Page 3

Clearly, Kieran felt a fight between Roth and I was imminent because he looked up from the letters he was rapidly churning out to give both of us an annoyed look.

“If the two of you are going to bicker, go somewhere else.” His eyes, which had been more gold than brown lately, dropped back to the note he was writing.

Normally, Kieran kept himself clean-shaven and his hair neatly styled, but he was sporting a week’s worth of stubble, and his blond hair looked like it hadn’t been brushed in days.

“Are you reaching out to the same people?” I asked tiredly. “I don’t see why they’d tell you anything different than they did two days ago.”

“Maybe don’t tell me how to interact with people.

” His words were clipped, and there was an edge to his voice I’d never heard from him before.

His eyes dropped back to the letters. “Roth is supposed to be good at research, although that’s been an epic fail.

I’m good at gathering gossip and cashing in on favors, which is why we have any information at all right now.

What the fuck do you do, Alaric? Other than going traipsing off into the woods and leaving all the work to us?

Do you even give a shit about getting her back? Or does this make you happy?”

I swallowed back my growl. Thank fuck I’d gone out this morning; otherwise, I definitely would have ripped his head off—best friend or not.

“Sorry,” Kieran said tightly without looking up.

Roth and I shared a look. We might constantly fight with each other, but that was mostly because we were too similar in a lot of ways.

As pissed off as we’d get, neither of us ever held a grudge—at least not for long.

Kieran was the peacekeeper in our group, and neither of us knew how to roll with the changes in his behavior.

Roth and I were good at a lot of things, but emotional comfort was not one of them. I cared about Kieran because he was my best friend, and I thought Roth had grown to like Kieran despite themself. Kier was just so . . . Kier. He was honest, loyal, and always willing to help everyone.

Now he was hurting and neither of us knew what to do because we were trying to keep from spiraling into panic and despair ourselves. Samara would have known what to do. She always did.

I missed her so much, it hurt. Up until recently, we’d been adversaries, but even then, I’d been obsessed with her. Samara had consumed my soul long before I’d ever tasted her lips against mine, and now she was missing and I had no fucking answers as to why or how to help her.

She was counting on me—on us—and we were failing her. I found everything about that unacceptable.

I took a deep breath. Letting myself unravel into despair wouldn’t help.

The absence of both Carmilla and Samara hadn’t exactly gone unnoticed. There was a quiet tension in House Harker, and the other advisors had been looking to me for answers. I’d been Carmilla’s top advisor, and since returning, I hadn’t exactly hidden that things between Samara and I had changed.

Everyone was aware of her relationship with Roth and Kieran.

I hadn’t stood in the center of the courtyard and dramatically declared my feelings, but I hadn’t needed to.

I spent every waking moment trying to figure out what had happened to Samara.

And even though we were biting each other’s heads off constantly, Roth, Kieran, and I were often together.

It didn’t take a genius to figure out that Samara had claimed another lover—just the gossip mill that was the House Harker court.

I was trying to figure out how to suggest to Kieran that maybe he should try some new contacts without setting him off when the doors to the rooftop burst open.

Adrienne stalked out onto the stone balcony, Emil and Nyx right behind her. A few of the strikers flapped their wings in unease at the sudden intrusion, their brightly colored scales glistening in the sunlight.

“I take it from your grim faces that you don’t have any news—good or bad—to share?

” Adrienne asked. Like Kieran, Adrienne was usually perpetually full of joy, but recently, the ranger, who was only a decade older than us, looked tired and drained.

The other two rangers—Nyx and Emil—didn’t look any better.

All of the rangers were feeling a little uneasy about Vail’s absence. But Adrienne, Emil, and Nyx were part of Vail’s personal squad—more than that, they were friends.

The fact that they hadn’t heard anything from him either had only increased everyone’s concerns.

“No,” Kieran replied without looking up from his letter. “Nothing today. You?”

Adrienne didn’t answer, and it was then that I noticed the letter she clenched at her side.

“What did you learn?” It took every ounce of my self-control not to close the distance between us and rip that piece of paper out of her hand.

But I knew Adrienne would tell us—we’d been sharing information all week—and she could absolutely kick my ass.

