Page 130 of A Flame of the Phoenix

“That primordial seems to have made a sport out of meddling with my fate,” Nyte grumbled, displeased.

“Did they send you here to help us against Marvellas?” Faythe hugged herself, staring at the gravelly stone wall.

“No. I’m rather hoping I’m here because you’ll help me.”

“If it isn’t obvious, I’m not much help to anyone here.”

He left a pause of silence. “So what are you going to do about it?”

Faythe didn’t expect that to strike a chord in her.

What was she doing? Lying here in a pitiful heap of agony, defeat, and denial. She had promised her friends and herself she would fight, and already, she was allowing pieces of herself to crumble.

With a deep breath, Faythe pushed herself up. “I’m going to win.”

“You have a plan?” he asked.

“Not exactly. I can’t predict what Marvellas will do—each day is uncertain. But she can’t predict whatImight do.”

“Sounds like a very dangerous game.”

Faythe finally looked at him. Not a detail had changed. She almost wanted to touch him, convinced he was just an illusion. He was too perfect, even with his facial scar. Too frightening…too much like his mother.

What would Marvellas do when she discovered him here?

It could change everything.

Nyte looked past her, down the hall. “Someone’s coming.”

A head of dark blond disheveled hair came out of the shadows to stand in front of her cell. She’d seen this guard before and had only remembered him as he was one of the few who didn’t hide under a mask and hood. There was somethingsadistically gleeful in his dark eyes every time he stood by Marvellas’s side, even as the Lakelarian queen.

“Are you going to be nice?” he taunted.

Faythe’s body tensed against giving him the satisfaction of seeing the shiver it broke over her skin. She had dealt with fae males like him before, and it had been a long time since she’d remembered Captain Varis in High Farrow at all.

“Are you her pretty pet playing fetch?”

It may not be wise to provoke someone in a position to hurt her, but she couldn’t help the natural loathing that surfaced as if she were right back in those cells in High Farrow.

He jammed the key into her cell and swung open the only barrier of protection she had against him. Faythe despised that a cage was her idea of safety in the domain of Marvellas and her band of volatile fae and dark fae allies.

“My name is Captain Daegal. I want you to remember who conquered the continent as the Goddess’s right hand.” He stalked into her cell with the slow anticipation of a predator.

“You’re of no more value than a footstool to her.”

The captain reached for her, but Faythe anticipated it. Though she had no magick and was still regaining her strength, she wasn’t completely useless. All it took was predicting his brutality and a carefully timed step, twist, and a marginal duck out of his path. He tripped over his footing when he didn’t grab her for purchase, but he caught himself, palms slapping the wall.

“That was embarrassing,” Nyte commented from behind her.

The captain snarled his outrage, head snapping to her with fury sparking in his eyes.

Faythe realized the position she was in, and her impulse took three backward strides just as he pushed off the wall. Her fingers gripped iron, and then…

Slam.

The captain reached the cell door just as she closed it. She blinked in bewilderment, having not predicted how easy that would be.

Nyte’s smooth chuckle broke through her stupor. “Aren’t you going to run?”

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