Page 89 of Kingdom of Briars and Roses

“I’m not lying. I just… I was thinking of home.”

The nightmare in his eyes winked out. In its wake, a softness remained that left me strangely off balance. There was nothing soft about Rydian Nytherra. Anything that suggested otherwise was not to be trusted.

“What are you doing here?” I asked before he could do something even more off-putting like be nice to me.

He gestured to the shelves around us. “I’d think that answer was obvious.”

“You’re here for a book?”

“Is that so hard to believe?”

“Yes,” I said with enough frankness that his eyes narrowed.But I refused to believe this beautifully deadly male wanted a good book to pass the afternoon. Besides, he didn’t live here at Grey Oak Castle, and he clearly didn’t hang out here voluntarily. So, if he was here, it wasn’t by choice.

That left being here on purpose. Either to see Duron or Callan. Or me.

“Or maybe you snuck up on me on purpose,” I said.

He didn’t look the least bit sorry as he said, “Or maybe you should pay more attention to your surroundings.”

All traces of that softness were officially gone. At least, I knew how to handle him this way. Hating each other felt like solid ground at this point.

I glared at him, clutching the book to my chest and stalking past him on my way to the desk. I purposely shoved my shoulder against his, planning to ignore him until he left. But he shot a hand out, wrapping it around my arm.

I stopped, breathless at his touch. When I twisted to face him, his dark eyes raged with a storm I didn’t understand.

“Is this what you sold your soul for?” he asked quietly. “A library?”

I wrenched my arm out of his grasp, my eyes narrowing. I couldn’t help but notice the way his hair fell over his forehead, so long it nearly covered his brow. Suddenly, I found myself fighting the urge to reach up and swipe it away.

Instead, I gripped the book harder.

“I’m looking for answers,” I said in a low voice. “For a way to save my people and stop Heliconia once and for all. What are you doing besides skulking around like Autumn’s little errand boy?”

“If you want answers, maybe try the volume about the Furiosities and their power.”

I went perfectly still. “Why would I do that?”

His brows rose. “Isn’t that where her power comes from?”

I blew out a breath. He meant Heliconia. “Right.”

But that wasn’t the entire reason for his comment. Not after what he’d said to me at camp the other day. He knew what magic I had. And something told me he knew where it had come from.

“Whatever you think you know about me?—”

“I know more than I care to.”

I gripped the book tighter. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“How exactly did you manage to ward your castle so securely?”

That question again. I was starting to think Rydian only ever asked questions he already knew the answer to. Fuck. “I told you, that’s none of your business.”

He studied me, and I forced myself not to look away. “For seven years,” he said quietly, “I looked for a way to break through the wards the Aine held around your castle. I searched every kingdom, interrogated, hunted, bribed—and I never found a way to unseal your borders. But this new magic is something else entirely. I’ve never felt anything remotely as powerful. And I’ve encountered some pretty otherworldly beings.”

He paused, waiting for me to say something.

I didn’t, and he went on. “I went back and stood where the castle should be. In the very same spot, in fact, as that rooftop where we met seven years ago. But there’s only grass, brown for the winter. It’s like Sunspire was never there at all.”

---