Page 16 of Realm of Crows (Wings of Ink #5)

Thirteen

Herinor

Kaira meant it when she said she wanted to interrogate Tata.

It’s a miracle Rogue and Astorian agreed when she insisted I join her, and not at all a surprise when Silas followed us down the stairs to the dungeon.

He had a soft spot for the fairy before she betrayed us, and I’d be surprised if he was over it.

Astorian is leading our little group while Rogue stays with Sanja, Royad, Myron, and the rebels, planning how to answer Cezux’s refusal to send military aid.

It’s ridiculous, really. Aren’t those humans supposed to want to protect their territory?

What makes them believe this war will pass and they’ll get away unscathed is beyond me.

The moment immortal creatures are involved, it’s never about just one territory.

It’s about everything. And Ephegos certainly wants everything.

Erina is merely doing his dirty work while Ephegos is playing a longer game.

“Are you ready?” Kaira flips her braid over her shoulder, turning to Silas. The male nods, face grim like he’s going to the gallows.

“Are you?” Silas asks in return, his gaze wandering to her arm where a needle was stuck in her vein not five minutes ago.

I should be asking that question, but my mouth seems to have sealed shut, nothing of the male left who swore to himself to tell the Flameling how he feels about her. Besides, my concern for her might as well be entirely unwanted, judging by the way she keeps avoiding to look at me.

“It’s a long shot, but if the healers figure out a way to create the drug, I’m happy to give them all the blood I can spare,” she tells Silas, who nods again, face unchanged.

“Keep your voice down,” Astorian warns as we turn the corner into a corridor wide enough for two fairies to walk side by side. “We don’t want the prisoner to hear us.”

We all fall silent again as we pass the empty cells until we arrive at a dark one a level below where I was locked up when the others questioned my intentions and my loyalty. This is the part where the Fairy King keeps his real enemies.

Astorian stops in front of the second-to-last cell and plants his palm on the piece of flat rock inlayed into the door, a magical lock that responds without delay. He pulls open the narrow steel door and steps into the cell, the rest of us following him into the dimly lit ten-by-ten-foot room .

Tata is sitting on a narrow cot, boots braced on the edge and leaning against the rough rocks that make up the walls.

A tiny orb of fairy light is hanging beneath the low ceiling, a few moths circling like they have been stuck in its field of gravitation.

The air is cool and humid, not cold enough to let a prisoner freeze to death, yet not warm enough to let them get comfortable.

Even the smell is inconspicuous, telling me that Tata gets the chance to relieve herself and wash up in a separate room.

Rogue is really too good to his prisoners.

Had I known what a soft king he was, I might have never lifted a sword against his armies back in the Crow Wars.

If I think about it, I’ve come to respect and like King Recienne of Askarea enough to call him a facsimile of a friend.

Might take another century or two for me to trust him with my secrets, but it’s a start.

Tata glances up from the leather string on her jacket that she is playing with, her dark eyes flashing in the fairy light.

Her brown face is clean, no signs of cuts or bruises, and her thick, black hair has been pulled back into two long braids.

“I’ve been wondering how long it would take you to show up.

” I’m not sure who of us she’s talking to until Silas detaches from our group and steps forward.

“You look better than I’d”—he pauses, searching for a word that isn’t a lie—“thought you would.”

From the bitterness in his tone, I can tell the word he’d been wanting to speak is hoped , but he couldn’t bring himself to say it because he can’t lie. He’s still struggling to come to terms with what she’s done to all of us.

“Rogue has always been too hopeful to kill his prisoners and too weak to let them waste away.” Her response is filled with the ice that otherwise doesn’t reach this cell .

Astorian is next to Silas in an instant, the cell door flying shut behind him. “Don’t you dare call him Rogue. You have no right to use the name only his friends know. You are not a friend of his or of any of us. You are a traitor.”

“Am I?” Tata continues to play with the leather string. “Or was I just looking out for myself because no one else would?” She tilts her head to the side, exposing a cluster of scars along the side of her neck, and Astorian cringes while Silas deflates like she struck him in the face.

I have no idea what this is about, but if Astorian and his men haven’t gotten any useful information out of Tata, perhaps he shouldn’t be the one leading this conversation.

