Page 70 of Cursed Heirs

By me.

I’d decided to strike a balance between creating political upheaval in the Dark Fae Realm—more than there already was with my father kidnapped—by forcing my ascension to Interim King, and appealing to Marlowe to go themagical maproute as Xavier and Talon had pulled for.

I’d basically threatened Marlowe with my ascension, something he didn’t want for me. Something my father didn’t want for me.

Not like this.

Not tainted like this.

It sparked their fears of me going dark and losing my way.

I sat in one of the oversized baby-blue armchairs, continuing to rest my body as Talon had urged, something that really wasn’t coming easy and was taking effort with the dire straits we all currently found ourselves in.

Xavier without his magic and still reeling from it, albeit in good spirits currently at least.

Constantine on the loose.

The supernatural world under attack.

My father kidnapped.

Alena stolen from us and under the influence of a psychopath.

Exemplarstruggling to fight off this madness.

While I was affecting and trying to maintain a calm and composed air in the face of it all, Talon was perched on the arm of my chair sipping at his favored Hurricane to take the edge off, while Xavier was leaning against the wall chewing on a Red Vine, as we listened to Marlowe’s report.

Apparently, he’dhadan in to one of my father’s contacts this entire time, neglecting to tell me through fear of what I might do, not wanting to involve me because he believed it would be against my father’s wishes for me.

“A defected Light Fae,” he explained. “A former member of their Royal Council. Your father’s secret contact—well, one of them—who resided in the human realm. They were close, but Taelorn betrayed him for a taste of Constantine’s power when the acolytes reached out and informed him of how close they were to raising him. He wouldn’t tell me a thing, even under torture, so I sent him to the new Commander in the DFR to employ harsher methods to ensure his… breakage.”

“Thoseharsher methodscan take days,” I spoke.

“Days only. Not weeks or months. We’ll know soon enough.”

“And then you plan to take the intel toExemplarfor them to act upon?” X asked him.

“Is that not what you’d want, Xavier? As the great Elliot Sabre’s heir I understand that the two of you see eye-to-eye on everything. You don’t color outside the lines like Orpheus.”

“Circumstances aren’t normal. Neither should our actions be,” he responded impressively diplomatically.

“Plus, aren’t they gonna be pissed that you tortured a suspect?” Talon spoke.

I smiled inwardly. He really had a gift for hitting the nail on the head.

“This is Dark Fae justice,” I told Marlowe. “This person is responsible for our King’s kidnapping. He’s key to finding my father and he’s holding out on us. It started with Dark Fae justice, it stays as Dark Fae justice. We see it through on our own. If he breaks and the lead pans out, then we’ll bringExemplarin on it.”

“We have to. Alena is involved,” X said.

I didn’t want to go into that with Marlowe. His focus was on the Dark Fae aspect, obviously, and that was what I needed to appeal to. Emphasizing how much the three of us were being killed inside by the fact that Alena wasn’t here with us and, worse, that she was in that psychopath’s hands would only complicate matters. And we had enough of that. I’d briefed the boys on keeping our emotions over our woman on the down low all the while he was here.

“But at this delicate stage, the last thing we want is them finding out we’re torturing someone to get the answers we seek, and possibly pulling the traitorous bastard out in the name of their moral code and, thus taking this opportunity from us,” I added, eyeing Marlowe pointedly.

“I am in agreement.”

“There’s clearly a first time for everything then,” I rebutted.

“Well, you’re handling this in a much more reserved and careful way than I’d figured you would, especially after that display of dark violence with Isabella Ravenfall.”

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