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“You really are a bastard,” she hissed, trying not to cry. She saw her words pierce him like an arrow before he steeled his expression again. “If you were planning on killing me, why didn’t you just let me die?”

“So you did hear that conversation,” he said, almost amused, confirming what he suspected.

Why was he not angry? Why was he not upset? She felt her heart being shredded, and he seemed so damned calm.

“Yes, I heard you conspiring with your father against me and the High Mountain Court.” She sneered, feeling a bottomless pit of sorrow opening beneath her, ready to swallow her whole.

“Interesting,” he said, lips twisting. The gray of his cloak made his eyes even darker from beneath his hood.

“What?” Remy’s fingers twitched, readying to grab her bow.

“Only the fae can communicate through fire,” Hale said. “You shouldn’t have been able to hear that.”

Shit.

“It was witch magic,” Remy said, even as she retreated from him again. She knew she gave even more away by retreating, but she needed to create distance in case he rushed her.

“It was not witch magic,” Hale said, his gray eyes darkening as he took a few slow steps forward. She thought she still might be able to outrun him if she summoned all of her powers. “I know who you are, Remy . . . or should I say, Your Majesty?”

Without a second thought, Remy grabbed her bow and nocked an arrow, pointing it at him. She did it in less than a blink of an eye. If he knew who she was, there was no point in hiding her speed anymore either.

He knew.

Hale stared at her in shock, watching her unleash her full speed.

“You are incredible.” He grinned.

Why did he seem so pleased, even awed, by her? He looked at her the same way he always had, and yet seconds ago he had promised to kill her. Why was he still pretending?

“Why are you smiling?” Remy’s voice filled with rage, even as she blinked away the tears filling her eyes. She would not wipe them away. She would not move her hands from her weapon. Let him see all the ways he had broken her trust.

She didn’t let Hale answer. Her anger consumed her as she released her arrow.

It flew straight for the middle of Hale’s head, which she knew he would dodge. She knew how he would move, like a part of her lived inside his body. The arrow landed precisely as she planned, pinning the hood of Hale’s cloak to the tree behind him.

He looked up in surprise. He reached to release his hood, and she unleashed another two arrows in rapid succession. Remy knew Hale’s movements that well. She skewered his sleeves, one above his head and one by his side. He would break free any moment, but it would give her a head start. She turned and took another step uphill.

“Remy, wait.” She hated that Hale’s voice made her feet halt.

“Why should I?” The knot in her throat tightened again as she looked at him, and she saw that his calm, amused mask was crumpling too. “You have sworn to your father that you will kill the last High Mountain fae and the bitch witch, and now you realize I am both. My elder brother Raffiel is a ghost, I’m sure of it. I am the reason Vostemur can’t wield the Immortal Blade . . . you will kill me the second you are free.”

“I will not,” Hale said, his jaw hardening. “I was only lying to my father until I could get you close enough to the Immortal Blade. I will never hurt you.”

“You liar.” Remy laughed coldly at him, even as more tears welled. “Why not?”

“Because you are my Fated mate.” Hale’s voice was thick with gravel as emotion overcame him too.

The breath stole out of Remy. She had known it, too, for so much longer than she was willing to admit to herself. The night Carys told her that Hale’s Fated was from the High Mountain Court, she had wondered. The thought was a glimmer of light in Remy, a whisper of “I wish it were me,” a wish she could never acknowledge even in her own mind. But she had hoped she was his Fated all this time.

She had hoped because she knew there was this undeniable thread tying them together. She loved him irrationally from the moment she first looked into those smoky gray eyes.

“Why should I believe you?” Remy gritted out even as another treacherous tear slid down her cheek.

“Because you know it’s true.” Hale’s body remained taut as he stared at her, a hint of desperation on his face.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Remy bit her lip between her teeth to keep it from wobbling.

“Because I thought you would either run or shoot an arrow through me . . .” Hale looked up at the arrow lodged mere inches from his head, “I suppose I was right. Your name is Remini, isn’t it? Remini Dammacus, third child of the King and Queen of the High Mountain Court?”