Page 178 of Promise of Darkness
“So am I,” she breathes before practically fleeing from me.
* * *
The rulersof the Seelie Alliance are all gathered at the Queensmoot, including Kyrian, the Prince of Tides. It seems almost incongruous to see him here. The last I’d heard, he’d sworn to have my mother’s head if he ever saw her again, yet here he sits, stony-faced and demanding, his eyes locked firmly upon me as if nothing else exists.
The moment throws me.
He stares at me for a long moment, raising a brow.
I return the sentiment, determined not to yield. He’s no friend of my mother’s, and his attention can only be a bad thing.
Prince Kyrian seems disappointed with my defiance and gives me a mocking smile. “As inconstant as your mother.”
What a strange thing to say.
The Queen of Aska strokes the hawk resting on her leather glove, her eyes half-closed but watchful. Amusement rests on her pursed lips, though I’d hate to be the cause of it. Queen Maren makes my mother seem sane, and most of the fae call her the Queen of Nightmares when they’re certain she can’t hear them.
At her side is Lucidia, the Queen of Ravenal. She stares ahead of her through blind eyes the color of an alpine lake, and I’ve never seen one of the fae with such withered white hair or parched dry skin. She wears age like a mantle, and I can’t help wondering how many summers she’s seen. The fae don’t usually age. Instead, when they reach their end, they wither quickly and fade, like a bloom plucked from the vine.
It doesn’t make her any less dangerous.
There’s only one face missing, though I’ve never seen him in person. All I’ve heard are rumors.
The Prince of Evernight is my mother’s dearest enemy and would never lose the chance to taunt her face-to-face.
Whispers suddenly cease, and the chorus of a dozen fae suddenly sucking in a sharp breath sounds as loud as a shout. Fae peer over each other’s shoulders as movement swims through the courtiers directly opposite us.
“What’s going on?” I whisper.
All my instincts howl that something is wrong.
Andraste ignores me, staring stonily ahead.
“At last,” my mother whispers, and triumph lights her eyes.
The crowd opposite us parts, and the Evernight delegation finally arrives.
I understand the urge to take a sharp breath. There’s a fae male in the lead wearing black enameled armor, embellished with glittering chips of obsidian. He towers over the warriors at his side, and I swear, as his cloak swirls around his calves, for a moment it looks like a pair of wings.
He’s staring directly at me, as though no one else exists.
“Vi,” he mouths.
The crowd vanishes, and for one precious shining moment I feel the hand of fate grasp the back of my neck. A shiver runs down my spine. There’s something about his face that makes my heart skip a beat. I have this horrible, breathless sensation inside me, as if fate took a direct sidestep into my path and there’s no avoiding it.
And then a stab of pain through my temples nearly brings me to my knees.
I blink, and stagger sideways.
Andraste’s hand locks around my wrist, forcing me to straighten. “Stand,” she hisses.
And then the pain is gone, and so too is the sensation I felt.
Some of my mother’s courtiers hiss at the prince. Others smile malignantly. He ignores them, wading through the crowd as though they’re but flotsam and jetsam that seek to hinder the inexorable surge of the tide.
I can’t take my eyes off him.
“Vi,” he says, again, stopping but five feet in front of me.
