.

“I may have enjoyed your mother’s fiery temper,” he breathed out, “but I will not abide any offspring of mine to get away with what you just tried to do. I will have obedience from you,Princess Wren,or you shall find yourself suffering far worse than Anneke ever did.”

She stiffened, and a dull ringing filled her ears.

He lies.

But as her eyes locked on Lord Idril’s, she could see he believed it to be true.

“Not possible,” she murmured, her lips going numb.

“Oh, I assure you it is.”

Wren trembled as she attempted to process what he’d just said. It couldn’t be true. But the longer she stared into Idril’s eyes, the more it was like looking in a mirror. Had Idril himself not pointed out that redheads had to stick together, and kept casting Wren undue attention when the rebellion arrived in his home?

Horror struck her.

She stomped her booted foot over Idril’s bare toes and wrenched her wrists free from his grasp and brought them to her ears, to the tiny scars that were barely discernible against the pads of her fingertips when she ran them across the skin there. Had Wren’s pointed ears beencutwhen she was too young to remember anything—to stop her from ever reaching the conclusion that her father had not, in fact, been a man, but instead an elf?

“Thathurt,” he growled. “It seems you’re more like me than you realize. You’re a little bloodthirsty thing, aren’t you? The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.”

Lord Idril was her true sire. She could see it not just in his familiar eyes and hair and other shadows of herself in his face, but in the way his rage turned into a grim smile of satisfaction when he saw Wren reach the horrible conclusion all on her own.

“How?” she gasped.

“The usual way, of course, but I’ll spare you the details.”

“I am no daughter of yours,” she rasped, feeling like the floor was collapsing beneath her.