Page 116 of The Night Prince

“No.” We make it to the entrance hall, and the torches are being lit by Kayleigh, who looks between us, wide-eyed, aswe pass. Callum pushes open the double doors and steps into the Madadh-allaidh courtyard. “You’ll see.”

The courtyard is quiet. A few Wolves mill around—a servant carrying chicken feed, Fiona, who waves a hand before walking through the archway toward the stables, and Lochlan and a few of his men. I assume they have been training from the way their shirts cling to their chests, and the way they gather around the water pump. My breath mists in front of my face.

Callum turns to face Philip in the center of the courtyard. He draws his sword and drops the sheath onto the cobblestones.

Philip cocks his head to one side, his nose curling up. “Are you serious?”

Callum roars as he whips the blade through the air. In a lithe, graceful movement, Philip unsheathes his weapon and raises it to block Callum’s blow. The sound of steel on steel reverberates through the courtyard. Birds nesting in the walls take flight, their wings flapping as they head toward the mountains. The Wolves around the water pump stop their conversation and turn to watch.

The force of Callum’s blow should have shattered Philip’s arm. Philip throws him off. The two males go at each other, and my lips part.

Callum is brutal, every blow deliberate and designed to overpower his opponent. His biceps ripple beneath his sleeves, and he grunts as he brings the sword down upon my brother. Philip blocks and dodges every blow. It’s like watching fire battle water. A hammer clashing with steel. He is the opposite of Callum’s brutality yet no less efficient—he moves as if he’s dancing.

A muttering fills the courtyard as more people going about their morning chores stop to watch. I’m frozen, my mindnot able to make sense of what I’m seeing. Callum is a battle-hardened alpha, while Philip is a spoiled drunken fool. And they are equally matched.

“Is that all you’ve got, princeling?” Callum kicks Philip in the torso, and sends him staggering back.

Philip glances up and smirks. He winks, and when I follow his gaze, I catch Isla scowling through the window above the oak doors. “Not quite.”

Philip goes on the offensive, and I realize I was wrong. They’re not a match. Philip is better. He slices his blade through the air and dances around Callum. His moves are ethereal yet deadly.

There must be twelve Wolves out in the yard now. They gather around the two with interest in their eyes. Callum’s claim to the throne is already weak, and my brother is beating him. If he were to win, I dread to think of the violence that would befall both them and me.

Yet when Callum staggers back, a soft laugh escapes his lips. “Lochlan,” he says.

He ducks back, into the circle of Wolves, and Lochlan darts forward to block Philip’s next blow. He attacks Philip, and Philip adapts instantly. Lochlan’s style is almost as brutal as Callum’s, and his steps have some of Philip’s grace, yet Philip outmatches him too. The two parry each other’s blows, and Philip doesn’t seem to tire.

This doesn’t make sense. This is the male who would drunkenly bellow through the palace halls with a bloodied nose and the scent of perfume on his collar.

My eyes find Callum as he watches. A smile ghosts his lips. “A keg of ale to anyone who can knock this perfumed princeling on his spoiled southern arse.”

The Wolves watching laugh. Two men dart forward and join the fray. Philip disarms one of them, and sends the other reeling back. Another raises his sword. Philip ducks, then swipes out his leg and sends him flying.

By the time Philip is holding his own against five Wolves, his blade a blur in the grey light, my fear ebbs away and all I can do is stare, dumbfounded.

“That’s enough,” says Callum, amused, when four of them are on the floor, and only Lochlan still stands against him—and even he is breathing hard.

Lochlan shrugs a shoulder at Callum. Philip glances up at Isla, whose mouth is parted. Slightly breathless, he bows elaborately, and her scowl reappears before she disappears from the window.

“You’ll do,” says Callum.

Philip turns on Callum, eyes widening. “Do for what?”

Callum strides toward Philip and clasps him on the shoulder. “Pack a bag. I’ve got a job for you.”

He heads toward me, his expression softening. Something sad swells inside me when he towers before me.

“A word, please, Princess. I think it’s time for us to have that conversation.”

Chapter Fifty-Three

Callum takes me up a narrow stairway to the top of the castle’s curtain wall.

He walks to the edge, and rests his forearms on the stone wall. I stand beside him, and his body heat stops me from feeling the early morning chill. Mist whispers across the loch far below, and thick clouds hide the peaks of the mountains. The evergreens to the left rustle in the breeze, their pine needles black in the low light. For a moment, we are silent—drinking in the peace. I wonder if, like me, he wonders how long it will last.

“My father took James and me up here on the first night we arrived at Madadh-allaidh,” he says, his voice rough. “That way is the enemy, he told us.” He gestures south, over the forest. “And that way is home.” He inclines his head toward the mountains in the north.

“Highfell.”

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