Page 210 of Bride of the Midnight Prince

“You have a choice, son of mine,” roars Lady Nothril. “Give me back my daughter, and I will spare your wife. If you do not, you will be forever banished from all of Faerieland.”

Rahk stands his ground.

Lady Nothril drags one taloned hand through the trees and screams: “You will never see your homeland again. You will never see your friend the High King again. You will lose your throne. You will lose your long life. Would you give up a thousand more years for a mere hundred?”

Rahk grits his teeth against the force barreling into him. “You cannot set foot in this realm!”

“Will you give up everything—for that?” Lady Nothril’s massive eyeballs swivel to me, pinning me in place. “A tiny, puny creature who will live a few more decades, at most?”

Rahk’s answer carries over the wind. “Yes.”

My hair whips across my face. A dagger stabs into my heart. I don’t want him to give up everything for me. I don’t want him to give up his only friend, his long life, his throne, his chance to do good in Faerieland.

Rahk looks back at me, holding my gaze as he repeats, “Yes.”

I stop breathing. There is no regret in his gaze. Not a single piece of resentment.

He wants to spend the rest of his life with me. Here, in the human lands. No matter what it costs him.

Over everything, he chooses me.

Torn between laughing and crying and also running for my life from Lady Nothril, I end up just standing there stupidly, my mouth gaping open.

Lady Nothril’s expression contorts in genuine shock, and I almost pity her. Her fingers curl into a fist that she smashes into the ground. Even on the other side of the border, the entire valley shudders. Then she plunges forward.

“Rahk!” I scream.

Lady Nothril’s attention latches onto Pavi. “My daughter! Come back to me!” Her hand whips out—to reach across the border and grab Pavi.

A soul-splitting scream almost seems to tear the worlds in half. I crumple to the ground in a fetal position, covering my ears from the searing pain. When I look up, Lady Nothril waves a burning hand in the air, clutching her wrist and shrieking.

“You cannot come into this land!” Rahk yells back.

“Pavi!” screams Lady Nothril.

Tears stream down Pavi’s face. She whips back and forth between looking at Rahk and her mother. That is when I realize it.

Pavi still does not know the monster that Lady Nothril is. She thinks that because Lady Nothril protected her from Lord Nothril, it means that she is less evil.

Rahk sends me a panicked look as he realizes the same thing. Then he looks at his sister. I watch the shift come over his expression. My lungs tighten.

He beckons Pavi to his side. She goes at once. He gets down on one knee before her, taking her hands in his.

“You are safe here in the human lands,” he tells her. “You are not safe in Nothril, and you are not safe with Lady Nothril. But you are old enough to choose what you want. You can stay with me and Kat. Or you can go back.” He draws a deep breath. “You must choose for yourself.”

She looks up at him, looks at me, and then back at the towering visage of her terrifying mother. Her brow hardens. Her voice is quiet, but the swirling wind carries her answer to my ears. “I do not want to leave Nothril like this.”

Rahk’s eyes shutter. He tightens his grip on her hands. “You know that I cannot protect you if you go back. I will not see you again.”

Tears well up in her eyes. She throws her arms around his neck, and he holds her tightly.

“I love you, Pavi,” he chokes. “Do not let Nothril change your sweet heart.”

She nods, clinging harder as she sobs. Then she pushes back and starts toward the Wood.

I block her path with my arm. “Not yet.”

I step closer to where Lady Nothril towers over the Wood. I lift my voice and cry: “We will return your daughter in exchange for the release of every human slave in all of Nothril. Only then can you have her back.”

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