Page 57 of The Shadow Heir

I scratched my chin. A beard was forming that I needed to remove.What are you up to, little spark?

“Want me to bring her back down?” asked Felipe.

“No.” The response was too fast. I tried to recover. “I will see that she doesn’t touch Father’s precious throne.”

Felipe nodded, hiding a smile. “Certainly, Your Majesty.”

As I moved out of the small cavern, I wasn’t sure if I wanted a reason to wrap my arms around her again or not. And theuncertainty of that brought a wave of pain as the curse surged in my blood.

By the time I reached the throne room, Zara was not there.

Her scent lingered on the cool air, and I searched for her with my magic. She was near, in the weapons training room.

Odd. She did all of her training outside, with the other entertainers.

As I approached the massive cavern, a smile broke across my face and I paused outside the room. Alba.

My sister’s magic resonated against my own from inside the room dedicated to combat training. Had Zara finally agreed to spar with Alba? I hoped Alba hadn’t used any coercive magic to push Zara’s stubbornness aside.

Part of me wanted to barge in and watch, and part of me wanted to let it unfold. I hesitated outside the cavern. If she befriended my sister, perhaps Zara would not think of us all as monsters.

My hand lifted toward the handle, but I never turned it.

Because I was a monster. I’d never planned to keep Zara alive at the end of my Father’s absence. Only Alba. Everything was for her, to keepmy sisteralive.

Everything Zara had said about me was true, and her words cut like knives, exposing me. I would search out the traitor in my court, the one who wanted to poison Alba and me, and I would do it without Zara’s help. She didn’t need to think of me as good, for I wasn’t. Despite all my elixirs and potions, I had no antidote for my father’s wrath. And if she was alive at his return, he would end her, without a doubt.

25

Zara

Adán did not recover from his wound. Tomas, however, was back at the table with us by the night following the trial with no visible limp and his arm had only a scar that looked years old. I said nothing and asked no questions, knowing that I was only alive because of a deal I’d struck with the heir himself. If these others had made similar deals, who was I to blame them?

The fae cavorted with an extra measure of glee, but only for a night before their glamoured faces began once more to droop in boredom, fanning the flames of my hatred for them into a raging inferno.

At our table, Adán’s empty seat gaped like a missing front tooth.

For days, the rest of us hardly spoke during our meals, which suited me just fine. I couldn’t force conversation with these people knowing that I’d survived because of Casimiro’s protection. I felt like a traitor every time my eyes paused on the vacant space at our table.

The weeks after the trial passed in a strange blur as my body adjusted to waking in the evening and sleeping in the day. Atfirst, I slept in small bursts. Exhaustion would win, and I’d curl into my borrowed bed, fighting off nightmares of dips nipping at my ankles as I ran through a version of my garden back in Avencia, this one choked with brambles and filled with smoke. Then I would wake, march down to the arena for moretraining, which so far had consisted of being chased or fighting with wooden weapons, much the way I had once practiced under my weapons tutor’s direction. The absence of Adán pressed like a suffocating blanket over our training sessions, reminding us what was at stake. Even Ivy said no more than a handful of words to me the entire week. I wasn’t in the mood for idle chatter, either, except that I needed to uncoversomethinguseful for Casimiro before he would tell me about Talia.

And I wanted to know why his arms turned black. It hinted at a weakness, and the more I learned about this immortal fae prince, the more it seemed he was weaker than I’d once thought. So, I’d accepted Alba’s invitation to duel, hoping to eventually learn more about Casimiro. She’d only come to collect me one time in two weeks, which helped me remember that time passed differently for these immortals. They were never in a hurry about anything. Sparring with a fae had proven every bit as maddeningly unfair as I’d expected, but, in the end, Alba had not hurt me, and I’d actually found myself smiling a few times.

In an effort to hold up my end of the deal with Casimiro, I’d asked Ariana about the poisonings, but she’d given me a stiff look and fastened my dress extra tightly that day, so I’d decided not to ask her again. And every other mortal I’d asked had given a similarly unhelpful response. Casimiro was right—the people here must have been silenced from speaking about this.

One night after a training session, Ivy and I walked mostly in silence through a cavern we’d discovered that housed fascinating glowing mushrooms and equally mesmerizing crystal formations that twinkled in the strange light. This placereminded me of the whimsical illustrated children’s books in my father’s massive library. I missed the comforting reading space and the welcome feel of the library I’d left behind in Leor. I missed my own bed and the food I was used to eating in my home. I even missed Nina.

“Do you think of your family often?” I asked Ivy.

She nodded but didn’t reply.

Speaking of home brought a tightness to my throat, followed inevitably by a sinking feeling that felt like guilt mingled with anger. I huffed as memories of Jorge barged into my mind.

“What is it?” Ivy asked. Her features were painted in a pale blue hue from the glowing fungus that climbed the walls.

“If I hadn’t been so bad at reading men, I wouldn’t be here right now.”

Ivy tilted her head. “You don’t know that love would have broken the bargain.”

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