Page 12 of A Flame of the Phoenix

A hand encased her upper arm, and she released a whimper. It guided her, and the moment she met those emerald eyes, Faythe broke.

Shattered.

Tears slipped from her eyes when she blinked hard to clear her vision, but she smiled with such elation that it broke through her resistance to feeling anything at all since having been torn from Reylan.

“It’s really you…” she breathed. His smile was a piece of treasure given at her most dire time. “Nik.”

They embraced tightly, and she didn’t care for the ugly display as she sobbed into his hood. Faythe breathed his scent to calm her. Her human senses had never been able to detect the notes within—hints of vanilla and meadows, then deeper. It had a smoky essence, not like fire but a storm. She committed it all to memory.

Faythe shut out the questions of this chance meeting. Why he was here; how he’d found her. All she clung to was the impossible gift that consumed her.

“I suppose I should order a few more drinks,” Kyleer cut in when she was beginning to come down from her high.

Faythe pulled back, lingering one last look on her dear friend before she was alerted to the fact he wasn’t alone.

She let Nik go in her shock.

“Nerida?”

The healer beamed brightly as they stepped for each other and collided.

“I knew we would meet again soon,” she said in that beautiful, melodic voice of hers.

Gods, Faythe felt in another realm with this reunion. It was lifting her from a dark pit she hadn’t thought she’d be able to claw her way out of. There’d been no light until now. But asshe scanned the others, it shone brighter, reminding her not everything was lost.

“It’s so good to see you, Your Highness,” Lycus said, smiling knowingly, and Faythe choked a sob.

She also found a breathtakingly beautiful fae female with auburn hair by his side. The fae offered a timid smile of greeting, then the person who’d crept close to Nerida…

Faythe blinked at the Prince of Olmstone.

“We have a lot to catch up on,” Nik said, but his tone wasn’t all cheerful, and Faythe acknowledged their reunion might hold heavy tales on both sides for him to be here without…

“Tauria,” Faythe breathed, whirling to Nik.

She’d never seen such desolation overcome him in an instant. Nik flicked a look to Kyleer behind her and gave a quick survey of the group, noting Reylan’s absence too.

Her face fell, as torn as his.

“A lot to catch up on indeed,” he said sadly.

CHAPTER THREE

Izaiah

Izaiah drifted through the halls with confidence despite the many dark fae tainting them. One hand in his pocket, he didn’t care to give any of them his attention.

These halls closed in with judgment, eyeing him like a traitor, but he blocked that out too. He was no stranger to the feeling of being outcast, and he didn’t surface the urge to defend himself to anyone observing his actions.

On time, Jakon rounded the next corner. Izaiah knocked the human’s shoulder, turning to him with an unfazed smirk, while Jakon blazed.

“Watch yourself,” Izaiah warned.

Jakon paused, debating whether or not to engage. He didn’t, and Izaiah relaxed, not dropping his arrogant swagger down the rest of the hall.

Now he was heading to the king’s study.

Over the weeks, he’d attended meetings with Dakodas, listening in on tedious outlines of the city and their new defensemeasures. Of course, he never expected those meetings to divulge anything of real secrecy that could be used against them.

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