Page 129 of Boundless

“Well, damn. This whole thing just got way easier,” said Hil and put his hand over mine on his forearm.

And then Rune’s shadows spread out right in front of him, three tendrils of darkness just hovering there in the air.

“I’d remove your hand from hers if I were you.” All this he said in perfect calm.

“Rune!” I hissed, pulling my hand back on instinct.

“Hey, hey—she touched me first!” said Hil with his hands up in surrender, but he was smiling ear to ear.

The shadows retreated slowly back inside Rune’s hand. “She can do whatever she wants. You can’t.”

Hil laughed—a short, throaty laugh.

“Are you serious right now?!” I demanded, but all Rune did was bring my hand to his lips and kiss it.

But before he could answer, Hil stopped laughing abruptly. Turned toward the closed doors.

My heart about fell all the way to my heels instantly, laughs and smiles forgotten.

Lyall,whispered a voice in my head. It was Lyall. He’d already come back.

“Do you hear that?” Hil said and stood up, turned toward the doors.

“No. What is it?” I asked because I couldn’t hear shit.

“The…the doors,” Hil whispered. “It’s like…” But he didn’t know how to finish the sentence.

“A pressure,” Rune said, and together, we stood up, too. “It’s the palace telling you someone is coming.”

Hil looked at him. “And?”

“And you can choose to open the doors or keep them closed.” That sounded a lot like the palace, yes.

“I can just…open them?” Hil said.

“Yes. Think of them opening or ask them to. Whatever works,” Rune explained.

I didn’t think I’d ever seen him thispatientwith other people before, except me. He must have really liked Hil. Or most likely just felt bad for him, I figured.

Hil closed his eyes, breathed in deeply. It took but a second for the handles to push themselves down and for the doors to swing to the sides at the same time.

Hil laughed. “By Reme!” he shouted, but I couldn’t even be happy with him, for him. Because my eyes were locked on those of Maera, standing just outside the throne room, shifted back into human, naked. Pissed off, if the look on her face was anything to go on.

“He’s gone,” she said through gritted teeth.

Rune squeezed my hand in his, and I triednotto be relieved because I knew she was talking about Lyall.

I failed.

forty

Rune stayedwith Hil when the fake king and queen’s advisors and chancellors apparently separated into two groups—the ones who opposed Hil and who demanded he be hanged in front of the people for treason, and the ones who believed him to be the rightful heir sincethe very thronehad accepted him, and those statues of animals had come alive to protect him when his life was threatened. The soldiers who’d been in the room with us, as well as all the staff who’d been standing outside the doors had been witness to the whole thing.

Codessa, apparently, was found dead in her chamber after having taken the Iyandra that was reserved for queens. She’d killed herself because Maera suspected Lyall had just left her and fled the kingdom. She knew without the morvekai her husband had made she couldn’t fight. No Unseelie fae could really, truly fight with magic after so much damage was done to the kingdom and the balance of power. At least not right now.

Luckily, Chancellor Ryat, the guy who’d first found us at that settlement, was on Hil’s side. He had the ear of most of the people clinging to power in this court, and he looked mighty relieved that the fake king and queen were gone, even if hetried to hide it. More than that—he was willing to sit down with Hil and Rune to talk about the most pressing matters with the court’s assembly. The ones who weren’t trying to kill Hil, at least.

I asked Rune before he leftwhatthose most pressing matters were, and apparently, they had to decide this very dayabout ways to restore order in the palace after the death of the usurpers. There were only three hundred active soldiers in the Unseelie army, which, according to Rune, was a very,verysmall number. He expected riots and rebellions from other nobles who wanted a taste of power now that Lox and his morvekai were gone, and they would try to take advantage of the situation, so Hil had to be prepared. His safety came first, on which we agreed. Because it wouldn’t be surprising if Lyall tried to assassinate him the moment he went out to speak publicly to his people the next morning. They had to make sure there would be no loose ends.