Page 23 of Court of Wolves

“How long do they expect to keep us locked up here?” he mumbled, crossing his arms over his chest as he stood at the ornate double-doors that opened onto a crumbling balcony. He’d tried climbing down it, but the violent waterfall that crashed over the side of the building from far above made escape impossible. He’d have washed away and wound up dead if it wasn’t for Ark.

“I can feel it again,” the guard-turned-rebel-general said from where he sat stiffly in the tattered brocade armchair across the suite, his short gold hair mussed. The fabrics were fine, and so were the columns, the moulding on the walls, and the gild edges, but everything was worn and faded and fallingapart. Luxury left to ruin. “Here.” Ark knocked a fist against his breastbone.

Kheir turned from the window and tried to sense what Ark did. He hadn’t felt it the last few times, either. He could barely sense his mate, her soul faint and far from him. Wherever she was being kept, it wasn’t nearby, and that fact made Kheir want to trash this entire room. He stalked away from the balcony window and threw himself down on the edge of the bed. The soft green sheets were dusty and old, the gold thread unravelled from its pattern. It wasn’t any craftsmanship Kheir recognised.

His wings itched where he’d hidden them within his skin, the foreign sensation unnatural after so many years showing them proudly. But he couldn’t risk the saints getting hold of his vulnerability.

“Describe it,” he asked Ark, meeting the guard’s solemn eyes. He kept sensing something from Maia, a deep, gnawing pain, and just the suggestion that someone was hurting her made Kheir want to scream. His wings itched under his skin, tucked away because no way in the dark chasm was he letting the saints get their hands on his weakness. But they already had his biggest weakness, his mate. His bright burning star. Had they already dimmed her light? She was still alive—he would have felt it if they’d killed her. It was the only thing that kept him sane.

Ark sighed, rubbing that spot on his chest. “I can feel her here, like a dull pain scraping through my chest right over my heart. If it’s like last time, it will last an hour or two. It’s not agony but it’s deep and undeniably pain.”

“What the fuck are theydoingto her?” Kheir hissed, dropping his head into his hands. Hopelessness threatened to drown him. The room was locked, and neither of their attempts to smash the damn door open had worked. They were trapped in here, separated from Maia, and that pain Ark felt said she needed them. She needed Kheir, and he couldn’t go to her, andit fuckingkilledhim. He massaged a pain in his own chest, his heart clenched tight.

“When he comes back,” Ark began quietly, because they didn’t know if the saints were listening, “we’ll try to overpower him.”

“Again,” Kheir muttered, shifting his weight and ignoring the sharp flash that went up his ribs. Courtesy of Vawn. Kheir wished they’d left the bastard in the saints' circle instead of trying to save him. He was stronger than Ark and Kheir put together, as proven by their last attempt at getting out of this room. The saints had done something to him; he was too strong, too fast.

“We fucked up by trying to fight him,” Ark said with that clarity of his. The wisdom he’d been granted because he was the Lady Justice reincarnated. And Kheir? The Archer, saint of love in all kinds. He failed to see how having the power of love would help him escape.

Well, that wasn’t true. He had one idea, he just hated it.

Ark met his eyes, met the agony squeezing Kheir’s chest. “We need to take a different approach.”

“I have something but it’s… repulsive.”

Ark watched him closely, leaned forward in the chair with his arms resting on his knees. They’d both been given clean clothes, allowed access to water even if it wasn’t particularly clear, and provided with food even if it was tasteless and cold. They’d been treated well, not strung up and interrogated like he’d expected, or turned into some mindless beast like Vawn, who seemed to leap at the saints’ every command.

“Tell me,” Ark said quietly, intensely.

“I’m the saint of love reborn,” Kheir murmured, so his voice only carried to Ark. “What if that’s not just a title? What if it’s magic? I could…” He forced the words out. “Seduce Vawn. Makehim love me, then use him to get us out. He must know where they’re keeping Maia and the others.”

“Nowhere nearby,” Ark muttered, running a hand over his short beard. He looked more rugged than when they’d been dumped in this room, a little haggard, a little wild. Kheir wasn’t much better. He was a far cry from the refined prince he’d been when he arrived in Vassalaer. “We can try something else,” Ark said, catching Kheir’s eyes, so compassionate it made his chest hurt worse. “Leave your idea as a last resort.”

He suppressed a wince and nodded. He didn’t want to manipulate anyone that way, but if it got them out of here and back with their mate, he would do it. “What if—”

They both tensed when the rattle of a key in the lock came from the other side of the tarnished door. Kheir leapt to his feet at the same time Ark rose and reached for a sword that had been confiscated. Kheir’s weapons had been taken, too. When they woke up here, they were muddy, blood-stained, and unarmed in their gilded prison. Unlike the man who stepped through the door with a flat, empty expression and leathers that had seen much better days. His brown hair was tied up in a bun, making the carved features on his sun-gold face more severe.

The emptiness sent a claw of ice down Kheir’s spine, and as it always did when their eyes connected, a ripple went through him. Unease or panic or some deeper, baser warning.

Vawn kicked the door shut behind him—it locked with a solid thump of metal tumblers—and carried a silver tray with two plates to the table beside the window. Sunlight made him as gilded and tarnished as the room, warming his skin, bringing out threads of gold in his brown hair.

“Hello again, gents,” he greeted, the flat vacancy in his eyes clearing to reveal something haunted but defiant. “Dinner is served. It’s shocking as always, probably not up to your princely standards, but I reckon you’ve had worse, guard.”

Leaving the plates on the table, Vawn crossed the room to lean against the wall beside a tapestry aged and dust-covered. It depicted a parade of fae, but Kheir hadn’t been able to place their origin. It could have been Aether, could have been Vassal.

“What do you want today?” Ark asked, his hands loose at his sides and steady eyes watching Vawn.

Vawn’s mouth twitched. “Our glorious leaders would like Kheir to write a letter. Ark, you can eat.” The words were direct, the edge of his voice honed and deadly. Kheir hadn’t known the rebel possessed that magic when they stormed the palace to rescue Maia. He wondered if Azrail even knew Vawn’s magic could control a person’s mind. A blunter, indelicate echo of Maia’s snaresong. And he could never,everdiscover Kheir’s ability to shield.

So Ark walked to the table by the window without complaint, sat, and ate the vaguely brown offering in the bowl Vawn had brought. Kheir watched Vawn warily, unable to keep the expression off his face even with years of political education. He’d done a better job of it in the Delakore Palace but a lot had happened since then. His mate had been taken fuck knows where, was being hurt right now. And Vawn was a cog in the machine that let that happen. Was the bastard they’d come to rescue.

“What kind of letter?” he asked freely, since Vawn hadn’t issued a command to him yet.

In response, Vawn reached into the pocket of his leather jacket and pulled out a piece of thick paper, an envelope, a pen, wax, and a seal. It was the Sin Rivian seal that made Kheir stand straighter, taking a slow breath to manage his rage.

“Friends in high places,” Vawn said with the ghost of a smirk, answering Kheir’s unspoken question of how the fuck he’d got that. He passed the pen and paper to Kheir, who warily accepted them.

“I can’t believe we went to Venhaus to rescue you, you piece of shit,” Kheir snarled, canines bared as he clenched his hand around the pen. He wanted to use it to jab Vawn’s eyeball but he couldn’t fuck this up. They’d have one chance, one opening, and Kheir wouldn’t waste it on a rush of anger.

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