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This time, Evora cut in. “Whatever you choose to believe, she helped my cousin shoot down over two dozen depraved in Asra Domm. I witnessed that myself. Not any mortal could do what she did.”

This statement incited more murmuring.

“Was this the same colony you and Serinbor had been tracking?” Abecka asked, and the crowd quieted again.

“Yes, Your Majesty, only they beat us to it.” Evora cast Seph a sideways glance, accompanied by a small discreet smile that Seph held close to her breast. It was a lifeline in this tumultuous sea of eyes.

“Thatispromising,” Tyrin observed. “Is that all she’s exhibited?”

“Thus far,” Alder said. “Though I suspect her kith side will become stronger—maybe even surprise us—the longer she’s here.”

He wasn’t telling them about her ability. Was he keeping that a secret for her sake? Or for his own designs?

“And how did that happen, exactly? Herbeing here…and withyou?” Celia asked. “The last any of us heard, you were at the Rift, so how did you end up deep in the mortal realm, escorting Jakobián’s heir into ours?”

It was the question all of them had come to hear answered. It was why Abecka had summoned them before the elders, and Seph had no idea how Alder was going to answer it.

Alder had been impatient to give an accounting of his last few years. To get this drama over with so that he could move forward.

That was, until Josephine walked through those doors.

Honestly, was Abeckatryingto torment him?

He hadn’t been able to look away from her, hoping his face didn’t betray the battle within. He was a fool for not seeing it before. Not that he could’ve known she was related to the enchantress—he’d never laid eyes on Abecka before—but he should’ve known Josephine was more. That she wasthis. She might hate the expectations and the theater of it all just as he did, but she was born for it. To lead. To fight. To resist the temptations so many leaders before him had succumbed to.

Josephine was made of something else. Somethingrareand unyielding, and when her clear blue eyes had finally found his…

Well, Alder began doubting the story he’d constructed in those early hours of the morning. The one that would put the final nail in the coffin of their moribund rapport.

Dammit.

“Alder?” Abecka pressed.

Alder cleared his throat and angled himself to the crowd, though Josephine burned like a falling star in his periphery. “Actually, I was stationednorthof the Rift. At the Sumner gate.”

“But that has long since—” Tyrin started.

“Fallen, yes. I know. I was there when it fell, so as you can imagine, my time at the warfront was…cut short.”

Some in the crowd whispered, glances were exchanged. Everyone knew about the Fall of Sumner, because it’d been a slaughter near the beginning of the war. When the tide had turned against the kith, when the kith had begun asking for mortal aid.

Alder hated thinking on it now.

“We were told there weren’t any survivors,” Sienne said.

“Oh, there were survivors,” Alder said lowly. “I would guess somewhere around fifty, but all were taken captive by depraved.”

“Andyouare the only one who escaped?” Celia asked. Each question was like a manacle she hoped to bind him with.

Alder smiled viciously. “You are trying to trap me in my words before I’ve even spoken them, Celia dear.”

“Your words cannot be trusted.”

“And yet my words are all you have, considering you’ve been hiding underground while the rest of us fight your war.”

Alder probably shouldn’t have said it, since he was supposed to be clearing his sordid reputation, but there it was, hanging in the air like some foul stench. The room fell silent, a few shifted uneasily, but his kin from Weald stood tall and proud, Alder was glad to see.

“Celia will listen,” Abecka said—thankfully—casting Celia a pointed look. “Please proceed, Prince Alder.”