Page 53 of The Princes of Stone and Steel

“Huh…” Mármaro sighed and pinched the bridge of his marble-streaked nose. “Might you have a bite to eat?” he asked our host. “It seems the Forfex prince cannot take a hint. And I’m starved.”

“Of course, my printce. Right away.” Ellard stood from his chair, set his cup and saucer on the split log table and waddled out of the room, presumably to the kitchen.

He’d said he planned to add on. I supposed one could build quite an abode in two hundred years.

“How long do you think he’ll stay up there?” Mármaro asked, sounding halfway between bored and impatient.

“I don’t know,” I answered. “He loves me. A man in love tends to be pretty persistent.” As the words left my mouth, I knew how true they actually were. I sort of hated myself for doubting it for even a second.

And then there was Mármaro. How could I have once thought of him as a friend? He flicked his wrist, dismissing me.

“Touch… the… roots…” The words spoken filled inside my head. I darted my eyes to Mármaro, who sat digging dirt from under his nails while he waited for food.

If he heard, there was no way would he stay seated, so bored and calm. It had to be the wind.

“Touch… the… roots…” I heard again.

Slowly I stood, pretending to stretch. This caught Mármaro’s attention. His head turned slowly, his eyes assessing my every movement.

I reached my hand up to run my fingers over the exposed roots delicately as I walked over to the wall to look closer at Ellard’s pictures.

Mármaro’s gaze scorched my back. I felt it. The weight of his mood pulled me down, attempting to subdue me, but I refused to go down quietly. Not now. Not with the wind giving me the head’s up. And turning my head to smile at the lying, Vráchos prince, I reached up to grab hold of one of the thickest roots.

“Is she here?” I heard Steele’s voice, though not muffled, like he still called to me from aboveground. But like on the other end of a telephone call.

“He cannot understand.” This voice belonged to one of the tree people. Not Maior, but one of his kind.

Right. Steele needed me to help him understand. I opened the channel to him through the root system.“I’m here,”I spoke in my head only.

“Millie?”gasped Steele in my head.“Millie. Are you hurt?”

“I’m okay. I wasn’t hurt.”

Even in my head, he sounded winded.“What about you?”I asked.“You sound pained.”

“Just a scratch. I’ll be fine.”

Like I’d believe that?

“Will the tree open so I can climb out?”I asked the tree man.

“No. The trees are controlled by the magic of Vráchos lands. Only whoever cast the spell didn’t take it deep enough.” I really didn’t like what the tree man was telling me. Not one bit. It wasn’t all bad news, but it wasn’t exactly good either. “The trees must work for Prince Mármaro. The roots are free.”

Great. Well, that was no help.

“He won’t leave until you do,”I told Steele.

“I can’t leave you, Mills.”

“The Forfex prince will need his strength for what lies ahead.” The tree man voiced my fear. Steele had been injured in the battle with the warecats, injured worse than he let on.

“I’ll be safe, he wants to control me. He needs the power of the flesh to tip the odds in his favor.”Shoot, I heard the desperation in my own voice. In my head.“Isn’t there someplace he could go? Someone who would help heal him?”I implored through the roots.

“There is a place… On the border between the Vráchos and Outlier lands. A lake. There, he will find the mná-spriggan. If he goes into the lake, they will heal him.”

“I’m afraid I’ve never heard of the mná-spriggan,”I said.

“It’s my understanding that they don’t like men and… are no friends to my people.”Steele sucked in a sharp breath and I could almost see him clutching the worst of his injuries.

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