Page 21 of Fae Exile

“Nowhere anyone knows you. Once she figures out you’re gone, she’ll hunt you. Keep away from Magiarantos. Don’t tell anyone where you’re going.” I pushed the importance of my warning into my stare. “No one, not even if you have reason to trust them. The queen knows how to turn people. She can get to anyone.”

“Okay.” Already looking toward his sisters, the brother began to stand.

“Do you know where you’ll go?” I asked.

“No, but we’ll figure it out.”

I hesitated but only for an instant. The throne room was falling apart. “You know who I am?”

He nodded.

“Take your sisters to Amarantos, to the drake’s estate. Find Larissa and tell her I sent you. She’ll hide you till it’s safe.”

“Drake Rush Vega, I thank you. We’re in your debt.”

“There is no debt. I understand what it means to be responsible for sisters. Now go.”

He reached for his sisters as an entire snake, now free of its under-floor prison, weaved around the head of their father, encircling its prize and smearing blood over the cracked and now uneven floor.

Shaking off the gruesome imagery, I sheathed my sword and stalked toward the spot I’d last seen my friends.

As if a giant were lumbering across it, the floor shuddered some more.Brrrum, brrummm, brruuum, bruuuumm. Every one of the large windowpanes was already broken, but the chandeliers overhead were still partially intact, potential bombs waiting to launch their shrapnel.

With the nobles summoned to the throne room without the chance to dress in their colorful costumes, their hair was mostly dark, so as I wove through people I searched for Hiroshi’s distinct lavender head.

I hadn’t yet found my friends when a woman yanked my arm.

It was Jolanda, the dowager countess of Etherantos. Plaster dusted her copper hair, muting its usual bright shine. Her eyes welled with tears. “Help us, please. It’s Conroy.”

Pursing my lips, I scanned the sea of bobbing, frantic heads. Still no lavender.

“Okay,” I told her. “Where?”

“Over here.” She clutched her chest and hurried to where a cylindrical chunk of column, as tall as I was, lay across her son’s legs.

“We can’t get it off him.”

Lennox popped his head out from behind the fallen column. His copper hair was as dingy as his mother’s. His eyes, however, weren’t imploring. They were a cold and calculating brown, waiting to see if I’d hold every one of his offenses against his brother.

“You did your best to kill the woman I love,” I told him.

“I know.” There was no apology on his face or in his tone. “I shouldn’t have bothered though. You did a fine enough job all on your own.”

The world shook me as if I were no bigger than a tick on a sneakle. But even as I rode the floor like a board atop waves, I didn’t move my glare from him. I could kill Lennox now and, by the time the dust settled on this catastrophe, I might get away with it.

“Apologize, Lennox,” Jolanda hissed. “We need Rush to save your brother.”

Lennox didn’t move, didn’t blink nor clear his face of dust.

“Lennox!” his mother barked.

But I was already shaking my head,tsking. “Just hurry. You lift that side, I’ll lift this one.”

Conroy’s eyes were closed, his breathing uneven beneath the heavy stone.

I squatted and heaved, and Lennox and I rolled the column off Conroy.

Jolanda’s hand clutched my arm. “Thank you, Rush. I won’t forget it.”

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