Page 2 of The Vanishing Throne

I make the mistake of looking over the edge.

My stomach clenches. Below me is nothing but darkness, an escarpment that descends to nothingness. No light penetrates the blackness below and there’s nothing to grab onto if I need to escape. No other platforms nearby, or rocks to jump onto, and the floating buildings are too far into the distance.

This is a prison, with the only escape a lethal drop.Where the bloody hell is this place?

‘Good. You’re awake.’

I whirl to find Lonnrach on his own platform, smaller than my own. In my distraction, I hadn’t even noticed the taste of his powers, the lingering touch of flower petals against my tongue and the sweet taste of nature and honey. Gone is his gleaming fae armour. Instead he’s dressed like a human, in smoke-grey trousers and a white lawn shirt. His salt-white hair is pulled back and gathered at the nape of his neck.

His eyes are on my head injury. ‘I’d hoped that didn’t cause any permanent damage.’

Why?I almost ask, but just the sight of him still alive fills me with rage. My gaze strays to the mark on his cheek, the one left by my sword. I had the chance to kill him and I didn’t take it. I won’t make that mistake again.

‘Where are we?’ I ask. My voice is rough, my throat raw.Calm.Stay calm.

‘TheSìth-bhrùth, in what was once the Unseelie Kingdom.’ As Lonnrach’s gaze lingers on the crags to either side of us, his expression hardens. ‘What’s left of it.’

Were we in a ballroom, and I didn’t know Lonnrach as something other than human, I would have described him as achingly beautiful. Magnetic. But that’s all part of his physical allure, his ability to entice human victims with such ease – a skill that alldaoine sìthpossess. I was tempted by that power back on the battlefield, but now he’s just the bastard who injured me, made me bleed, captured me, and—

‘If you’ve done anything to my home … ’ My voice dips low, dangerous. ‘I’ll kill you.’

I’ll kill you regardless. I’ll just take my time.

Lonnrach tilts his head slightly. There’s an amused, slow lift to his lips, as if we’re at an assembly and he’s participating in light flirtation. His smile is unnerving. An arrogant hint ofI know something you don’tand whatever thesomethingis almost breaks my hard-won control.

‘Will you?’ he asks.

I bite my tongue to stop myself from asking about Kiaran, about everyone I love. I can’t let him know my worry that they’re all dead; I have to pretend that I don’t feel a thing.

Instead, I brush my fingers against myseilgflùrnecklace, plaited together in a single strand. The soft thistle is deadly to Lonnrach’s kind, effective enough to burn through his flesh. ‘I could wrap this around your throat if I wanted. It’s not a quick way to die. I’ve seen it.’

Lonnrach stuffs his hands in his trouser pockets, and I’m certain if his platform had something to lean on, he would bestanding against it. Cold, casual, obviously not the least bit concerned.

Perhaps he has a talent for lying, too. Just like me.

‘You’re not in any position to make threats,’ he says lightly, glancing down into the crevasse at its deepest and darkest point.

I try to resist looking, too. I fail. Even if I managed to kill Lonnrach, I’d be trapped. Pushing him over the edge isn’t exactly an option – he’d likely survive the fall, damn his indestructible fae body.

I let my expression settle and appear cold, detached. It takes every skill in deception I’ve learned since I first discovered the fae were real and one of them had murdered my mother. With the fae, everything is a game. Even grief. If given the chance, Lonnrach would use it against me, torment me with it. I have to play the game, too.

One breath, two, to steady myself. ‘How do I know it’s not a trick?’ My voice is almost playful, chastising; it is as calm as a mountain stream. I am a masterful liar. I learned from the best, after all. ‘This place?’

Lonnrach’s expression doesn’t change. ‘It’s not.’

I think of his fleeting smile and the possibility that everyone and everything I care about is gone. Then I really do have nothing to lose by being reckless.

But Lonnrach does. There’s still one thing he needs: Me. If he didn’t, I’d be dead.

Time to test that. I approach the edge of my small platform on the side closest to him. ‘So if I dothis’– I balance on one foot, on the tips of my toes, so close to the ledge – ‘and fall, it’ll kill—’

Before I can even blink, Lonnrach is off his platform. His body slams into my own, knocking me off my feet so hard I fear we’ll go over the other side and he’ll kill me anyway.

We don’t. In the end, he hauls me up, his hand painfully gripping my upper arm. His silver eyes glow bright with anger. I’msurprised by the display of emotion; the fae always seem so in control, every feeling perfectly reined in.

‘You are afoolishgirl,’ he says.

Now I know. Lonnrach forgot the foremost rule of our little game:Never let your enemy know how desperately you require something. Heneedsme alive, not just as a prisoner of war. That’s why he cared about my head injury causing lasting damage.

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