Page 10 of Black Hearted (Cursed Fae #4)

Zane

I bolted upright, my heart hammering in my chest like a war drum, a thin sheen of sweat coating my skin.

The dream. Lorelei. It was real.

The dream, as well as the one I’d struggled to remember the night before, came back to me with full clarity. Lorelei was a dream walker, and she’d been kidnapped by Dawn’s delusional mother. I had to rescue her.

I leaped out of bed and turned on the kerosene lamp, scouring the dark space for my boots. The sun had yet to rise, but that didn’t matter. I couldn’t stay here. I had to get to Lorelei.

A groan came from the other side of the room, and I glanced over to see Nellie asleep on the cot. I’d momentarily forgotten about her. Of course, I couldn’t just leave her here.

I went over to where she lay and shook her gently until her eyes opened to slits, and she stared up at me groggily.

“Grab your stuff. We’re leaving,” I told her, then started packing my own belongings.

Lorelei. Lorelei. Lorelei. Her name was a frantic call in my mind.

From the moment I’d laid eyes on her in the vision with Isolde, all I’d wanted to do was protect her.

And now, after seeing her in my dreams twice and knowing she was in danger …

it caused my protective instincts to flare to unimaginable levels.

I’d kill Queen Liliana for this. And burn down whoever got in my way.

“You’re scaring me.” Nellie’s voice was small, and I froze.

I hadn’t realized I’d been aggressively shoving things into my bag and growling to myself in anger.

I took a second to breathe deeply and looked over at her.

“I’m sorry. It’s just that someone I care about has been taken. Princess Lorelei. I have to rescue her.”

Nellie sat up, looking concerned. “Okay … where is she?” she asked, her red hair mussed from sleep.

Now that I’d calmed down enough to think, I realized I didn’t have an answer to her question. “I don’t know, but I can get help from someone at the Spring Palace. And then I can return you to your aunt.”

She made a face. “Right. My aunt. Well, you can’t leave without that pretty dagger, right?”

I ground my teeth in frustration. Moving to her side of the room, I started stuffing her things into her small pack. She was right. I did need that dagger. It was far too valuable to leave behind.

“I’ll steal it back,” I told her. I wasn’t above breaking the law if it meant getting to Lorelei sooner.

Nellie frowned. “Then we go on foot to the Spring Palace with Mr. Donahue looking for us with his goons?”

Why was a twelve-year-old making more sense than my own thoughts right now?

Lorelei, Lorelei, Lorelei.

Her soft brown hair and those sharp purple eyes pierced into my very soul. I had to get to her. But was I being too hasty?

I stopped what I was doing, clutching Nellie’s small boot in my hand. If I stayed another day and participated in that fight, I could win enough money to buy a horse. That would cut our travel time to the palace at least in half, making up for the day I’d lose here.

I let out a shaky breath, and Nellie laid her small hand on my arm, startling me. I hadn’t even noticed she’d padded over to me. She stared up at me with understanding in her eyes.

“I get scared a lot, too. I was really scared when my nana left,” she said, voicing what I hadn’t yet admitted.

That I was terrified of losing Lorelei before I’d even had a chance to get to know her.

“How about you just leave the dagger with Mr. Donahue? Then we can set out on foot right now and save the princess. I can even help.”

My gaze dropped to the hole in the bottom of her boot I was still holding, and a weight settled on my chest. She couldn’t last another day on foot.

“You need new shoes, kiddo,” I told her, inspecting the boot closer.

“It’s fine,” she snapped, her sassy personality coming back out to play.

“Hey, don’t worry. It’s not just about your shoes. I need that dagger. It might be important.”

“So you gotta compete in the fights?” she asked, and I could see the fear in her eyes.

I didn’t want to fight for this money. I wanted to forget about the dagger and leave town right now. But I didn’t even know where Lorelei was, and even though I had no idea how, these daggers might be important to ending the curse. I couldn’t just leave one here.

Nellie needed new shoes, the sweets I’d promised her, and we had to get a horse to make the best time. According to what Evander had told me, we could reach the Spring Palace in twenty-four hours if we rode all day and night. That was more than twice as fast as it would take us on foot.

It was obvious what needed to be done.

“You ever ridden a horse?” I asked her, and her eyes lit up.

“It’s only my favorite thing in the world.”

“Good. Tonight, after I win the fights, we’ll ride all night and day to make up for lost time. Okay?”

She nodded enthusiastically, but then her face fell. “What if you don’t win? What if you … die?” Her bottom lip started to quiver, and I reached out to squeeze her hand.

