Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 123190 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 616(@200wpm)___ 493(@250wpm)___ 411(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 123190 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 616(@200wpm)___ 493(@250wpm)___ 411(@300wpm)
I can’t think about my heart right now. I need to focus on escape.
I should have insisted that we put safeguards in place, should have insisted the princess give me something to tell the king in the event that I was found out. He’ll never believe she sent me in her stead. He’ll never believe she wants me here. And now I’m as good as dead.
“Who. Are. You.”
“Jas,” I try once last time, but it’s too late now.
“Liar! Tell me why I shouldn’t kill you this very moment.” Vines erupt from the floor, wrapping around my legs and pinning me to the bed, thorns biting into my skin. A flash of lightning illuminates the window and thunder rumbles low and angry in the distance.
“Please,” I gasp. Tears well in my eyes and roll down my cheeks. “Please let me go.”
“You’re lucky I don’t end you now,” he growls. Stepping back, he scrapes his gaze over me in disgust. “You almost had me. I don’t know how you did it, but you almost let me believe . . .” His eyes meet mine. The flames of anger have burned to embers, revealing the scars of betrayal. Heartache. I hurt him. Just like I never wanted to.
“Misha,” I whisper.
“I am king, and you will address me as such.”
His anger leaves me hollow. There’s nothing but an echoing cave where my heart should be.
I’m falling for you too, I’m hurting too, I want to say, but my confession would make this worse.
The heavy steps sound on the stairs, and armored sentinels stalk into my bedchambers. He must’ve mentally called on them.
“You can spend your last days in my dungeon while I wait for the shadow queen to arrive. She’ll have the opportunity to question you before we arrange for your execution.”
“Please, don’t.” I close my eyes, trying to slow my spinning thoughts, trying to make a plan.
Misha’s vines release me so suddenly I sag to the floor, only to be scooped up by the guards—one under each arm.
“Let me explain. I’ll tell you everything.”
He drags his gaze over me, lips twisted in obvious disgust. “No. I think I’ll let you rot in my dungeon for a few days before I listen to more of your lies. We’ll see what you have to say for yourself after sleeping with the rats.”
The guards drag me to the stairs, my toes barely brushing the floor.
“Jasalyn’s in trouble!” I shout.
The guards don’t pause, and every step brings me closer to the dungeon and further from my opportunity to explain.
“She traded her immortal life for the kiss of death.”
The guards freeze and turn me to face their king.
Misha scowls down at me from the top of the stairs. “Are you accusing the Unseelie princess of murder?”
“I’m saying she’s in trouble.”
“Says the creature who’s been living in her skin.”
“At her request!”
“More lies!”
“I’ll open my mind to you—just look and see that I speak the truth.”
“You must think I’m truly a fool if you expect me to trust anything I might see there now, after all your convincing lies and scheming.” I can’t name all the emotions I see flit across his face, but I know the final one when it tightens his jaw. Steely determination. “Take her away.”
Chapter Thirty
Jasalyn
I SCOWL AT THE FAERIE who fancies himself the next Eloran king. “You’re here for the child queen? The one the Seven fear so much?”
His eyes flash, and the intricate lines tattooed across his forehead, marking him as the Chosen One, glow, giving me my answer.
“My friends among the Seven wanted me to dispose of her.” My smile stretches across my face. “Just like they want you dead.”
He only lifts his chin a notch higher.
“They underestimate me, though. There’s something I need more than your queen. Are you prepared to bargain?”
His nostrils flare. The cockiness in his eyes makes me want to slowly slice him to bits just to prove who’s in charge, but the little Kincaid girl wasting away in my dungeons is more important to me than my pride.
My seer tells me that this male, this Eloran faerie with his arrogance and ice-blue eyes, has the power to make her want to live.
“I’ll make a deal with you,” I say. “I’ll release your queen in exchange for you. You will take her place in my dungeons and befriend the Eloran girl I’m holding there.”
“Why?”
I cock my head to the side. “Do you truly care? Kendrick the Chosen, who will sacrifice anything for the future of his realm. Would you not do this small thing? You want your queen released, and I need my girl to live. Now and after I’m gone.”
“What do you have in mind?”
“She isn’t taking well to being a prisoner. She needs . . . a friend. What better friend for her than a charming young man from Elora?”