Page 111 of All the Devils are Here

I cannot rule with another. Not knowing that Dante is here, that I would never be able to return to him.

I cannot force that life upon him, either. The crown would drain him, waste him away before my very eyes, and that is nothing to mention what being taken from his pack would do to him. Even if we had centuries behind us, it is not what I would ask of him.

“You know what will happen should no one take the crown,” Iagan says. No, the Huntsman. As he stands by the door now, he is wearing that face again, the one he uses to hide every part of himself. “The Otherworld will fade. Fae will die for your whims, Lark. Humans, too.”

“The choices they make are their own. As are mine. I will not be shamed for them.”

I will not shame him for his, either. When I left the Otherworld, I left for good. I had no intention of returning.

I will not return. Not ever.

The Huntsman gives me one final look before he storms out into the night. I lock the door behind him and press my hand to the wall, feeling the wards twist at the touch of what little magic I have left.

I feed it into them—all of it—because he may not have said it, but we both know the truth.

It is not only Iagan who will be seeking out a lost prince. He is right. Many fae will believe they can take the throne, but very few have the power to endure the true weight of the crown. The Otherworld will soon begin to fade just like its queen did.

And then other fae will come for me, too.