“Feed our son and then handle the guild enforcers who showed up about an hour ago and started asking questions. Now isn’t the time for them to be here, even if they’re seeking information on Alden. Handle it, or I will.”
“Ryder,” I murmured through a shaky exhale of pain.
“The moment you leave this room, you show no emotion to anyone. Shut all emotions down and leave Dristan in the war room with a handmaiden you trust with your own life. I mean it because I won’t fail him again. Lucian and Spyder have been testing the kingdom all night. If he has spies inside our walls, I will rip them apart piece by piece to show him why no one fucks with the horde or my family. I’ve also closed the palace to outsiders, Pet. No one comes in or out without first being subjected to testing.”
He exited the room without a backward glance, and my heart shattered. We may have lost our daughter, but we were also dangerously close to losing Zahruk and Alden as well. No one had figured out a way to remove the contamination yet, and we couldn’t keep them locked inside the rune-warded cages forever. Eventually, Ryder would have to be judge, jury, and executioner for both.
Chapter Twenty-One
Alden struck his fists against the glass, snarling as spittle dripped from his lips. His previously salt-and-pepper hair was darker and fuller. The age lines that had marked his face had faded. He no longer resembled the elder of the guild and the man who was a father to me. Alden looked as if he’d fully transitioned from human, into a pureblooded fae heir.
His nails were razor sharp, with blackened tips that seemed to drip thin tendrils of shadows. Still, more darkness slithered around his arms, rotating in soft spirals that scaled higher to reach his broad shoulders. His formerly gentle, kind gray eyes had turned to a deep-azure, vibrantly flaring with the madness he could no longer conceal.
“Jesus,” Adrian growled from his spot beside me. “This is nuts. It’s some nightmarish bullshit that you never thought would happen to you or someone you know. In a million years, I’d never thought this would be Alden’s outcome. He was straightforward with his choice to remain mortal. Why is he different from everyone else who died after being exposed to this shit?”
Adam grunted in agreement and jabbed inked fingers through his lustrous hair.
“This is so much crap,” he said as he strode closer to the dense glass. Adam’s palms pressed against the boundary, and Alden lurched forward. Surprisingly, Adam didn’t recoil or flinch back away from the barrier.
Alden’s movement no longer resembled anything remotely human. He slithered and flickered in and out of visibility before appearing right in front of him. He also didn’t sound human any longer. The once well-spoken man had resorted to communicating with indiscernible sounds that were comparable to the way Arius had communicated to his guys. It was similar, but it wasn’t the same.
“So, what the fuck is the plan?” Lena asked as her palms settled over her unborn babe. “We can’t just sit here and do nothing. It’s Alden. He doesn’t deserve this.”
“No fucking clue, but if it helps, I don’t think he’s in there anymore. Alden would never look at either of you like he’s currently doing. I hate to say it, but . . . no. I can’t fucking even get that shit past my throat.” Adrian swallowed before dropping his head back to run his palm over his face. “This is messed up. He isn’t some stranger or monster. He’s my fucking mentor, and the only asshole who showed up and stayed beside me without faltering. He never asked for shit other than to help make me a man and a badass enforcer. I can’t think of him being anything else.”
“I agree. That thing isn’t Alden. He’d never want to be left like this.” I fought the pricking of tears searing my eyes. “You were there when Zahruk was contaminated, right?” I asked Lena, who was staring at Zahruk oddly. Her vibrant eyes shifted to me and then slowly moved back to take him in with a glimmer of regret. “What did it feel like when it tried to adhere to you, as it did to Zahruk?”
“Yes, I was there,” Lena confirmed quietly. “I honestly didn’t realize he’d been infected at first. At that time, no one knew that by simply touching it, you’d be infected. I was going through some shit, too. He had it on his hand, and it appeared to attach itself to him readily.” She tilted her head as her brows knitted together. “It felt ice-cold and full of malice, so fucking dark I would have done anything to get away from it. I questioned quietly, feeling the weight of the world pressing against me.
“I still don’t understand why it wouldn’t infect you. You held some pretty powerful beings inside, and would have been the ideal target if these assholes are seeking power.”
“Lucian and Spyder think the furies protected me and kept me from ending up in a cage beside these two.” Her mouth tightened into a strained white line as she flicked a peek at Alden, who was humming oddly.
“Do you think there is a way to replicate what the furies did?
“It’s not that simple. The furies feast on the soul of the host. Lucian and Spyder had to find a way to remove them before they fully devoured mine. There’s also the unfeeling, cold-calculated mental state they induce. Zahruk in such a state would be a fucking nightmare. We might be able to contain Alden long enough for the furies to drive off whatever is infecting him, but would he want that? It would be trading one unknown for another.”
“I get that, but there has to be something we can do for them. I hate this shit. Not knowing if we’re losing him or if he’s in there begging for help and unable to communicate? It drives me fucking mad not knowing. That, and the list of what-ifs keeps growing, and the guild is starting to lose patience with waiting for answers.”
Adrian gradually shifted his focus from Alden to Zahruk, who remained in the cage beside Alden’s, his powerful arms folded over his chest, with his head leaning against the barrier. The sinful sapphire-blue eyes hadn’t left my face once in the last hour we’d spent down here. While Zahruk could still communicate, he had provided nothing useful.
“You said it was cold and filled with malice?” Adam inquired, walking back over to watch Alden continue to batter himself against the glass.
Lena released a strangled noise of regret when Alden’s focus transferred to her, and he produced disjointed sounds to lure her closer. “It was like handling ice or stepping into a walk-in freezer after sunbathing. There was also this kind of humming noise that lured you in and captivated you. I felt the pull to enter the fractured portal, and if it weren’t for the furies hissing at it, I likely would have. Lucian was actually hesitant to change me back to my true form because of what was happening to these two.”
“You’re not powerful enough to hold it,” Zahruk offered, forcing our attention to shift to him, where he smirked coldly. “Tell me, Synthia. Is the babe healthy? Does he look like Dristan?”
The agony burning in his stare made my heart ache. I wanted to deliver the news that the babe was perfect and his chubby face looked so much like Dristan, but Zahruk wasn’t entirely in control of his mind, and it was clear he was being manipulated.
“You know me,” he murmured before pushing off the glass and sliding his palm over his mouth.