Page 81 of Owned

“Where are you going?” Bastian called out.

“The library,” I snapped.

“You’re going to miss all the fun,” Bastian said. “I’m going to tell Lucian everything I know about this meeting… Are you sure you don’t want to come along? You know he’ll expect you to know everything…”

A small, treacherous part of me hoped Bastian would say the wrong thing at the wrong time, and Lucian would take care of him for me.

“Fine,” I ground out.

The shadows bent as we passed, darkening and stretching like long arms reaching for us. When I’d been a child, this place had been frightening—but those days were long gone.

Now the only thing that frightened me was the image of Avril—pale and haunted—barely breathing.

I tried to tell myself that I was only worried about her because of the blood bond—if anything happened to her, what would happen to us?

That was what I needed to know.

But I wasn’t sure that any of the books in my library would hold information like that.

That spell had come from the depths of the grimoire.

Not some classroom at Messana Academy.

This place had changed her.

We’d changed her.

As we neared our father’s study, the air grew colder, biting at my skin. I pushed open the heavy wooden door without knocking and let it swing wide for my brothers to follow me in.

Lucian sat behind his desk, his fingers steepled under his chin and a cold smile playing on his lips as he regarded us with a look that could make anyone feel like an insect pinned to cardboard.

He watched us in silence as we entered.

The glowing red orb that hovered just above his desk pulsed with a steady rhythm, and the delicate tendrils of smoke that swirled around it spilled down over his desk.

“What news do you have?”

His tone was sharp and Valen’s chin lifted slightly.

“Nothing new?” He looked at each of us with a cold appraisal. “Whereare my answers?”

“Only rumors,” Valen said. “Nothing we haven’t heard before. Old grievances are coming to the surface again, but nothing that you should worry about—”

“Nothing?” Lucian mused.

The room was silent for a moment, and I resisted the urge to glare at Valen. That waspreciselywhat I wanted to avoid.

Lucian’s paranoiarequiredproof.

He stood quickly and the scrape of the chair across the uneven flagstones grated in my ears and echoed through the room.

“Nothing?” he shouted as he swept around the desk and approached us with long strides.

He stopped in front of Valen and took hold of his middle son’s jacket. Valen didn’t move, and he kept his eyes fixed on the window at the back of the room.

Smart.

Lucian’s knuckles whitened as he tightened his grip and jerked Valen off balance. He stumbled, but didn’t fall and Lucian released his hold as he turned his attention to me. “I send you out—snakes in the garden—to hunt down the rats that would seek to overrun my kingdom.”

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