Page 3 of Fae Exile

“Not sure how things could get any worse,” Ryder said.

“She could have died.” I scarcely breathed, unwilling to give this alternative fuel. “I could’ve killed her.” My fear bounced along with chiming laughter and the steady tempo of mandolins, like the light touch of fairies skimming water as they flew over it.

Hiroshi shook his head and rubbed his forearm as if he still felt the pain of losing the limb he’d later regrown. “That definitely would’ve been worse.”

Hiroshi was the steadiest of us all, the calmest in a crisis. His gray eyes now shone with the apprehension I had to work during every one of my waking hours to erase from my countenance, lest the queen suspect the nature of my true intentions.

He said, “Tell me you’ve got a plan, Rush. ’Cause I don’t know if I can stand by and watch you end up with someone else. Not when you’ve got a ... you know.”

A mate. I’d never forget it so long as I lived. I’d never stop feeling Elowyn as if she were still in my arms—at least, I hoped I never would.

As a group, the four of us studied the queen, who was now surrounded by Natania, Coretta, Eliana, Malina, and several other women who aspired to become the next crown princess—and my wife. Their hairdos towered far above their heads in colors so bright they resembled a flower garden—except that they were the wasps instead of pretty petals.

Even as my every impulse yearned for Elowyn, I forced myself to hitch up my chin and straighten my shoulders. “I have no choice. I’ll do what must be done.”

“By dragons’ veins, I hope that doesn’t meanthey’rewhat you have to do,” Ryder uttered, accompanied by another shudder.

“She’s ... enough that she might want you to do all of them at once,” West said, and I registered the “sick and twisted” sentiment he purposefully omitted in reference to the queen. “I’d bet on you taking down an entire legion of skilled soldiers on your own over surviving those odds. They look like they could break you, then eat you alive.”

As if the women possessed preternatural hearing and could pick out our conversation on the other end of the busy hall, all of them looked our way in unison. No, not “our way,”myway.

My ass clenched all on its own.

A few tight breaths later, during which my friends and I stood frozen in their focus, my hand reached for my sword on impulse, where it pressed to its hilt, waiting.

Soft, silky fur slunk along the knees of my britches. Silver beneath the cool lights of the overhead orbs, the fur shifted to an ash blond I recognized instantly. My fingers curled around my sword though I surely wouldn’t be able to draw it against the queen’s newest favorite pet.

In a flash too fast, the feethle transformed into a woman I’d hate if not that the queen alone had claim to that title.

Millicent of Potesantos dragged a finger along my shoulders before stopping with her lips too close to my ear. “Her Majesty Our Great Queen demands your presence, Drake Rush Vega.”

She drew out each of her words so that they scraped along my skin like a rough fingernail. “Better hurry, Rushy. Her Majesty doesn’t like to be kept waiting, and she’s in the mood for the more ... sensual delights you can offer her. You don’t want her ... impatient.”

Then she trailed her fingers down my arm and across my waist, where she came too close to my crotch. I growled a warning at her that the creature in her would understand, but she only chuckled, a barking hoarse purr, and sauntered away, the skirt of her dress swaying exaggeratedly.

“Fuck, man,” Ryder said for all of us.

Before I could receive any more sympathy or useless though well-intended offers to help, I patted my sword on my hip and strode toward the dais.

This was the cost I’d agreed to pay in order to be the one to kill Elowyn and send her body away—and thus spare her life.

So long as Elowyn lived, it was a price I could bear.

I took another step toward the throne and the cruel queen who sat on it, indulging in a recurring fantasy where I had sliced my blade into her heart and not my beloved’s.

Her blood, not Elowyn’s.

Her death ... it was coming.

3.WHERE WE’RE THE PREY

~ ELOWYN ~

What sounded like a twig snapped somewhere off to my left, and I spun in the saddle to look, the sharp movement tugging on the wound above my heart. I hissed at the stab of pain before remembering not to, then swallowed a groan as my companions predictably divided their attention between the twig and me.

“What was that?” I asked from where I sat atop Bolt, short for Lightning Bolt, hoping to return their attention to where it belonged. We were deep in the Wilds, which Pru, Reed, Finnian, and Roan also referred to as Sorumbra, the name given these savage, shadowy lands by the fae who lived far removed from the pomp and artifice of Embermere’s court.

As soon as it became evident I’d survive this most recent near-death event, and my healing finally accelerated, my alertness returned—and not a moment too soon. My days of fevered unconsciousness with scant moments of lucidity saw us through the outskirts of the royal city of Embermere, past the dense forests that separated it from the clan lands, and then through the territory of Amarantos—Rush’s seat of power. I hadn’t been aware enough to protest our route, or Roan’s insistence that we’d be safest passing through Rush’s territory, that as his mate, even if his subjects weren’t yet aware of ourconnection, there should be some innate protection offered me as the unofficial drakess of Amarantos.

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