Page 101 of Destined for the Fae King

From the guarded looks and silence around the table, none of us are too excited about a follow-up to yesterday’s horrific disaster.

Zoe has just settled into her plate of vegetables when the main door to the room opens without warning. Multiple women startle, glancing toward the door as guards file in, led by the Captain Avara, the king’s right-hand man a step behind.

I brace, waiting for the king, uneasy anticipation of whatever he has planned for us churning up the food I’ve just eaten. After all, if he planned to apologize, why bring a host of warriors with him?

But the king doesn’t appear.

Avara looks us over before settling on me. “Lady Mira, you’re to come with us.”

“Me?” I blink, taken aback.

“Right away,” the king’s personal guard orders.

Then Tharin is there, pushing through the other guards to step between me and the newcomers. “What’s happening here?”

When his hand drops to the pommel of the sword at his side and stays there, my heart drops.

Wrong. Very wrong.

“King’s orders,” Avara says.

Dawning horror steals the warmth from my skin. He knows. Oh God, somehow he knows. I twist back toward the table, searching one face after another.

“Mira?” Grace grabs my hand.

Alex looks ready to leap out of her chair and fight the guards herself. Adeline is pale and drawn. Gabriella openly gapes in shock. Zoe has dropped her fork. I finally glance at Cora, expectingthe sting of her triumphant gaze, but she looks as horrified as the rest. She gives the slightest shake of her head and mouths,No.

Not her. Not any of them.

Tharin is arguing with the guards closing in, but I barely hear him.

None of the women ratted me out. They wouldn’t. And it wasn’t Tharin—he’s as shocked as the rest.

“Right now, miss.” Avara waits, hand outstretched just a few feet away.

My heart is in my throat as I release Grace’s hand, rise on shaking legs, and reach for the guard’s outstretched hand.

But Tharin grabs my other arm first.

“I’m going with her,” he snaps. He cuts his gaze to me, concern evident.

Thank you,I say silently. He must understand, because he gives a short nod before turning back toward the Captain of the Guard.

The moment I take Avara’s hand, we shift. The air constricts, the world melts, and then we’re in a dimmer room that swelters with warmth. My head is still spinning, my lunch tossing and turning, when the captain’s strong arm lands on my shoulder and pushes me downward.

“Kneel,” she says.

I drop, half falling, my palms slapping onto the stonework. Tharin is right there with me, down on one knee, his head bent in a show of deference. Flames flicker in my periphery, sending light and shadow dancing across the ground. Probably the source of the heat too, since it comes in waves from that direction. When the world stops spinning, I raise my head.

The king sits on a throne just ahead, head propped on his fist as he scowls at me. A few guards linger off to the side, but much of the room is empty and dark.

“This is the woman you saw this morning?” Vasilius asks someone.

“It is.”

I twist my head toward the voice. Now I know why Katherine wasn’t at lunch. She was here. And the bitch looks all too proud of herself, arms crossed, chin raised, and a sneer on her pointed face. Should have known it was too much to hope for us all to get along.

“What is it you thought you saw?” I demand, pushing back to my feet. I glance between her and the king, waiting for an answer.

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