Page 72 of Glow of the Everflame

Remis abruptly released me and flexed his fingers, but the feeling of his grip on my arm remained, an invisible shackle locked in place.

“It’s very important that we keep this bargain between us. Some in House Corbois would be willing to Challenge you just to cost me my magic.” His gaze darkened. “Especially those powerful enough to believe they can defeat you.”

I frowned, but I nodded in agreement. I didn’t need his pointed look to know there was only one Corbois who fit that description.

Remis beamed like he had won some critical advantage, leaving me with a nagging unease. “Let me be the first to formally welcome you to House Corbois.”

I rubbed my still-throbbing wrist. “Has my mysterious Corbois father been chosen?”

“Indeed.” He retrieved a book from a nearby shelf, then cracked it open and laid the pages before me, his finger tracing the ink of a handwritten family tree. “Harold Corbois. He was the last of his line.”

I skimmed the information below Harold’s name. He had no spouse or siblings, born just before the death of his parents, and deceased a month before my own birth.

Curiously convenient.

“Is there anything I should know about my dear departed sire?” I asked.

“I believe the less you know about him, Your Majesty, the better.”

I looked once more at the family records. The ink on Harold’s listing was thicker and bolder than the other faded entries on the page.

I wondered if dear Harold ever even existed at all.

“Well, then.” I gently tapped my finger over his scrawled name. “Rest in peace, Father.”

ChapterSixteen

The day of the funeral, a group of servants arrived to move me to the royal chambers despite all my protests to the contrary.

Though the Crown’s multi-room suite was filled with every luxury, I had no desire to return to the site of my bizarre encounter with the late King, and my current room’s close proximity to Luther gave me a sense of comfort I was trying not to think too much about. I was begrudgingly convinced to move when Luther promised me the King’s deathbed had been replaced—and when he mentioned the suite connected to the gryvern habitat.

Sorae was ecstatic to have me within reach. A row of wide archways in the spacious main parlor and the Crown’s bedchambers opened up to her perch, and she had wedged herself as far through them as her enormous body could fit. She purred contentedly, her scaled head resting on a bed of cushions I’d piled together as her ochre gaze watched me pace around the sprawling firelit room.

I had no idea what to expect of a Descended funeral, and I had been too wrapped up in thoughts of the Challenging to bother finding out.

To make matters worse, there was no one around to ask. House Corbois had departed hours earlier to rub elbows with the other Houses before the event began. Remis had insisted that I fly in later on Sorae—alone.

“If only you could talk, Sorae,” I groaned, flipping through a stack of dresses I’d pulled from the wardrobe. “I bet you would be a fantastic advisor.”

She gave a breathy snort and snapped her teeth, as if to sayYou’re damn right I would.

Eleanor had stocked my closets with clothing in every style and color, but she had thought too highly of my intellect—wrongly, it seemed—to label them by appropriate occasion. I pulled out a modest, unadorned black gown that revealed little other than a low back and held it up to Sorae. “What do you think—royal funeral appropriate?”

The dark slits of her reptilian eyes swelled and thinned. She gave me a guttural rumble, a tendril of smoke wafting from her nostrils.

“Too plain?” I wrinkled my nose and stared at my options. “If you were pretending to be a naive, airheaded fool, what would you wear?”

A scrap of glittering scarlet caught my eye. “Probably something like this,” I joked, tugging out a slinky dress with thin crisscrossing straps down the back and thighs. Sorae let out a soprano trill that I swore sounded like an agreement.

I held the gaudy dress against my body. Flecks of light sparkled as I swayed from side to side. “If I wore this to a funeral in the mortal world,myfuneral would come next.”

Sorae’s fur-tipped tail smacked the floor. She lifted her head from the pillows and nudged my ankle insistently.

“It’s too much. There will be time soon enough to make a big statement. Today, I need to blend in and not be noticed.”

Her golden eyes shot to the dazzling Crown above my head, as if sayingGood luck with that.

I sighed and peeled off my clothing, then shimmied into the plain black dress. The open back was more dramatic than I’d expected, dipping so low it was nearly obscene. I fought the instinct to cover it up.

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