Page 8 of Blood On His Lips

“It’s fine,” Sea Eyes said, startling me. A crisp, contralto voice heavily accented with the old realm intonation rather than Everennesse, musical without being overly feminine. “I’m much older than you.”

Who was she, what House? She’d deliberately engaged me. With each strike, I gave ground. She could have ended this, but she drew it out—not for the sake of tutelage, but for satisfaction. She toyed with me like a child with a bug, pulling my legs off one by one and watching me writhe.

This was personal.

I staggered back from a blow I’d failed to block and blinked rapidly, shaking my head to clear my vision.

She was fast, as fast as Baroun, and now I understood he’d been holding back. The more curious question was why, but that didn’t matter right now. He was High Fae and fought like one. I’d survived him because of my Skills and because, I knew now, he’d never really tried to kill me. Against any Low Fae, I was fine.

So what was my opponent? There were no High Fae in Everenne who were mere warriors, and a Lord wouldn’t conceal their face, even if betraying the Prince. The point of the public betrayal wouldbeto be known.

But she fought like one, her movements betraying skill and experience that came only with age and high-level training, an unconscious assumption of greater power and strength over her opponent—me.

I ducked and rolled, springing to my feet in time to block, parry, spin, and aim a powerful kick at her knee. She evaded, throwing a punch. I swung my dagger up in a high arc as my weaponless arm blocked—

—then went numb as her fingers dug into a pressure point.

I yelped, and barely twisted aside enough to avoid the meat of a swipe at my neck. But I stumbled.

Sea Eyes pressed her advantage. Moments later, I was on my back, a blade pricking my throat.

All right.

“Say please,” she said. “How does it feel?”

I stared up at her, calculating and discarding dozens of scenarios, burning through my strength as I drew on the analytic portion of my Skill.

“Who are you?” I asked, buying seconds of time.

The impression of a smile again. “That, my dear, would be telling. And not as fun as your utter bewilderment.”

Definitely personal.

She whirled away from me suddenly, and I glimpsed Juliette, blade in hand. My cousin listed to the side, her broken gait that of someone severely wounded. I jackknifed to my feet, and we attacked Sea Eyes together.

Juliette distracted her while I pulled briefly on my Skill. Sea Eyes evaded my blow at the last second but not before my sabre sliced into her back. Not a fatal wound, but painful.

Juliette’s eyes punched me. “Get out of here. Go!”

I snarled. “I am a Capulette. I don’t leave my warriors on the field to die while I run.”

Sea Eyes laughed. “Don’t worry, children. You’ll die together.”

Another black-clad warrior joined Sea Eyes. Numair and Martine closed in. I raked the field, picking out the position of each warrior.

“We’re being herded!” They must have decided divide and conquer wouldn’t work as well as piggy in a pen.

Our shield overstressed, I stumbled back as a burst of wind slammed into me. The Windwarder was renewing the attack now that Numair and Martine had been repelled.

Another whisper of knowledge clawed up from a deep grave in my mind, and for a split second I panicked, lashing out, and yanked the Windwarder’s power away from them, weaving it into the shield.

Someone cried out. “Kill her! Kill the Apex, she’s taken my power.”

Borrowed, damn it. Borrowed. And again, entirely due to Darkan’s mind dump. That wasn’t the kind of news I needed getting around before I better understood it myself.

The wind bucked and writhed in my hold as I wrestled it under my control enough to force it to disperse. Shock pulsed through my veins. I’dtakenanother mage’s power as my own for a few breaths.

This was a glimmer of what it meant to be an Apex, the other half of my newly discovered duo of abilities, and this was why my older cousin Édouard had wanted me to keep my mouth shut. The High Fae, especially the Lords, would move against me if they knew. They would be forced to consider me a threat.

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