Page 5 of Heat of the Everflame

Arboros,Realm of Root and Thorn.

I should have known. During my time as a Guardian, I’d heard the Lumnos and Arboros cells were working together on a mission, and Henri and my former healer colleague Lana, both Guardians, had left for Arboros days before the Rite of Coronation.

Vance crossed his arms. “I’m a realm leader just like you,MotherCordellia. I’ve earned my title.”

“Did you?” I cut in. “Henri told me you were just borrowing the title until the woman in charge returned.”

Cordellia nodded. “She’s right, Vance. You’re only the Lumnos Father until Auralie can resume her post as the leader of the Guardians.”

Leader of the Guardians.

Blood rushed from my head.

“What did you say?” I croaked. “Auralie—my mother... she’s...”

Cordellia’s brows rose. “You didn’t know that, either? She’s led us for nearly a decade.”

The memories of my life somersaulted around me, reframed by an impossible new reality. My mother, Auralie Bellator, was the leader of the ruthless, violent rebels preparing to raise a bloody war against the Descended. Againstme.

My mother, who had made her career working for the Descended as a healer in the Emarion Army.

My mother, who must have slept with a Descended man to become pregnant with me.

My mother, who had negotiated to send her son, Teller, to the Descended academy to grow up among Lumnos’s elite.

All my cherished mental images of her suddenly felt warped and misshapen, the colors all wrong, like a painting left outside to wilt in the sun and rain. How could those choices have come from the same woman? Had my father known the truth about her? Did Teller know?

DidLutherknow—was that why he had secretly helped her?

My chest squeezed painfully taut at the thought of him. He would be wondering where I was, fretting over whether I was safe, blaming himself for my capture. He had barely been willing to let me leave the palace without a small militia of guards—if he knew I was being held in chains in a rebel camp, he would stop at nothing to storm in and save me.

Just like he would have rushed in when he noticed the rebels attacking Coeurîle.

My heart leapt into my throat. “The attack—was anyone hurt? Were there any casualties?”

Cordellia’s expression softened with a touch of sympathy. “Your mother survived. She wasn’t hurt, but she—”

“Were any of the Descended killed?”

The question spilled out in a rush. I tried and failed miserably at feigning indifference, but there was a flurry of movement as mouths tightened and eyes narrowed, suspicion spreading like wildfire across the mortals’ faces.

“There was a man who came with me to the island. He—he was a friend to my mother. And to me.” My pulse picked up speed as the prospect of losing him grew too large and too real. “He’s a good man. He helped the mortals. He—”

“You were the only Descended we were instructed to spare,” Cordellia said curtly. All lingering warmth cooled from her tone. “There were casualties on both sides. I cannot offer you any more information than that.”

My knees felt made of sawdust, ready to collapse at the slightest gust. If Luther had been killed trying to protect me—and from an attack I might have played a part in bringing about...

I would never forgive myself, if that was the case. And I would never forgive my mother.

“Please,” I begged, my anger giving way to desperation. “Tell me what happened. Why was my mother there? Why am I here?”

Cordellia sighed. “When it became clear the King of Lumnos would die soon, your mother knew the Crowns would have to meet to coronate his heir. She proposed that, during the ritual, we launch an attack to capture the island. She had an associate that was able to smuggle her onto Coeurîle this past Forging Day to set up explosives and light them once the Crowns arrived.” She paused. “I don’t think she anticipated herdaughterwould be the one coronated.”

“Nor did we realize it would be eight months until we could strike,” Vance muttered.

Scattered details from the last year began to slot into place.

Luther must have been theassociateto bring her to the island. Only the Crowns were permitted access to Coeurîle, and even then only for specific occasions, but perhaps Luther had been permitted to go in the King’s place, given his illness.

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