Page 42 of Shade of Ruin

She shakes her head. “No. I will never sit on the Throne again. There is another who can stop the corruption, but she will need help.”

“You come here asking for help? What help could I possibly be?”

“None. But you canbecomesomeone who could help her.” From behind her back, she pulls a ragged black cloak. Simple and unassuming, it’s made of linen and doesn’t look like anything of value, like so many of the ancient pieces of magicfrom the House of Shadows. Nothing like the finery that most High Fae wore.

She hands it to him, and as soon as he touches it, he feels the power flowing through it. His eyes open wide, and he asks, “The Shadowed Cloak? I thought it was a myth?”

Brenna shakes her head slowly. “As with most things, my House knew where it was hidden. But a thing like that cannot be given. Everything has a price.”

The male looks down at the cloak. An artifact from a time long forgotten. “What is the price?” he asks. The Shadowed Cloak. Worn by unknown High Fae throughout time, all of whom were known only as The Shade.

“You must swear that you will do everything in your power to see the one that I have chosen finds the Throne when it is time.”

The male takes a deep breath. Treason. A death sentence. But it’s the best path to saving the magical world, and the male knows this. A member of the House of Shadows on the Throne would help to right things. It would patch the hole that the Shattering put in the balance of the world. It wouldn’t fix it. That would require a member of the House of Earth, too. But it would make things better.

And maybe it could give everyone more time to figure out how to repair what was broken.

“I’ll do it.” A statement of intent. Not a vow.

She nods and slips off the chair, moving with a grace that only the House of Shadows has. He puts his hand out, palm up, and she presses a black fingernail against his wrist. Those dark eyes of hers peer into his, and he knows that this is not a deal that Brenna wanted to make. Trusting others is difficult even when a magical oath is made. Her nail is as sharp as any blade, and when she pierces his skin, a thin line of shadow snakes into him.

Her power in his skin. Willingly given and willingly received. A debt that gives her power over him.

“I will make sure she claims the throne, Lady Brenna,” he says, taking the oath more seriously than any other he’d ever said.

She nods to him. “Good. My daughter will need help. Use the cloak as it was used in the past.”

Of course it would be her daughter. She wouldn’t trust anyone other than her own blood to hold the Shadowed Throne. The male agrees with her choice. Her bloodline is the strongest. But who is her mate?

Brenna gives the male one last look, a haunted one, and then she takes a step, shadows wreathing her body in nothingness, and when they disperse, she’s nowhere to be found. He looks down at the black cloth in his hands and realizes that, for the first time in his life, he can’t depend on anyone else or blame anyone else for his failure.

He looks down at the mark on his wrist. A bond that ties him to the Queen of the Shadows. The little black mark wiggles on his arm, barely noticeable. No one can know what he’s doing. The only thing that anyone will know is that the Shade has come back in the people’s time of need.

And he will begin to collect debts that he’ll use to protect the future Queen of Shadows.

Chapter 21

Control is what separates the High Fae from the other magically touched races. Only the High Fae can manage the emotions that flow through them so strongly. But that control will fade over time…

~Inni the Destroyer, A History of Magic and Dragons

Tomorrow we’ll be inDraenyth. Skycrest rises high into the air in front of us, and I don’t know if I’ve ever felt so small. A thousand times bigger than anything I’ve ever seen, it rises so high it makes the clouds look low.

All around us are mountains climbing into the air, but Skycrest towers above them all. And instead of thinking about that, I’m following Darian through the underbrush full of bitterberries.

He’s so focused on what he’s doing that he doesn’t notice the splashes of yellow that dot his linen tunic from all of the berries he’s crushed. “It’s somewhere close,” he says. “I’d know those feathers anywhere.”

Tracking a gryphon is what Darian had decided to do instead of help Cole with the fire. If I were a smart woman, I would have stayed far away, but based on everything that’s happened in the past few weeks, that’s obviously not the case. It fits my glaring character flaws that I couldn’t tell him to track the gryphon on his own.

Lee had thought he was an idiot. Cole specifically told him he was an idiot. And I’m helping him find the beast.

“Just stop moving,” I finally say, frustration welling up inside me, which is not the same as anger. There’s no buzzing of lightning in a bottle. It’s just… annoyance. Like a bug buzzing in your ear. “Are you even trying to track the gryphon? Or are you just wandering around and hoping you’ll see it?”

Darian blinks. “How do you track something that flies, Maeve? That doesn’t sound like it’s even possible.”

I shake my head. “Then just be quiet and let me find it.” I put my hand on the bitterberry bush next to me. My fingers rub against the waxy leaves of the plant as I close my eyes and go back over the things I’ve seen since I started “tracking” the gryphon with Darian.

There was the feather we found on the trail to Draenyth. A large white feather that’s almost as long as my arm. Tipped in black, it looked like no feather I’d ever seen. Then there’d been the deep paw indentations along the road that led into the forest. Angled just slightly northeast of the road.

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