Page 49 of Until the Stars Fall

My heart thundered in my ears.

My lungs gulped for air.

My mind whirred around nothing and everything all at once.

“Connor,” my father said, his tone so casual I wanted to retch. What had happened to him? Where had our loving father gone?

But I knew. I knew what had blackened his heart and why his temper raged.

He had lost his mate.

That’s no excuse for this!

“What happened?” I asked, my voice shaky.

But the king didn’t respond. Instead, he leaned down and grabbed Brennan hard by the chin. His fingers slipped in the blood that covered my brother’s face, but he still managed to yank his head up.

“I don’t care if that human is your fucking mate, Brennan,” our father hissed. “You will propose to Calla. You will marry Calla. You will forget the human. Do you understand?”

Brennan choked and swallowed hard before nodding.

My father growled, “Good” and then flung my brother’s face away from him, sending him backwards in the chair, which toppled over and slammed into the floor with a crack so loud I winced.

The guards rushed in behind me.

“We’re sorry, Your Majesty.”

“He just—”

With a wave of his hand, the king quieted them. “It’s okay. He needed to see this. Take Brennan to the healer.” He tossed his head toward my brother, and then his hostile eyes met mine. “You can’t always protect him, Connor. You can’t always take his punishments for him. And I should never have allowed it all these years. I did you and him both a disservice by doing so. But this had to be done. You know what is at stake. You know what he needs to do. You know what we stand to lose if he fails. And now hopefully he does too.”

I had no words. I had no thoughts. I had nothing.

I was nothing.

I was good for no one.

CHAPTER 24

Lieke

My feet wouldn’t move. As I watched Connor race into the palace, I didn’t know if I’d done the right thing. Connor didn’t particularly like me, and he certainly didn’t like my relationship with Brennan.

Any hope that my fear for Brennan’s safety was unfounded had been dashed away by the horror in Connor’s eyes when I’d told him. No, Brennan wasn’t okay. Rumors of the king’s temper had circulated the palace hallways since the queen’s death, but few of the staff had ever witnessed it firsthand.

Those who had seen it refused to talk about it.

“What happened?”

I spun around to find the other fae, Connor’s friend, walking toward me while a page led the horses off to the stables. I couldn’t speak. All I could manage to do was stare dumbly at him as he approached. He assessed me, his brows lowering over his dark eyes as if I were some wild animal who didn’t speak his language.

He stopped a respectable distance away but leaned forward slightly as he said, “I’m Matthias. You’re Lieke, right?”

I nodded, still incapable of speech.

“What happened to the prince?” he asked gently, concern softening his features.

“The king dragged him away,” I said.

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