Page 40 of The Crown of a Fallen Queen (Curse of the Fae #4)

Visiting Hours

SETH

L etting my cousins imprison me was a mistake.

The cell is too quiet. Unrefined lyranthium deposits line the walls, and the reflective stones glimmer with hints of blue and purple, the color of old bruises.

Even the bars are threaded with lyranthium, the metal feeding on my magic and draining it to the dregs.

There’s no possible escape from this fancy cage dressed down as a drunk tank—not for a Storm Fae.

What is Devi doing? Is she safe?

I see her face behind my closed lids—those striking silver eyes, and the mocking tilt of her mouth when she teases me. The way she gets quiet and bites her cheeks when she’s thinking. The shimmer of her faint scars.

Alaric took her prisoner, and I know he won’t pass up the chance to avenge his wounded pride. The realm is in chaos, and Devi is branded a criminal and a traitor. He’s got carte blanche to do whatever he wants to her.

A cold, sinking sense of dread licks my ribs.

Even when we were friends, Alaric was vicious. And he always lusted for what he couldn’t have. The Royal Academy. Being a dual wielder. His father’s love. Whatever Devi is to me now… I shouldn’t have brought her here.

I should’ve known better, but I never imagined Alaric could have already taken his father’s place. My uncle was young and strong, unlikely to die this century.

My hands curl into fists, useless without magic.

Lyranthium saps more than power. It strips away distraction and leaves you alone with your regrets, your mistakes. It takes away your hopes and dreams, and every single one of my doom-laden thoughts leads back to Devi Eros.

If Alaric touches her—if he lays a single hand on her, with that sly, calculating smile—I’ll burn through every layer of this prison to avenge her. Even if it kills me.

The soft flutter of Percy’s wings stirs the air, and my heart booms at the now familiar sound.

I jump to my feet and clutch the metal bars in front of me, my knuckles white at the strain.

It was reckless for him to sneak in once, let alone twice.

It would only take one flick of a Storm Fae’s wrist to scorch him, and yet, I’m glad to see him.

When he’s here, I’m no longer drowning in catastrophic scenarios.

I have a thread back to Devi, a chance to warn her, to plan an escape.

“Percy?”

The Faeling wiggles through a narrow crack in the outer wall.

“ Urfpth ,” he grunts, halfway through. “I should really lose weight.”

I let out a small chuckle, relieved to see his sense of humor is still intact. If he’s making jokes, it means Devi’s safe.

“Is she alright?” I breathe.

“By Eros,” he mutters, “you two sound exactly the same.”

A smile tugs at my lips. “She asked about me?”

He lands on the bracket of the lone torch lighting the prison and fixes his clothes, dusting off grime from his purple tweed jacket and hair. “She’s been summoned to dinner.”

He opens his mouth, then presses his lips together, like he was about to add something and thought better of it.

My brows furrow. “Should you be here, then? Devi might need you if anything happens.”

“I need to know exactly what happened between you and Alaric, why you think he poses a danger, and what kind of man we’re dealing with.”

By the spindle, recounting my twisted history with Ric would take hours.

“It’s a long story,” I say.

Percy’s wings twitch. “I need more. Tell me everything you know about him. In detail.”

I hit the bars with my opened palms. “It’s hard to think about. I was young, I—” I exhale hard through my nose. “It’s not pretty.”

“As mistakes so often are,” Percy cracks.

A wince wrinkles my face. “It might alter your opinion of me.”

“As secrets so often do.” He waves off my concerns. “Don’t hold back, pretty boy. The more I know about the vendetta linking you two bums, the better I can advise my mistress.”

I walk away from the bars, threading deeper into the cell.

“After I graduated from the Royal Academy, I was desperate to be accepted by my father. It was a fool’s quest, but I didn’t know it yet.

I came to Deiltine under an assumed name and worked as a technician, until my uncle figured it out.

He wanted to send me straight back to the Secret Springs, but I begged him to let me stay, to earn my place here.

No nepotism—I worked. Day and night, fixing the wind turbines on the western cliffs.

The ones that get the worst of the wind. ”

I rub my hands over my face. “I’m not proud of all the choices I made back then, but I’m happy with the work I did.

The effort I put in. It was potatoes and leeks nearly every day, and a cot that barely counted as such.

Alaric was a few years younger than I was—he’d just failed the Royal Academy trials, so he was just as desperate to prove himself. And a little unhinged.”

My eyes dart down. Unhinged is not enough of a word to describe Alaric, and my throat burns. I couldn’t see it sooner, young as I was and so desperate to belong. So happy to get a real Storm Fae on my side… I didn’t want to admit, even to myself, how cruel he really was.

I swallow back a sigh. I dug my own grave where Alaric was concerned, and I should be enough of a man to own up to my mistakes. It’s cathartic to confide in Percy, to confess . I just hope he won’t hate me for it.

“Alaric hated me, at first, but we were the only high-borns. I was a bastard, sure, but I had the education, the accent, the posture. To the common folks, I was still a High Fae. We got bullied for it. Hazed. Relentlessly. In between black eyes and ritual humiliation, we became friends. At the end of our year-long posting, he invited me to spend Scebaan with his family. We were to attend the royal ball in Zepharion, where my father would finally see me as a man.”

