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* * *

I arched up, my muscles tensing, breaking against the invisible bonds of memory.

Except I wasn’t bound any longer. I felt my hands moving, clenched so tight I’d drawn blood from my own palms.

I waited for Veyka’s screams. Was met instead by the even inhale and exhale of her sleeping beside me.

I’d lost count of the number of nights I’d woken like this since our joining. The dreams were different. Varying shades of torture, but always the same two subjects.

Veyka. My mother.

I was always helpless.

Tell her.

Wake her, let her soothe us,my beast growled.

Veyka shifted, rolling to her side.

Had she sensed my beast, even in slumber?

Take her. Let her soft body wrap around us.

That I could do. I could hold her, bury myself inside of her.

But I could not burden her with my terrors. She had enough of her own.

I could protect her from this—from the darkest parts of me. Even if I couldn’t protect her from everything else.

47

PARYS

It was a simple concept. Three rounds. The first rounds were sorted between elementals and terrestrials. Elemental versus elemental, terrestrial versus terrestrial. Then the winners of those matches were paired up—with a fae from the opposing faction. Those pairs then battled another pair until there were only two sets left. The final pairs would face off against each other to be declared winners.

No matter how the competition unfolded, there would be one elemental and one terrestrial in the winning pair. They would be forced to work together—to learn about one another’s magic, to respect it.

It was brilliant.

He hadn’t even needed to come up with a prize. The fae were competitive enough that they’d agreed to the competition with only a bit of persuading. If they hadn’t realized that they’d be fighting with a member of the rival faction rather than against them… well, he couldn’t be faulted. He’d never explicitly promised anything.

If a few died before the night was over? That would only add to the entertainment and be one less ego for him to soothe later.

Parys was more than a little pleased with himself as he sipped his first—and only—goblet of aural. Leading an entire unified fae kingdom meant he couldn’t overindulge. At least, not publicly. And not without the female at his side trying to cut his balls off.

They were seated on the dais, but below the thrones.

The symbolism was important—sitting on the same level as all the other courtiers would have implied he and Guinevere were the same as them, mere members of the court. The elementals would seize upon that small show of weakness in a second.

But Parys would never put his ass on either of those thrones. Not even on a dare. Not even on a promise of a month of solitude in the library.

If Guinevere had wanted to try one out, the throne that should have been hers… she didn’t say. She didn’t even look at them.

She was much too busy watching the first match-up. Two terrestrials, one flora and the other fauna gifted.

The fox, with its sharp teeth and quick tail, adeptly dodged the vines that shot after it. But the shifter didn’t realize that his flora-gifted opponent was herding him—back and back and back towards an innocuous looking flower.

Too late. The pink bloom grew—quickly. So quickly, the shifter didn’t realize what was happening. By the time the fox tried to dart away, a terrible barbed tongue had shot from the center of the flower and wrapped around its thick tail.