“You can stop behaving as if she is the weakling and you are the savior. You see the bond of your lives as a benefit to her, but that is because you assume that your life will be longer than hers. She is no longer human. The rules of Nothrek no longer apply to Estrella Barlowe. You would do well to remember that,” he said, his jaw clenching in frustration. It was the first sign of any kind of emotion he showed, his head tipping to the side with a subtle, disgusted shake.
He turned his back on me, walking in the opposite direction as the stars at the edges of my vision went fuzzy.
“What is she?” I called, demanding the answer that would cure me of my ignorance so that I could help her.
He paused, looking over his shoulder with a creased brow. “You think you can be trusted with that information? You, who are a slave to Mab herself?” he asked, the words landing the blow he’d intended. “How could I expect you to save her when you cannot even save yourself?”
The stars faded, the walls they created shaking as the Void around me appeared to melt into nothingness. All illusion, a trick of the mind.
It wasn’t the Void at all.
I turned my stare back to the male who had greeted me, the one who had spoken the harsh words. His form melted away as he watched me over his shoulder with gleaming golden eyes. He drifted into the night sky as it crumbled until his place was empty.
Only those golden eyes remained.
7
Estrella
I sat in the chair beside the fire, trying to warm my limbs. I couldn’t stand to look at the trail of blood leading away from the table. Two of Mab’s guards had come, grabbed Ophir’s body by the feet, and dragged it out of the room. They left Malachi to carry the head of what I’d learned had been his brother, his face carrying the first traces of softness I’d ever seen.
That faded the moment our eyes clashed, the ire in his expression unparalleled.
He would be a problem if Mab couldn’t control him; the wind of the vengeance he sought for his felled brother carrying my name on it. It didn’t matter that it had been Ophir who’d attacked me or the fact that he’d done so under Mab’s command.
I was the murderer. I was the one who needed to suffer.
I swallowed, turning my gaze back to the fire. The dress they’d put me in was stained with Ophir’s blood, the metallic scent reaching up to torment my senses. I wanted nothing more than to strip off the fabric and burn it, but I didn’t know if there was anything else I could wear in its place.
Mab lingered in her seat at the table, looking all too disgruntled that our conversation had been derailed by the show of violence. As if my rape wouldn’t have made reaching an agreement impossible at any rate. The guards left us alone at a wave of Mab’s slender hand, dismissing any threat I might have posed. The temptation to test her rose within me, but even I knew that with my magic crippled by the iron around my wrists, there was zero chance my explorations would end favorably for me.
“You’ve made your first enemy here,” she said, sipping her wine dramatically as she stood. “That was not a wise decision.”
“You’re wrong. You were my first enemy here, and we were set to this rivalry before I’d ever set foot on the soil of Alfheimr. Your actions toward my mate for the entirety of his life have guaranteed that you will never find a friend in me,” I explained, holding my head high as she took a few steps toward me. She stopped just out of reach, staring at the cut on my cheek and glancing down at my shackles.
“I do have to wonder. If I removed those shackles, would you heal your injuries as suddenly as in the throne room?” she asked, reaching out a hand. The sharp tip of her nail pressed into the cut on my cheek, separating the flesh until a fresh stream of blood trickled out. I pursed my lips, refusing to flinch back as she drew her finger away and took the tip of her nail into her mouth.
“Why don’t you take them off, and we can find out together?” I proposed, raising an eyebrow in challenge.
Her lips tipped into a smile that surrounded her finger, and she finally withdrew it. Reaching forward to cup my cheeks in each of her hands, she tipped my head up to meet her gaze as she revealed teeth at the corners of her mouth that looked as if they’d been sharpened intentionally. “You taste like power, and I will know where it comes from by the time I am finished with you.”
“I sincerely doubt either of us will like the answer very much once we have it,” I said, wrenching my head away from her grip.
Her nails scraped along the skin of my cheeks, trying to hold on as I fought to get free. They tore through the skin, gathering beneath the tips of her talons.
“It doesn’t need to be this way. You and I do not need to be enemies, Little Mouse,” she said, and the term twisted into something akin to affection in her attempt to convince me that there was anything other than a rivalry with the most powerful Fae queen of all time in my future.
But the Fates had written my story already, and nothing I could do would change what was to come.
When they spoke, I would listen.
“And what of my mate, whom you have tortured for centuries? Am I supposed to ignore the harm done to him in order to become your ally?” I asked, rising to my feet and turning my back on her. That was not something I would ever be willing to do, even if I could bring myself to ignore the plights of the Fae. They’d never cared about me, so why should I care about them?
I did care about Caldris and Fallon, however, and both were presently imprisoned by Mab.
“Do you enjoy your place as a woman in this world? Trapped in the games of men and nothing more than a pawn for them to use and abuse so that they might get what they want in life? Do you think it is you whom your mate loves, or is it what being mated to you will give him?” she asked, a cold, bitter laugh escaping her. “Or do you want to be free?”
I glanced at her over my shoulder. “My freedom does not need to come at the cost of the freedom of another. There is no reason we cannot all be free to live our lives how we desire,” I explained.
“He will take his part of your magic. He will grow stronger, and he will become King. Whether he manages to overthrow me and becomes King of the Shadow Court or he takes over as King of the Winter Court, he will place you as a pretty object at his side. You have no birthright here. You are not royal, and you do not stand to inherit a single throne. He is the son of the Queen of the Winter Court and the King of the Shadow Court. You are nothing compared to his succession,” she said, stepping up to the door. She paused there, giving me time to absorb the words.
A pretty trophy at his side. I loved him and believed he loved me with everything he had.
But would that change the suffocation I was bound to feel being trapped as a figurehead without any authority? That had been the promise of the life I would have lived with Byron in Mistfell, but I had to believe Caldris wanted more for me.
“It is possible for a queen to have power. You rule over all of Faerie. Twyla commands the Winter Court…” I trailed off, not knowing enough of the other court royals to speak of their arrangements.
“I rule over Faerie because I took it. Twyla has her precious Winter Court because her mate and husband are both dead. If a male remained to steal her power, he would have. Why do you think she has not remarried since the death of her husband? Because she knows as well as I do that in spite of whatever pretty lies we tell ourselves to help us sleep at night, we are nothing compared to our male counterparts. Our world is not ready for women in power as peaceful rulers,” she said, turning her back to the door.