Page 8 of The Barbaric Fae's Soul

Fresh air, and freedom.

Damn, it was blissful.

All of Vevol looked and felt different, because finally, I could breathe again.

Dakota didn’t want a true mate, and I didn’t either. But this bond between us was taking away our pain. And since it didn’t feel like a cage, or a prison, I had no desire to be free of it.

So I lowered my head toward the ground, tapped into Vevol’s magic, and ran faster through the melting snow I’d given up on holding in place.

If I couldn’t keep the icy prison in my grip, there was no point in dividing seelie from unseelie.

And if the klynnas had escaped, we were going to need every set of hands Vevol had—seelie and unseelie alike.

Three

Dakota

“Aev is checkingthe prison right now,” I told Fovea, when she answered the door to the Stronghold. Her lips turned down in a deep grimace, her hands and arms spotted with something dark red that I really hoped wasn’t dried blood. She turned her back to me and led me deeper inside.

“Do we trust the king to do that?” the woman asked over her shoulder, without turning to glance at me.

Irritation swelled in my chest, but I forced myself not to acknowledge it.

Frustration had no real value, especially in a situation like this. Usually, I was fairly hard to annoy. But for whatever reason, I was protective of Aev.

“Yes. He was the one who held the prison together for so long; what reason would he have to lie about this?”

“I don’t think he’s lying, but he should be in a great amount of pain.” She glanced over at me, concern knitting her eyebrows.

Oh.

I blushed, and my whole body probably went pink again, like it always did.

“I kissed him,” I lied.

It was close enough to the truth.

I added quickly, “I’ve been in pain since my fake mate bond with Nev broke, so I told Aev that if he was hurting too, we would make a temporary bond to save him from that pain. We’re friends. And it worked.”

Fovea’s eyebrows raised. “That’s actually a good idea.”

At least she hadn’t judged me.

She brought the subject back to the monsters that may or may not be free. “Nev and I have discussed the klynnas. There was nothing like them in Vevol before the war, which leads me to believe that they were a punishment for the male fae, because of their decision to attack each other. I have been trying to reach the goddess, to determine some way around the male fae’s method of repeatedly killing the creatures, but she has yet to connect with me.”

“Has anyone gone to ask North if she’s seen anything?”

“No. Her future-sight will take decades to develop, if not centuries.”

“Still, she might be able to figure something out,” I reminded Fovea. “I can go to their cave. I think I’m the only one who knows where it is, other than the Wild Hunt guys.”

She flashed me a concerned look over her shoulder. “Nev asked me to stay out of the skies. Soaring over the trees makes us easy pickings for the klynnas. We don’t know if they’ve escaped yet, but if Aev can’t feel the prison anymore, it’s likely.”

I grimaced. “Maybe we can send someone else.”

“We’ll discuss it with the men,” she said.

I didn’t think she could possibly say anything that would surprise me more thanthat.

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