Page 11

Chapter 11

Caspian

Blair.

It was all I could think about.

I’d met my baby cousin all of once, soon after her birth. The family had had a party, and her parents had, grudgingly, brought her all the way to Sunrunner Palace to get my father’s blessing. Even if they didn’t give a single damn about my father—and retrospect and experience told me that they did not—his position still meant something in our lands.

I didn’t even remember their names, her parents. Only the baby that I’d been so taken with at the party. I’d still been wishing for a younger sibling, despite knowing beyond a doubt that I’d never have one.

I’d wanted Blair for my own.

So I’d saddled her with this.

With the possibility of Aunt Rachel trying to kill her.

That, finally, was what made me admit the truth to myself.

Aunt Rachel had always hated me. She hated most of the family. She’d been no more friendly to Blair’s parents than she had to me or Mom, thinking that every single person who was ever born into the Sunrunner family was some kind of usurper, trying to steal the legacy for ourselves. It didn’t matter that we had as much tie to, as much claim to, that legacy as she did. She had always seemed to think she was the only true Sunrunner, and the rest of us were an annoyance.

That the rest of us were in her way.

Which, it turned out, might be precisely what she thought.

Frost helped me into the passenger seat of the enormous car Ember had brought, settling me in and going so far as to buckle my safety belt for me, like I might forget to do it myself.

When Kit joined him standing in the door of the passenger seat, he was holding up the car keys. Frost looked at them, then at Kit, and finally shook his head. “Tomorrow. I’ll—” he broke off and took a shallow breath, lifting a hand to his head. “I’ll drive tomorrow. Right now I’m starting to see double.”

What?

My head snapped up and I stared at him. “You’re sick? We’re at the hospital, we can?—”

“It’s power overuse,” Kit interrupted, shaking his head. Then he hesitated. “You will be all right, yes?”

“I’ll be fine,” Frost promised. “I’ve done worse than this in practice. There’s a reason Vex has always pushed me as far as I could go. He knew we’d need it eventually.”

Kit nodded, dropping the keys into his own pocket. “I’ll drive tonight, and you can take over tomorrow, if it’s better. Just as well for me to find a hotel, since you and Ember would pick the obvious one.”

Frost cocked his head. “Obvious one?”

Kit glanced at me, then back to Frost, biting his lip.

“You think my father is dead,” I told him.

He sighed, leaning on the door frame and nodding. “I think he’s been dead since before you and Ember left Verisa. That’s why they tracked you all the way to Dawnchaser lands to have a go at killing you. She’s getting desperate to get the job done, because the timing is so vital.”

“Then why are we looking for Dane at all?” Frost asked, looking like the most adorable, confused puppy ever born.

“Because we don’t know anything for sure. We have no proof he’s dead. So we have to investigate, and that means starting at the beginning and tracking his movements until we find him.” He turned and looked at me. “But the most important part of the job isn’t even finding your dad. It’s making sure you’re still alive at the end of this mess.”

“And Blair,” I added, automatically. The idea that my father was dead saddened me, but in a distant way. Like thinking about my mother being dead. The truth was that my father hadn’t truly been Dane Sunrunner, much less a father to me, since my mother’s death. Blair? She was just an innocent kid who might be in Aunt Rachel’s crosshairs because I’d been a lonely little brat.

Kit didn’t even question me, just nodded. “And Blair.” He glanced over at Ember, who’d climbed into the back of the car, then shook his head. “I know how to handle that. I have an old acquaintance who spends a lot of time in Sunrunner lands who’ll make sure your cousin survives this mess.”

Without another word, he pulled back, tugging Frost along with him and closing my door with a soft click, then ushering his brother into the seat right behind mine before climbing into the driver’s seat.

As he drove, he dialed the phone.

“Fox,” came a terse voice after two rings.

“Major,” Kit said, just as terse. “Unsecure line. I have a job for you.”

“On an unsecure line?” the man asked, amusement dripping from his voice.

“Yup,” Kit agreed. “Job’s on the up-and-up for once in your life. Find Blair Sunrunner and make sure she doesn’t get dead.”

“Blair Sunrunner? Never heard of her. What’s the pay?”

“Standard,” Kit answered, and I had no idea what standard pay was for saving someone’s life, but whatever it was, I’d make sure it was paid if he protected Blair. “Since she’s second in line to the Sunrunner family, she shouldn’t be too hard to find, but that’s half the problem. Rachel Sunrunner is third, and she’s trying to pave that path. She’s throwing money around to amateurs to see it done.”

The groan on the other end of the line was almost a living thing, so annoyed that I was almost embarrassed on Aunt Rachel’s behalf, even though she was trying to kill me. “Fine. I can find her. Who’s on the heir?”

Kit snorted at that. “Me, of course. And my brother, who’s gonna marry the little bastard.”

“I’m what?” Frost whisper-squeaked behind me, while I stared blankly at Kit as he navigated our way out of the hospital parking lot.

The man on the other end of the line laughed uproariously. “Finally admitting you’re not just an automaton with a sword, Fox? Brother, is it?”

“Brother,” Kit agreed. “And you can spread the word on that, that if anything ever happens to him . . . well, you know.”