“Hello, Tata.” I prowl over to the cot and sit on the edge, a foot from the female.

She doesn’t as much as acknowledge me, her gaze still on Silas, who seems to be going through his own personal nightmare.

“What did Ephegos promise you in return for your spy work? Did he offer you a better future? A new family? A home?”

Myron and Kaira shared everything that happened in that clearing after Tata fled and Clio returned to Aceleau with Andraya and Pouly to save them and warn Rogue.

I know the exact words Ephegos used: I gave her a family.

The Flames took me in like a brother, and so I’ll take her in like a sister.

Sister to the king of oh so many realms.

“You wouldn’t understand,” is all Tata replies, gaze on the leather string.

“Try me.” I push, ignoring the others’ stares of disapproval. “Don’t forget I’m considered a traitor, just like you. I swore an oath to Ephegos, just like you.” I lean closer, whispering the last few words. “I fell into his trap, just like you. So perhaps I do understand.”

Like a whip, Tata’s eyes snap to mine, full of hatred.

“You made a bargain because you are a fool. You’ve always had a family; you just chose between two parts of it, while my family—” She breaks off, gaze snapping back to Silas, and deep sorrow softens her expression.

“I have nothing to say. Leave me alone, or kill me.”

“You regard your life that little?” It’s Kaira who knows what to say to that, not the fairy general, Silas, or me.

“Either you’re a great liar, which I fully believe you are, or you wouldn’t have fooled all of us for such a long time, or you’re as stupid as this oaf of a Crow right here.

” I try not to cringe when Kaira gestures at me.

“Or both.” She shakes her head. “Probably both. You’re a stupid liar. ”

I take solace in the fact that Kaira’s insult gets Tata’s attention enough to rouse her to lean forward. At least, my presence is useful in some way.

“You know nothing about me, Kaira.”

Kaira shoves herself between Tata and Silas, putting herself in the one spot where Tata is most likely to look, and braces her hands on her hips.

“You’ve got the perfect opportunity to share whatever you know right now, or I’ll take it from you, Tata.

I don’t care what happened in your past. I don’t care if Ephegos offered you a place where you belong, a family, or even a crown.

I don’t fucking care because you put my family in jeopardy because of it.

A family where you could have had a place yet rejected it.

You chose to spy on us and report every plan, every move to our enemy.

You pretended to be on our side and fought Erina’s men in the borderlands.

You killed members of your new family to fool us.

What did Ephegos say to that? Is that the sort of sister he was looking to take in? ”

Tata isn’t prepared for her words, but I’m prepared for any reaction she might show, and when she launches herself at the Flameling, I throw myself between them, taking the impact of Tata’s attack.

Astorian curses, and Kaira stumbles back as I hit her front, pushed by Tata’s weight.

Thank the gods, Tata doesn’t have any major magic that she could use to harm us in here.

I tighten the shield I conjured around the Flame and me before entering the cell anyway, probing it for any sign Tata tore holes in it.

Astorian and Silas have Tata on her knees and locked in a tight hold by her arms in a heartbeat, leaving me to spin around and check if Kaira was injured.

She waves a dismissive hand. “I’m fine,” she tells me in my mind, and I can breathe a little easier.

“Last chance, Tata,” Kaira says out loud, stalking toward the female like a predator, each movement graceful, lethal.

Every fiber of my being stands at attention at the sight of her zeroing in on her prey.

“Tell us everything you know. Every last little detail Ephegos shared with you, every move he’s planned, or we’ll take it by force. ”

That earns her a dark laugh from Tata, who spits at Kaira’s feet.

“What are you doing in this court of failures, Kaira? What are you doing kneeling at the feet of a king and queen who will never rule over anything but dust and ashes when you could be sitting at the side of an emperor who will rule over realms you can’t even imagine? ”

Her words hang in the air until my patience snaps, and I send a flash of silver power to slap her. An angry red blotch blooms on her cheek before she realizes what happened.

“You speak about my court like that again and this blow will look like a caress compared to what I’ll do to you.” My words are out before I can rethink them, and I half-expect the others to scold me, but I don’t even get a warning glance.