Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 100363 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 502(@200wpm)___ 401(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 100363 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 502(@200wpm)___ 401(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
It’s a chain. It drapes down my back and coils around Luthian’s fist.
“There.” Finally satisfied, Luthian offers his hand. I place mine delicately upon it.
I merely blink, and my bedroom has vanished. We’re surrounded by faeries, in a room with opulent gold columns and gleaming white marble on the floor. Overhead, a sky-painted ceiling is adorned with real clouds that move on a breeze, stirring the loose curls at my temples.
But as beautiful as the architecture is, it doesn’t compare to the gorgeous sea of fae around us. There is skin of pale milk, like mine, as well as russet and black as deep as Luthian’s hair. A rainbow of varying intensity colors others, deep ruby, pale violet petal, leaf green and vibrant orange. Their wings are bat-like, dragonfly, daisywing, collections of flowers, delicate spiderwebs sparkling with dew. I spy lace, like Sarta’s wings, but also a set of huge buttons, a pair of book pages, a sideways hourglass with silver sand constantly flowing. Every pair flutters with excitement; antennae twitch and spark.
And though I am dizzy with the sights before me, I do not allow my wonder to show. I keep my chin lifted, gaze straight ahead, face as still as that of a haughty corpse.
There is no disguising the beat of my pulse in the hollow of my throat, or the jerk of my bodice with the rhythm of my heart. The place is a wonder of glitter and gowns and finery.
And nudity. I notice several faeries wearing nothing at all, and I know my cheeks blush.
I walk beside Luthian as if we own the room, but it is beneath us. I sense as we pass that not all are pleased to see him. Fierce whispers mingle with the curious murmurs as the crowd parts.
“Luthian of Mithrax!” a voice roars, and the assembly splits into a loose formation of rows on either side of a long, grassy carpet.
At the end of it is a dais, and upon that dais is a throne, and upon that throne is an enraged faery.
Luthian stops. So do I. He bows from the waist, straightens, and nudges my hand. I find my wits and sink into a curtsey.
“Your Majesty,” Luthian begins. “It’s so good to—”
Spears of curling smoke ring us at the height of Luthian’s neck, their barbed points aimed straight and true.
“You were banished five hundred winters ago,” the king shouts.
He is a handsome king. Perhaps due to my mortality, I imagined he would look like a very old human. He’s broad-shouldered, well-muscled, and when he rises to approach us, I note the defined strength of his thighs beneath his leather breeches. I imagined he would have a crown upon his head, being a king, but he simply has a mop of amber-tinged brown curls pushed back carelessly from his square-jawed face.
He stops before us, not sparing me a glance. But his eyes never leave Luthian’s. “How dare you disobey me.”
“I’ve come to make amends, my most gracious king.” Luthian nudges me forward, but I have no desire to step directly into a barbed spear that will split my forehead. My gaze cuts sharply to him.
“Do you believe I’ve forgotten, in so short a time, the havoc you visited upon this court?” the king seethes.
So short a time? And then, my mind sticks on five hundred years. Was that the truth?
“You were born for it.”
I’ll pass out. I’ll faint and fall on the spears and that will be the end of both of us.
“I’ve reflected on my actions,” Luthian says. “I owe you an apology, Arcus.”
The king’s sun-kissed skin goes pale with fury at the sound of his own name.
I trust Luthian. He would not have led me into a trap he could not devise a way out of.
If he dies here, do I still get my wishes?
“I’m deeply sorry,” Luthian goes on. “Not just for my betrayal of you, but my betrayal of the late queen. My actions were vile. Disgusting. Not in the way this court usually celebrates.”
There’s a titter of laughter through the otherwise sepulcher-silent crowd.
The king notices me then. First, a glance from the corner of his eye. Then he doubles back for a longer look. “Who is this?”
“My bride,” Luthian says.
This is not a part of the ruse that he’s discussed with me, but I’ve promised to play along, and it’s the only way I’ll survive.
“Your bride.” The king sneers. “A human.”
“They don’t last very long, I’m afraid,” Luthian says, feigning disappointment. “But you know what they say about them.”
“Everyone in this court knows well what is said about them.” But the king takes a deep breath through his nose, as if trying to recover control that he’s lost. “It’s been a long time since I’ve had one, though.”
“My bride has several sisters—”
I wonder at that. Now that I suspect the motive behind my birth, I suppose he could have fulfilled many such wishes.