“Remember my shadow magic? The secret magic you’re not supposed to tell anyone about?”

She nodded as a tear welled in her eye, and she batted it away.

“Well, that makes me really hard to kill.”

She frowned. “But you’re not allowed to use magic in the fight.”

“Right. And I won’t. Unless I think my life is in danger. Then it’s okay to break the rules.”

I was confident I wouldn’t need my magic, but I wouldn’t hesitate to use it if the fight turned dirty—which something told me it might.

Rules tended to get broken in these kinds of fights, leaving you to rely on whatever you had at your disposal.

I hoped it wouldn’t come to that, but I’d do what I had to.

Most importantly, I wanted Nellie to feel safe. For the time being, I was all she had.

She nodded. “And if it comes to that, I’ll use my magic to protect you.” She crossed her arms over her chest and tipped her chin high.

Did I have that much confidence at her age? No, I didn’t.

This kid had grown on me. Beneath her tough exterior was something soft and vulnerable, and I wanted to protect that.

“I need to get a message to someone in the Spring Palace. Do you know where I could do that here?” I asked her.

If I wasn’t going to head out immediately, I at least wanted to warn Lorelei’s parents and let them know I was coming to help.

“I do,” she told me, then pointed to her stomach. “But I need to fill this first.”

Despite the situation, I grinned. “Oh, is that a fact?”

The kid could be bribed to do anything for food, which was a little scary. She was also very bony, and that made me wonder what she’d been living off of until I found her.

I glanced out the window and noticed the sun was finally starting to rise. “Come on,” I said. “Get dressed, and we’ll go find Evander and Elida to see about breakfast.”

At breakfast, I told Evander about a friend I needed to help and explained that I had to procure a horse and supplies to get to the Spring Palace.

I mentioned that I wouldn’t have the money to pay until later this evening.

Evander offered to help, reaching for his coin purse, but I waved him off.

Evander and Elida had just lost their home and livelihood.

They needed that money for themselves, and besides, it might not even be enough.

I explained to them that I planned to win a fight to get the funds I needed. Elida raised an eyebrow when I told her but said nothing. Evander nodded with respect and then gave me some pointers on keeping my arms up high and protecting my head.

After Evander and Elida graciously paid for our meal, Nellie and I set off to the messenger’s barn to send a note to the Spring queen.

Once we arrived, I found someone willing to send a message via raven for me on loan.

He was a fan of the fights and said word had spread all morning that the exceptionally tall outsider was Mr. Donahue’s new champion.

I sent a brief letter to Queen Gloriana explaining that Lorelei had contacted me in a dream and that I was coming to help rescue her.

I also mentioned that I had a plan to end the curse, though I didn’t elaborate.

I avoided saying I was from Ethereum and instead claimed I was a powerful fae from the Fall Court and a friend of Lorelei’s.

I didn’t know if the Spring queen would believe me—I was a stranger, after all—but if Lorelei hadn’t visited her parents in a dream yet, they needed to know what was going on. I hoped my message would spur them to ready their troops for a rescue.

Once I got to the Spring Palace and dropped Nellie off with her aunt, I was going to find Lorelei, and nothing would stand in my way. But having an army of troops at my back wouldn’t hurt.

“Now what?” Nellie asked as we walked through the shops.

I ran my hand through the longer strands of my hair for the hundredth time that day. I hated waiting. Sitting around and doing nothing was my least favorite thing to do. But the first fight wasn’t until sundown, several hours from now.

I glanced at the sweets shop we were about to pass, then down at Nellie. She grinned up at me, her expression softening something inside me in a way I hadn’t expected. I found myself wondering if Lorelei wanted kids, and if so, how many. I’d always wanted a big family. At least five children.

With those thoughts, a burning ache flared in my chest. I had to find something to occupy my mind, or I’d go crazy, so I stepped into the sweets shop.

Twenty minutes later, after a lot of charm-filled wooing, I convinced Britana to give Nellie a free bag of sweets in exchange for coming back just before closing in a couple of hours to sweep the entire shop and wipe down all the counters.

As we walked down the lane, Nellie fisting chocolates and shoving sours into her mouth, she glanced up at me with bright eyes. “I could get used to this,” she mumbled over a mouthful of candy.

I chuckled, though my smile didn’t quite reach my eyes.

I could only enjoy her happiness a little, knowing that Lorelei was hurt and counting on me.

The fight wasn’t for another eight hours, and waiting that long before doing anything to rescue the woman I was pretty sure was my mate was going to be one of the greatest challenges of my life.

Fate help me.