Scebaan. The wild end of the Fae year.

I pause, the memory worming its way through my heart. “I’ve learned since then that less is more, and that no amount of hard work can make up for being an unwanted and unloved child.”

“Go on,” Percy says.

“If Beltane is meant for fucking your spouse and St. John’s Eve gives you an excuse for fucking anyone but, then Scebaan is a break from traditions. A respite from social norms. One long night when Fae are allowed to get lost in the storm, before we start the year anew.”

Percy raises a brow. “Yes, as Spring Queen, Devi used to attend the Storm King’s ball on Scebaan. Partied a little too hard, did you?”

“As the firstborn son and heir to the warden, Alaric was engaged to Katia Brimvale, the eldest daughter of Lord Brimvale, my father’s right-hand man.

” My fists clench at my sides. “I was angry that night. My father wanted nothing to do with me—even after I’d wasted a whole year trying to prove I was tough enough, clever enough, and dark enough to be his son.

“I left the ballroom and found Katia trying to sneak into the catacombs. She kissed me, and I was wasted, so I took her where the young, single Fae from the different courts had gathered. Maddox had arranged for a night of debauchery, and Katia, Alaric, and I ended up celebrating Scebaan in a very…deliberate fashion.”

“Is that all? You had a threesome?”

He’s missing the point. “This isn’t the Secret Springs.

Storm Fae are weary of these sort of things, especially when an unmarried woman is involved.

Maidens aren’t allowed to take part in the celebrations.

Alaric expected Katia to save herself for him, and in the morning, he accused me of using my powers on her.

Publicly. He said that my magic was to blame for her weakness, and that without me there, she would have had the sense to say no. He demanded reparation from my father.”

“He could have married her, still.”

I bite the inside of my cheeks, debating whether to elaborate. “He thought she’d been… spoiled.”

Percy grits his teeth. “What happened to her?”

He clearly resents me for relaying Alaric’s views, even though I don’t share them.

“I have no idea,” I admit. “My father relinquished a hundred acres of land in the Brimvale to the Raynes and sent me back to Spring. I was forbidden from setting foot in Storm’s End for decades after that, until the Storm Queen passed away.”

“And your pal, Alaric? He’s still angry about something that happened almost half a century ago?”

“He’s not a forgiving person, but I’m valuable to him. My brothers would most likely be inclined to confirm Alaric’s command of Deiltine if I was returned to Zepharion in one piece. But Devi’s another matter.”

A metallic groan echoes down the corridor, followed by the heavy clink of boots. My pulse swirls.

“You have to go.”

Percy curses under his breath and scrambles up to the ceiling to wedge himself back into the crack in the wall, wings tucked tight.

The door opens without jangling keys or clanging chains, just the creak of metal on stone. Footsteps follow.

Alaric smiles.

I brace against the bars once more. “Where’s Devi?”

He cocks his head. “Still obsessed with pretty women, I see. Or is this one special?”

I should keep my feelings close to the vest, but I can’t help myself. “I’m supposed to bring her back in one piece,” I say instead, trying to hide my concern under a veneer of duty.

“Don’t play with words, Sethanias,” he says with an overdose of pep. “Your Devi has agreed to do me a favor in exchange for your freedom, so she’s accompanying me to the ball tomorrow night.”

“A ball?”

Whatever deal he dangled in front of her, I don’t trust it.

Alaric would rather cut off his own arm than let me walk away scot-free. Devi is about to walk straight into a trap.

“You’re still single, I hear,” I taunt him.

“And I have you to thank for that.”

It’s dangerous, poking the unstable bear that now rules the grittiest province of Storm’s End, but I have to figure out his real plan, and Percy is probably still within earshot.

“It’s rare that Deiltine hosts a ball…especially in Spring, when the storms are most active.

Are you planning on getting engaged tomorrow? ”

Alaric is the oldest of the three Raynes, but his brothers have just as much magic—if not more. If Alaric wants to remain warden in a difficult political climate, if he hopes to win his family’s seat, he’s going to need somebody else’s magic and influence.

“That’s the idea. For your sake, you better hope your Devi is as powerful as the legends say…” he trails off, and my pulse picks up.

“Who do you have in mind?”

“Luckily, you wouldn’t know her. Lord Grimmage keeps his daughters on a tighter leash than Lord Brimvale did.”

The name rings a bell… He couldn’t be talking about Tatiana Grimmage? Is he serious? She must be twenty, at most, though rumored to be the strongest of the bunch, and incredibly beautiful.

“Isn’t Tatiana Grimmage betrothed to my brother Maddox?”

“Engagements can be broken. You taught me that lesson the hard way.”

Fuck. Judging by the villainous grin on his lips, he asked Devi to shoot the girl with a forbidden arrow.

It doesn’t surprise me—Alaric would rather manipulate an unwilling woman’s affection than settle for a less-powerful bride.

Under different circumstances, Devi might even acquiesce to his demand, but the renowned archer has no bow, no quiver, and no arrows.

She can’t use her magic. Alaric doesn’t know that, which is good.

But how long can she keep up the charade?

With the end-all blade in play, Devi might get a chance to kill him. She’s ruthless when she wants to be, faster than her size suggests, and unpredictable enough to catch him off guard. Let’s just pray he’s not smart enough to search her.