Page 112 of Fearless

We eat. Talk idly. Attempt to repair the bond we once had.

“Any plans for the night?”

I smile at his question. “Just the usual.”

In truth, I have a very exciting evening ahead of me, one that the king would never allow if he knew.

I nearly step on Kai’s reply when I return to my room.

You think I would not beg to run away with you? My duty may be to the king, but my heart, Pae, is wherever you are. Itis in the palm of your hands, the pad of your thumb. So if you leave, I will follow. If you stay, I will bow. Because there has never been a moment when you did not own the only piece of me that mattered—loving you made me matter. And I ache to be full again.

I sit there, stunned and still and staring at the very meaning of devotion. I’ve never witnessed beauty look so content in its brokenness. Unabashedly, he pleads for me. Unflinchingly, he lays every mask at my feet.

My gaze falls to the final line, and the corner of my mouth twitches upward.

(Oh, I can bite. You only need to ask, darling.)

I slip his note into the drawer of my bedside table, reuniting it with the others before taking a seat at the desk. My father’s ring raps against the wood as I fight to write those three little words that clog my throat. They are seemingly harmless until those who earn them are ripped away from me. I shake my head, writing instead a short string of letters.

On paper, you really do sound like a poet. Or a fool. I won’t let you ruin yourself for me.

His response arrives quickly.

I want you to be my ruin, remember?

Edric

The princes are inseparable.

Kitt balances a book on his lap, though it’s difficult to focus on anything with his younger brother waving a wooden sword in his face. Myla stands to comb back Kai’s unruly hair, all while ignoring the boy’s huff of irritation. With the turning of a page, Edric’s heir grows suddenly studious in the presence of a mother who is not his.

Both boys have been continually told the very same lie as the kingdom beyond their castle walls. Kitt’s mother died giving birth to him before the king remarried and had Kai, making the princes half brothers. That is what they know to be true. Anyone who knows differently is part of the staff, sworn to secrecy, and stowed away within the palace.

In the many years of Edric’s marriage to Myla Rowe, a unique kind of love had blossomed between them. She was bold and stubborn in a way that Iris never had been, managing to rile the king more than he cared to admit. It was a rocky road that led them to each other, one that neither imagined treading. But Edric’s stony heart had started beating again, still only for his Myla.

The family clutters the king’s study, though two members are missing. One a weak child who remains in the west tower, and the other a forgotten princess who is just that. Edric thinks no more of the daughter he doomed to death. Rather, Iris’s end by something as weak as an Ordinary only enflames his hatred for them. And he will stop at nothing until his kingdom is rid of every last one. They were a mistake he is determined to remedy.

Myla looks up at her husband, watching him pore over the puddle of parchment on his desk. She offers him that bright smile, the one Edric had spent their first year of marriage coaxing out of her. For his wife, the king smiles back.

Catching the odd show of emotion, Kitt straightens before beaming at his father.

Edric only nods to the book in his heir’s hand and does not smile back.

CHAPTER 40Paedyn

The halls are quiet at this hour.

Shadows paint the ornate molding in an ominous light as I pass by. I’ve spent the entire day confined to my room or slipping notes beneath Kai’s door. It was a pleasant distraction until nightfall. But now I’m off to restore balance to the world, peace to my mind. I have been aching to do this since that final Trial, since returning from the Fort with rekindled vengeance.

I turn a corner and—

A flash of lilac in the moonlight.

There she stands, casually leaning against the wall. A dull look rests on the face she turns toward me, boredom creasing her brow. “So, apparently, you think you can kill me.”

My dagger is already gripped between trembling fingers. The image of Adena’s limp body in my lap is all I see when I meet Blair’s unfeeling gaze. I think of Mak and his hurt that magnifies my own. Anger explodes behind my vision, rage momentarily blinding me as I stride toward her. “I will do so much worse,” I pant. “I’ll make you beg.”

Blair’s laugh is breathy. “You know, I like you much more like this. It’s a shame you’re trying to kill me when we could be such good friends.”

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