“Like anyone with half a brain would piss you off on purpose.” There was a roaring noise on the other end of the line. “Okay, I’m in Amalion City right now. I’ll get Sarin on finding Blair Sunrunner, and we’ll see her through this. You want me to bring her somewhere?”

“Her parents don’t know she’s in danger,” Kit pointed out. “So that might be hard to do.”

The man snorted. “Please. How old is she? Weapons training?”

I wanted to point out that she was a kid, but wasn’t sure Kit wanted me interrupting his conversation, so I kept my mouth shut.

“No kidnapping unless you have to,” Kit said. “But she’s a child. Ten or twelve. I’d assume no weapons training.”

I nodded at that. Her father—my cousin—had been a writer, I thought, with some kind of small animal shift. A prairie dog? Certainly not the kind of parent who’d insist on dueling training.

The man laughed again. “On my way, Fox. And you owe me a hundred.”

“Done,” Kit agreed, and reached out to hit the button to hang up the call. He held up his hand for a few seconds after hitting it, then dropped it. “Okay, line’s disconnected, he can’t hear you.”

Ember was the first one to speak up. “Did you just offer that guy a hundred grand to protect Caspian’s cousin?”

Kit snorted, shaking his head in disgust. “No. I owe him a hundred dollars. I bet him he’d call me for help before I called him. I offered to pay him the standard going rate for protecting Caspian’s cousin. Could be a lot less than a hundred grand. Could be more. Depends on what happens.”

He glanced over at me, eyebrow lifted. “I assumed you wouldn’t have an upper limit in mind.”

“I don’t care what it costs,” I agreed. “I can’t—Blair can’t die because of me.”

He made a sudden turn, the tires screeching, and looked back at Frost. “Sorry. We were being followed, needed to make sure it was intentional.”

“Was it?” Ember asked, clinging to the door handle.

He watched the rearview mirror a while, then shrugged. “He didn’t get in an accident to try to continue following us, so maybe not.”

“Could have been the cops,” Frost said, but there was something wrong with his voice. It was hoarse and papery, making me turn around in my seat to get a better look at him. He was so pale . . .

I was about to undo my seat belt when Kit’s hand clamped down on my shoulder. “He’s got a migraine. You’ve got a concussion. Both of you just sit there while I get us to a hotel. No crawling out of your seat to check on him. Ember’s got this.”

He grumbled something about how he should have put us both in the back so we’d have been able to look after each other, but he didn’t make any motions to stop the car.

Behind me, I heard a pill bottle rattle, then Ember said, “Here, take these. It’ll help.”

Kit passed back a bottle of water, and then Ember passed it back up, along with a bottle of aspirin.

I held up a hand to ward it off. “Still have morphine in me. I’d throw up again.”

She curled her nose but took the bottle back.

As the morphine wore off, my aches and pains got worse, but frankly, I thought all of us were in that boat. Even Kit, the only one who’d come out of the accident with no apparent injury, would occasionally squirm with discomfort in his seat, no doubt having strained and tired muscles.

Still, he drove for hours like that. At first in circles, then down a highway I didn’t know, and then in some more circles.

By the time he pulled up in front of a hotel, it was well past dark, and I was starting to nod off. The snoring emanating from the backseat told me I wasn’t the only one. I had no idea where we were, even though we were clearly in Sunrunner lands. The dry air and desert landscape as we climbed out of the car told me that.

Kit helped us all out, Ember mumbling to him that “it was probably the cops following us, if anyone was.”

He patted her on the back, nodding. “Probably. But the more people who know where we are, the more danger we’re in. Including the cops.”

He only got one room this time, and he paid in cash before leading us around to the back, where our room was. It was a motel, I realized, and as we all sort of collapsed onto the beds, Kit moved the car to a spot near, but not in front of the door to the room we were in.

I never would have thought of a thing like that. Clearly, I was no spy, and I’d never survive on the run.

Good thing I didn’t usually have to live my life this way.

What if we didn’t stop Aunt Rachel, though? What if I had to keep running from her forever?

I thought back to Kit telling his . . . friend? . . . that Frost was going to marry me. Ignoring the fact that Frost and I barely knew each other, it was a sweet thought, but I’d never do that to him. He deserved to have a stable life, not one trying to escape murder constantly.

But also, how long could I really run? How long could this continue, particularly if my father was never found?

“Sleep,” Kit muttered, pointing to the empty space on the bed next to Frost. “I know it’s not how you imagined sharing a bed with him, but for now, we’re all beggars. No choosing allowed.”

How I’d imagined sharing a bed with Frost?

Little did Kit know, I’d never gotten all that far. Oh, Frost was gorgeous, and I’d have had to be dead not to notice and think about him. But I’d never even gotten to the point of imagining us in bed together, barring that half-formed dream that had taken place in my car.

Even more now, I wondered at the wisdom of it. For most of my life I’d tried not to imagine a future at all, since I wasn’t sure I’d be there for it.

But now? I was almost certain I wasn’t going to live to see next month, so dragging Frost into that . . .

No, I’d already dragged Frost into that.

Now I just had to make sure that if it killed someone, it was only me.