Page 18 of Queen of Stars and Shadows

“I think some of them are further down the row.”

“Did you see the man who was with me? Tall, dark hair, pewter-colored eyes?”

She shakes her head. “I’m not sure. Who is he? And where in Aureon have you been this whole time?” Her lips tremble as she speaks, her eyes still wet with unshed tears.

“That’s an incredibly long story.” I squeeze her fingers. “First, do you have any idea why the royal guard captured us? Why would the king and queen want us locked up? We fought and killed most of the nightmares that had been terrorizing the countryside.” I shake my head. It doesn’t make any sense.

“I think they’re accusing us of having something to do with that,” she whispers, trembling. “I heard snatches of conversion from the guards. They think, since they found us at the hiding place of the… the monsters. Nightmares, whatever they are. That we were working with them.” She cocks her head to the side. “Why did you call them nightmares?”

“That’s preposterous. Of course we weren’t helping them.” Fury simmers in my voice. Not only do I have Avonia and Jonavus to contend with, but now the king and queen of Eldare have imprisoned us without just cause?

“You seem different,” Lilette says softly. “Stronger. Not that you weren’t plenty strong before.”

I suck in a breath and let out a deep sigh. “Oh, Lilette. I’ve lived a lifetime since I left you.”

“Tell me everything.” Her eyes and her voice implore me.

“It’s all going to sound crazy,” I warn her. “But to start with, apparently, I wasn’t born in Eldare at all. I was born in… in Valaron.”

Her face wrinkles in disbelief, but she lets me continue.

“You remember, no doubt, the night when I was to be initiated as High Priestess…”

And I tell her everything. From Zyren sweeping me off to Valaron, the whole tale, up until earlier this evening. I even tell her all the things I can’t bring myself to tell anyone else. How Zyren and I made love in the meadow the night before I was to wed his brother. About the curse I kept secret from him for so long. Too long. About the nightmare blood that runs in my veins, and in Zyren’s too. And even about the deal I made with the demon, how I’ve damned everyone with my stupidity. How I now have roughly four days to solve a half dozen impossible problems before that evil creature is set free to prey on my people.

When I finish, Lilette’s eyes are as big as the moon. “That’s… that’s incredible,” she says softly. “I can’t believe it… you’re queen of a realm we thought was only a fable. And you’remarried.”

I raise a brow. “Out of all the wild tales I told you, that’s the part you latch onto?”

We stare at each other, and then a ripple of laughter rises from my throat, and Lilette’s face breaks into a smile, and the next moment we are utterly dissolved in laughter until tears pour down our cheeks.

“You’re making my ribs hurt,” I groan, clutching one arm around my abdomen, where it’s been battered so many times I lost count.

Eventually the mirth subsides, and I meet her gaze, my expression becoming serious once again. “Now I need to hear what befell you when I was gone.” I pause, swallowing past a throat which has suddenly gone dry as sand in an hourglass. “I think I know part of it. Something the demon showed me.” I lock eyes with her. “You had to take my place, didn’t you? As High Priestess?”

Lilette’s lips tremble at the edges, and she nods. “Don’t blame yourself, Sarielle. I know you.”

That now familiar black rage boils in my veins once again, and I can feel my face storming over. “How can I not?” I ask harshly.

“It’s what we were raised for. I knew it was my duty, and I was honored to fulfill it. It was only the once I had to join with the High Priest. Once, before the nightmares came.”

I let her tell the rest of her tale, tamping down my anger so she can share her story. She needs her voice to be heard, just as she had heard mine. She shares, in a shaky voice, the terror of being kept by the nightmares while they picked people off one by one. When she’s finished, her cheeks are streaked with tears.

I squeeze her hands and reach out and wipe her tears away. “I’m so sorry. I wish I had been there with you.”

“But you’re here now. You came back for me,” she says with a trembling smile.

“Of course I did.” I lean against the bars, resting my forehead against hers for a moment. Then I straighten back up. “And the High Priest—was he taken by the nightmares, too?”

Her expression sours. “No, he left the Amethyst Palace ‘on business’ five days ago and never came back.”

“That pathetic coward,” I growl. “Of course he ran off to save himself. He has never done anything but lie to us.”

I had shared with her what Zyren told me—the truth of magic, and how the priest was somehow controlling all the magic in Eldare, keeping most of the citizens from possessing it.

“If we survive the next few days, I will find him, and I will make him pay.” A low pulse of power moves off me and my nightmare growls within me. “Iwillreturn the magic to Eldare.”

“Why don’t we focus on saving ourselves first,” Lilette says softly. “You have enough on your plate already.”

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