Page 21 of Lifeblood

Maybe fate was trying to teach Gareth a lesson the same way she’d taught me one.

Lance must have caught the look because he inhaled loudly and with great exaggeration before taking steps toward the palace entrance. “Let’s just try it our way first to settle the chaos, okay?”

“Sure,” I said as he walked away. Gareth followed him, then Tristan, leaving me behind with only Mordred, who, if possible, looked even paler in direct sunlight.

He squinted as if on cue. “Follow me.”

And I did, but Mordred remained quiet, so I followed suit. Clearly, whatever discussion they’d had last night in the Shard’s throne room after I had left had been both fruitful in producing some decision, and also not exactly civil. Given how the four kings had actedinmy presence, I shouldn’t have been surprised.

Mordred quickly passed me off to a few female attendants in simple but elegant dresses. They treated me much the same as the demonic attendants in the Shard, which was to say moving me quickly and efficiently out of the sight of prying eyes and into a room filled with wardrobes of clothes. Clothes all the other women who’d ever won this lottery had probably worn before being… apparently not killed, but certainlydisappeared.

Gods, I wanted to know the truth about that so badly. If they hadn’t been killed, wherewerethey? And why would the demon kings not tell me?

The fact that something scared them all like this didn’t sit well with me. And it wouldn’t with any sane person.

The attendants aided me through readying myself for the kings, but once I’d been bathed and clothed in a new dress—this one shorter and pale pink, much to my distaste—we waited for at least an hour to be summoned. These ladies, unlike the purple-haired and sunflower attendants in the Shard, were not chatty. Even amongst themselves. I gave up trying after the first few minutes and just went where they told me and did as recommended.

By the time the doors to these chambers opened and revealed Lance in a bright pink and purple but fancy suit, I was so relieved to see someone I knew who’d actually talk to me that I ignored the hard set of his jaw until he stood before me and offered me his arm.

I rested mine on his and he began to lead us away. Only once I was this close to him and the stiffness in his jaw and form continued did I look up into the fae demon’s eyes and ask, “What’s wrong?”

“My fellow kings and I are not in agreement on how to proceed.” His body language said everything he’d left out.

“Gareth,” I guessed.

Lance gave the smallest of nods as we walked. He wasn’t looking at me, but rather, straight ahead. “I’m in agreement, I think, with your proposal of sharing, but Gareth is obviously opposed. I’m sure Mordred would prefer to have you alone as well. It’s been so long since any of us have indulged in the blood of a lifeblood.”

I glanced up at him. “How long can you go without it?”

That cracked a little smile on Lance’s lips, but it was hollow. “At least a hundred years. When did the last of your kind die?”

I bit the inside of my cheek.Fair enough. “Does that mean you’re all dying slowly?”

“It means we’re more desperate than any of the others would like to admit,” Lance said with a reluctant inhale. Like he also didn’t want to admit it but was throwing caution to the wind, given the situation. I fully understood. “There are a few things at play, Ava. Our dwindling immortality is—in my opinion, at least—the least of our worries. But they wouldn’t agree with that.”

He gestured toward the end of the ornate corridor we were passing through to a set of wide, two-story golden doors that had been embossed with floral and celestial designs.

“We’ll go with their plan for now, misguided though I think it may be,” Lance continued. “Head through that door. You’ll find the great hall empty of tables but instead full of strings latticed around the space. The idea is for you to follow one to one of us. They think fate will guide you to your true mate match amongst us.”

My eyes narrowed on the door. “I thought it was pretty obvious that we’re all in this together.”

Lance lifted my arm from his and began to back away casually. “It’s obvious to me as well, but let’s humor them, Ava.” Then he disappeared through another door along the corridor, leaving me standing there alone and questioning why of all the demon kings, I most agreed with the mercurial fae demon.

I focused again on the door in front of me. Even with Lance having disappeared through a door, I could still feel his presence. The demonic aura was diminishing the farther away he went, but our mate bond crossed the distance, coiling around me like a warm cocoon. I felt the other three mate bonds snap into place as well as I stood there outside the doors to the great hall. Gareth, Mordred, and Tristan were nearby. Waiting, probably.

The longer I stood there, the less I wanted to enter. Leaving all of this up to fate orstringsin some silly game seemed foolish. An even worse way to prevent a war than letting me decide. Although I supposed thiswassort of like letting me decide.

But fate had already screwed me once. Granted, I’d avoided her and her wishes for nearly two hundred years first, but still.

“Fine,” I said as I began walking toward the door. Raising my chin, I pushed it open, eager to get this over with.

I found in the great hall exactly what Lance had described. A massive, beautifully decorated hall with arched ceilings lined in frescoes and paintings. The grand tables that might have lined the space on a normal day had been pushed to the sides of the room to make space for strings that crisscrossed the large space. Directly in front of the entrance where I was standing was a table with four strings anchored by golden weights and a note in script that read:Choose one and follow. Fate will pick the one to be your mate.

Frustration bloomed within me, hot and fierce. They wereallmy mates. Why couldn’t they see that? Why was I, the one person affected by this the most, the only one willing to share? Aside from Lance, anyway. This entire game was more about dealing with their egos and entitlement and nothing to do with me choosing for them.Theycouldn’t decide.Theycouldn’t come to an agreement amongst themselves.

So it was up to me. Apparently.

There was a part of me that simply wanted to figure out which string was Lance’s and follow it with the sole purpose of then forcing them all to share, since then that’d be the only way they could have me. But they’d probably see right through it—Lance definitely would. And considering I was still asort ofprisoner, regardless of what they said, I needed to play along for now.

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