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)
If I killed Erith, I would lose my brother. And if I didn’t, it wasn’t a matter of if Erith found me. It was a matter of when.
My only option was to leave the only place I’d ever called home. As long as I never killed Erith, I wouldn’t have to watch Hale die too. As long as I never took my own form, as long as I never lived in my own skin, Erith couldn’t track me.
And for three years, I haven’t. Until now.
“Tell me,” Misha says, his voice louder than before, “what do you want with my court and Hall of Doors? What are you after, Felicity?”
Every day with him, I craved the sound of my name from his lips, and it hurts to hear him say it with such disgust. “I was never going to bring any harm to your court. My friends are looking for a way into the Eloran Palace. They want to bring down the Seven and restore Elora to her rightful queen. That’s why I wanted to find your Hall of Doors.”
“Try again.”
“That’s the truth.”
“My Hall has no portal to the Eloran Palace. It never has. The Magical Seven have never allowed anyone from my court to portal in.”
“But we were told—” I draw in a breath. That intelligence came from Shae. Shae, who’s been so cruel. Shae, who wanted me to rush into my search for a portal guarded by a deadly cave demon.
“I opened up to you,” Misha says, “and it was all a lie. Why? What is it that you’re after?”
I squeeze my eyes shut and feel the hot tears roll down my cheeks. Nothing about what I felt for him was a lie, but he’ll never believe that now.
“What did you do with the princess? What do you want with her? What do you want with my court?”
“I told you, I didn’t hurt her. She wanted me here to cover for her.” He doesn’t believe a word I’m saying, so I’m not sure why I’m wasting my breath, but I keep going. “She has a magic ring that gives her the kiss of death. I think it’s all connected with the faceless plague and the resurrection of Mordeus.”
Heavy footfalls sound in the corridor beyond, and I turn to see Finnian, the Unseelie king consort, standing in front of my cell, his silver eyes glowing. Behind him, his queen glares at me, rage burning in her eyes. At any moment those shadows of hers will rise up from the ground and tear me to pieces.
“This is treason,” she says, pacing the corridor in front of my cell as Finn falls back.
She stops and grips the cell bars, leaning forward—all menace. Wisps of shadow curl like fond cats around her wrists. “Where is my sister?”
“I told Mish—the king. I told the king I don’t know. She asked me to come here in her place. I think she’s still in the Unseelie Court. Everything I know . . .” I bow my head. I’ve spent my life hiding the full truth of what it means to be an Echo. The gift is sacred and not to be shared unless it’s a matter of life and death. And this is. I swallow. “Everything I know comes from the memories I’ve gained when shifting into her form. And lately I’ve seen a couple of things that seem . . . more recent. About her buying a magical ring.”
The queen spins to face Misha, who’s still sitting on the opposite side of my cell, as if he doesn’t trust me to be alone in here. “What is she talking about? Memories from shifting? Have you heard anything of the sort?”
Misha eyes me cautiously. “I’ve heard rumors but . . .” He shakes his head. “Felicity claims she’s not a common shifter.”
“Prove it,” Brie says. “Tell me something no one but Jasalyn would know.”
I grasp for something special. Something other than the scars and the horrors of Mordeus’s dungeons. “Your mother told you stories at bedtime. Tales of this land. Jasalyn was small, but you’d hold her hand and giggle together about what it might be like to visit Faerie.”
She folds her arms, expression harder now. “That could be any two human girls. Try again.”
I meet her angry gaze and hold it. “I don’t know everything about your sister, but I know enough—from meeting her and from what I’ve seen—to understand that she doesn’t want you to know what she endured in the dungeons. She doesn’t want you to know the truth about her scars.”
The queen flinches. “We don’t know where those are coming from. They’ve just been appearing.”
“But she knows. They’re scars from what Mordeus and his guards did to her in the dungeons, but she didn’t know that they were from blood magic—that they are signs that he’s calling on that connection he made between them in the dungeons. That he’s using her to come back.”