So I stayed where I was and forced myself to be patient.

“It’s not good.” Her expression was pinched, and when she opened her mouth to say more, it was like the words escaped her.

Finally, she just held the letter out, and I quickly walked over and grabbed it, eyes skimming the words.

There wasn’t much written, as if the person had only had a small opportunity to send the message and had hastily slapped it together.

I’d expected it to be from Vail, but this wasn’t his handwriting.

“Well?” Roth pushed. Even Kieran had stopped writing and was completely focused on me.

I swallowed. “It says Carmilla has been seen walking around the Sovereign House . . . with a crown of silver and gold on her head. Vail is often at her side.”

Kieran slammed his palm down on the table he’d dragged up here, sending some of the paper flying and several strikers to take off in the air. Then he rose and stalked to the other side of the balcony.

“Anything about Samara . . . or Draven?” Roth asked.

“No.” I shook my head and stared at the short note, as if some further insight would magically appear.

Based on all the information we’d been able to piece together, it wasn’t a surprise that Carmilla was walking around free.

Confusing, absolutely, because I didn’t understand why she hadn’t reached out to us.

Queen Velika being dead had been reported by enough sources that we’d all accepted that as well—shocking as it may have been.

But the crown . . . that was new. We’d been so worried about Velika getting her hands on both pieces that it had never occurred to us that someone else might not only know of its existence but would be vying for it as well. And definitely not Carmilla.

As unbelievable as it seemed, if Kieran’s informant was telling the truth, Samara wasn’t simply missing—she was imprisoned in the Sovereign House. And Carmilla now possessed the whole crown . . . and Vail wasn’t sharing a cell next to Samara.

“Did Vail betray us?” I half whisper the accusation.

On one hand, it didn’t seem possible . .

. but then Vail might not have seen it as betrayal, at least not to House Harker.

He was loyal to Carmilla, almost fanatically, and his dislike of Samara wasn’t exactly a secret, but it’d seemed like things had been changing between them.

Had he deceived all of us? A humorless laugh flowed from me.

“We were so concerned about the wicked prince that we didn’t see the devil already walking amongst us. ”

“We don’t know that Vail betrayed Samara,” Nyx snapped.

They were the youngest of the rangers and held Vail up on a pedestal, more so than even Adrienne and Emil.

“Maybe Carmilla used the crown on him. We know it can force anyone to obey the person wearing it. He may be just as trapped as Samara, even if there are no visible bars around him.”

Roth shook their head. “She still would have had to get the crown, and Vail was with Samara. If they found the other half, it’s not that big of a stretch to think he stabbed Samara in the back and gave it to Carmilla.”

“Vail must have had his reasons,” Emil said evenly, which seemed to soothe Nyx somewhat. I could see the doubt in the older Moroi’s eyes though. Despite his words, Emil clearly had some concerns about what Vail was up to.

“So what do we do now?” Adrienne asked. “Keep waiting for more information to trickle in? Or go to the Sovereign House to see for ourselves?”

“If that crown truly does everything we think it’s capable of, then our free will could be taken away as soon as we walk through those gates.

” Emil’s dark bushy brows creased in concern.

It didn’t escape my attention that he hadn’t said Carmilla’s name.

We were all having a hard time coming to terms with the fact that the House Leader we’d served our entire lives—someone we’d thought had been just and fair—would be okay with enslaving her own people like that.

I glanced at the letter again. Carmilla wears a crown of silver and gold .

If my parents had been here, I’d have asked them—they knew Carmilla well since they’d served her for over a century before semi-retiring—but lately they’d been foregoing the safety of the Harker fortress to spend time helping in the outposts.

No amount of pleading on my part about the dangers facing our outposts had convinced them to return.

Now, I was a little thankful, because if Carmilla truly was seizing power over the Moroi, it would be the Houses she targeted first.

“Roth,” I said slowly, my gaze flicking briefly to Kieran, who had silently joined us again, a storm brewing in his eyes. “Do we have any books or documents that show the interior layout of the Sovereign House?”

“No.” Eyes that burned like fire looked at me. “But I know where we can get some.”