Page 36 of I Destroyed the Elf Prince's Harem

The elf moved to stand beside me, his head tilted as he regarded me with narrowed eyes, as if he were still trying to decide whether I was being earnest with him or it was all an act. “To the left,” he answered slowly, his expression unchanging.

I tore my gaze away from him and turned to the left. At the next corner, I recognized where I was and could navigate the last couple of blocks on my own to the inn. Nylian walked beside me the entire way, neither of us speaking. I glimpsed my brown paper package dangling from his fingers by the twine, though. He was still carrying my purchase. The elf could have chucked it away, but he was holding on to it for me. It wasn’t like he didn’t know it was just soaps. He’d watched me shopping the past few hours. But he was still carrying it.

My confused and wounded heart clung to that stupid little thing as a tiny sign that Nylian might listen to what I had to say. I wasn’t dumb enough to let my hopes rise any higher than that. During our walk, I wracked my brain for what to say to him and was still coming up with nothing that would make sense. Was I left with nothing but the truth?

No one would believe the truth. I didn’t even believe the truth, and I was living it.

We tromped up the stairs after greeting the wigged goblin in the lobby, and I unlocked the door to my room. I placed my package on the table, hoping the stopper hadn’t come loose from the inkwell. Nylian slammed the door behind him and tossed my other package onto the bed. As he dropped into the one chair in the room, he pulled out a dagger and let the pristine silver blade catch the last tendrils of daylight coming through my window.

“Start talking,” he bit out.

“I will.” I snatched up the box of wooden matches and lit the lantern after three tries and two broken matches, thanks to my shaking hands. Once it was burning, I used it to light two more candles, chasing away as many of the shadows as possible, but it did nothing to thaw Nylian’s stony expression.

“I-I’m not sure what to say. Or even how to begin,” I stalled. This was all such a mess and so impossible. I paced the small space available between the bed and the window while trying to keep as much distance from Nylian.

“How about the truth?”

“I want to tell you the truth!” The words burst out of me in a shout. I turned away from him, shoving one hand through my hair. Was I scared of him killing me? Maybe. But really, I was more afraid of him not believing me. After everything we’d been through, all we’d shared while on the road, I couldn’t take the idea of him not believing me.

“But…” he prodded when I fell silent.

“You won’t believe me.” I sighed.

“Try me. If you tell me the truth, I promise I won’t kill you, no matter how bad it is.” Nylian held up the blade, letting the lamplight glance off the razor-sharp edge. “Lie to me, and you won’t leave this room alive.”

My hands balled into trembling fists at my side. “Fine! I’m not Victor Montcroix. I’m from another world and somehow, I got zapped into his body. My real name is Adam Lockhart, and I’m a writer. I fell off a bridge after finding this stupid coin. When I woke up, I was here, and you were standing over me. And since we’re being super honest now, I know that your real name isn’t Nylian.” I marched over to him and leaned down so that our noses almost touched, ignoring the fact that his dagger was pointed straight at my heart. “You’re Prince Xeran Elrich, twin brother of Prince Orian Elrich. The first sons of King Dorwynn of Wolfrest. You’ve been exiled and you’re searching for your brother’s actual killer. Someone is framing you, because you would never hurt Orian. You loved your brother. The problem is, you don’t know if you’ve been betrayed by someone in the court, your own family, or if one of the enemies of Wolfrest arranged it.”

I whirled around, stomping away from Nylian to pull at my hair in frustration. Now that the words were pouring out, I couldn’t stop them, no matter how ridiculous they sounded. A harsh laugh broke from my throat and I threw my hands up in the air. “I don’t even know if Victor Montcroix had a hand in it.” I spun to face him and hit myself in the chest with both hands. “But I didn’t do it. You were already exiled from Wolfrest when I came to this world. I…I…” There was nothing left. I’d run out of steam, and I was sure he didn’t believe a single word of it. Why would he?

The idea of showing him the coin crossed my mind, but I shoved it aside almost as quickly as it formed. Nylian had enough trouble as it was. While the wizard had been of little help, he’d confirmed one thing for me—that coin was fucking dangerous. There was no way in hell I was making Nylian’s life worse with that coin.

“I know you’re not Victor Montcroix.”

Nylian’s quiet statement almost knocked my legs out from under me. I wobbled and barely made it over to the bed to sit before I tumbled straight to the floor. “What?” I croaked, confident my tortured brain had made it all up.

“You’re not Victor Montcroix,” he repeated, except this time there was the tiniest hint of a smile on his lips as he placed his dagger into its sheath.

“You knew?” I exhaled. The room was spinning. The absolute relief was making me light-headed. My heart was doing a weird dance in my chest. Was I dying? Having a heart attack? Hallucinating? Probably all the above. “Wait! You recognized this body as Victor Montcroix, but you knew I wasn’t him?” I demanded, still trying to wrap my brain around his words.

“Yes, to both.”

“You fucking asshole!” I roared. With a jump to my feet, I snatched up the pillow on the bed and pummeled the exiled prince of Wolfrest with it while using every curse word I could think of. By the time I was winded and swaying, I was pretty sure what was coming out of my mouth was pure gibberish, but I didn’t care.

“All right, I think you’ve gotten that out of your system,” Nylian declared after blocking every one of my frantic strikes. He plucked the pillow from my fingers and spun us so he could deposit me in his chair. “You need to sit before you pass out.”

“But I don’t understand. How?” My fingers curled, and I shook my hands out in front of me.

Nylian tossed my pillow to the bed and leaned his shoulder against the wall closest to me, his left ankle crossed over his right. “Because I’ve met Prince Victor Montcroix. It was the celebration of my father’s fiftieth year as monarch two years ago, and the various kingdoms sent representatives to take part. Edros sent Prince Victor and several other nobles. We spoke very little, but I watched him from afar. Prince Victor’s personality couldn’t be more different from yours. When I spotted you in Trengrave Woods, I was planning to kill you, but then you opened your mouth…” He left the rest of the sentence hanging, finishing with a small shrug of one shoulder.

“I opened my mouth and what?” I cried.

“It was obvious something was wrong. You didn’t talk like Victor, or act like him. The more time I spent with you, the clearer it was. At first, I thought it was simple amnesia, but there were random things you knew, yet shouldn’t. Besides, I couldn’t believe that amnesia would cause a complete change in personality. You crack jokes all the time. Horrible ones. However, I’m certain Victor Montcroix has never told a joke in his life.”

With a groan, I dropped my face into my hands. How close had I come to dying that first day? It was better if I didn’t know. “Why…why did you keep me with you?” I made another disgruntled noise and glared at Nylian. “Let me guess, even if I wasn’t Victor Montcroix, I was walking around in his body. Everyone would think that I was the prince, which you could use later to get information out of Edros.”

“Precisely.” The elf smirked at me, and my heart twisted.

It was never about friendship. At no point had I won him over with my sparkling personality and my loyalty. He’d kept me close because he thought he might have a use for me.

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