Page 10 of The Barbaric Fae's Soul

He remained over me until I landed beside the new unseelie council and Nev and Teris. The dragon shifter landed with me, and he gave me a concerned look when he did. I recognized him as one of the unseelie, but I didn’t know his name. “You have to stay out of the skies, Dakota. Flying is dangerous when the klynnas are free.”

Being scolded by a man made me naturally inclined to act quiet and agreeable, but I was trying to kill those instincts, so I pushed them away.

“Can they see through the trees?” I asked instead of nodding or backing away.

“No, but their sense of smell is strong.”

“I’ll be more careful, then,” I said, just to placate him.

He dipped his head.

“Are the female fae preparing?” Nev asked me.

I think we all knew he was really checking on Fovea. The two of them weren’t a normal mated couple in the sense that they didn’t live together or spend most of their time together, but I was pretty sure they would get there.

They seemed to like each other more than they’d admitted, and everyone in the forest had heard them having sex way too often at the beginning of their mating. The sounds had only stopped when Nev finally finished building a house for them.

“Yes. The harsh are all getting ready to fight—Fovea included. She told me to make sure you knew she wasn’t going to sit out.”

His lips curved upward slightly. “As I expected.”

He was totally into her. Which I didn’t really understand, given that the female fae had murdered one of the unseelies. And someone who was violent once could always become violent again—or kill unnecessarily again.

That was probably why I felt safe around Aev, though. Because I’d never seen him even threaten to hurt anyone.

Then again, the unseelie as a whole were less violent than the seelie. They could fight, but I’d never seen them fight each other for fun or to establish dominance like the seelies did. And that also contributed to my comfort. Aev was the unseelie king for a long time; their reduced violent tendencies could be related to him, maybe. I didn’t know the men’s history enough to say for sure.

The council and wild hunt guys began discussing their plans—how many basilisks they had gathered, how they were going to reinforce the trees’ branches to further block us from the klynnas’ sight, and things like that. I listened closely, but didn’t know enough about the creatures or Vevol’s magic to have anything to contribute to the conversation.

It sounded like they were fairly confident the monsters were free, though. And since Aev was pretty sure too, I felt like that was probably a safe bet.

“If our oracle was here, she could warn us about incoming attacks,” Nev said, partway through the conversation.

I perked up; I had said something along those lines to Fovea, hadn’t I?

“She could give us locations, and time to clear out the other human women,” Korrik agreed. “Assuming she’s figured out how to use her sight.”

“It should be easier to control without all of those brands. According to Fovea, the mass amount of magic makes it nearly impossible to do anything on purpose. She plans to be on the beach when the next portal opens, in hopes that Vevol will remove some of her brands too,” Nev explained. “It’ll still take time for North to figure the magic out, but the odds are better now.”

I blinked.

Fovea wanted to get rid of some of her brands? I hadn’t seen that coming.

Then again, the women had gone through a whiplash-like number of changes in the last few months, so I supposed it wasn’t completely out of left field.

“Lian won’t take January to get North, though. Not while she’s pregnant and the klynnas may be in the skies,” Teris countered. “And Mare will be needed here, to help with keeping the human females from panicking while the harsh women fight with us. Ervo won’t leave without her.”

“You’ll have to go after Priel and his mate,” Nev agreed. “I can’t leave Fovea, and no one else knows the location.”

Teris grimaced.

He loved fighting more than any of the other fae I knew. I would’ve put money on him being excited about the klynnas’ freedom, rather than afraid.

So I spoke up. “I can go. I’ve been to North and Priel’s cave before; I know where it is.”

Too many sets of eyes turned to me.

My cheeks heated, and I knew it was only a matter of time before my entire body was pinkish red, stained by my damn blush.

---