Page 56 of Moonmarked

I don’t really know how I knew—maybe it was just pure common sense. A man who was a prince, about to become a king; a man who would be targeted andpoisonedby someone close enough to him to actually pull it off; a man who would speak to his mother, a queen, the way he had—very difficult to imagine such a man to be this kind, sweet,innocentguy he wanted me to believe he was right now.

Or maybe it was because of my instincts. Because I already knew enough about Verenthia to understand that nothing was ever as it seemed here, and I wanted to find Rune first.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.It all came down to one thing—I would not let myself trust this guy no matter what he’d done for me when we were kids, until I knew who he was now.

“How?” I asked as he took me down the wide hallway, every inch of the marble underneath our feet perfect, every color twisted just right. The walls, the chandeliers, the lanterns, the paintings—everything in this place was so perfect it mademefeel like I was the biggest flaw to have ever existed in both this world and mine.

“How, what?” Lyall asked, eyes on the side of my face, but I refused to meet them.

“How did you pull it off? You looked so real. I was doubting my own eyes, my own sanity.” Which sucked because I’d been doing it since the first time I ever saw his face in the meadow.

“Illusion magic,” Lyall said. “My mother’s. She’s quite powerful—and very thorough when she creates.”

Creates,he said. Like illusions were a piece of art or something.

“Where are we going now?” I asked because we turned one corner, and now we were about to turn another that ended with a wide staircase, and there were no soldiers out here by the walls, only the three who had been in the throne room with us, following some ten steps behind.

“To your chambers,” the prince said. “You will haveyour space to relax and rest, to clean up and do whatever it is you feel like doing while you’re here.”

Chambers.That was something I never actually thought I’d have.

Come to think of it, to be in a golden palace in a different realm, walking hand in hand with a fae prince was even more absurd than having chambers, if we wanted to be picky.

“How long will I stay?” I asked because I still felt like I was diving into this headfirst without knowing what was awaiting me on the other side—just like I had when I followed his uncle through the Aetherway.

“As long as you please, my Lifebound. Forever wouldn’t suffice to get enough of your beautiful face.”

Heat rushed to my cheeks. “Just Nilah is fine,” I muttered. “Where is Helid, by the way? He wasn’t in the throne room.”

Lyall led me up the marble stairs lined with gorgeous golden railings illuminated by the floating lights. “My uncle is away on business, currently in the Unseelie Court,” he said. “Why—do you need something from him?”

“No, nothing. I was just curious.” I said.

“Well, if you do, please don’t hesitate to ask. Your chambers are on the sixth floor of the palace, which isthis,”he said when we reached the top of the stairs, and led me into yet another hallway, wide, one side of it made of floor-to-ceiling windows with golden frames. Dressers and fresh flowers of all kinds were neatly placed in golden vases. Those paintings and those floating lights, the sweet scent of the air, the way the walls and the corners of the floor seemed to glow from within as if they were made to repel any kind of shadow—it was all a fantasy to me still.

“It’s…it’s beautiful,” I whispered because there was simply no other word that could do this place justice.

The prince smiled and I saw it through the corner of my eye.

“I’m glad you like it. My chambers are on the eighth, so I am not too far away. For anything you might need, it will be enough to ask your guards.” He moved back his hand to indicate the soldiers following us still. “Even if you need to send for me, talk to them and I will hear about it.”

“Thank you, Lyall. But this is too much. Seriously, I?—”

We were in the middle of the wide hallway, which had only one set of white and golden doors at the very end. He stopped and turned to me with his whole body, my hand somehow between his.

“You saved my life, Nilah,” he whispered, analyzing my face like he really was that fascinated by it. The sunlight from the windows at our side fell on him, and his skin glowed golden, and the ears and the hair and the eyes—how is he real?

“Well, you saved mine first,” I muttered, suddenly uncomfortable in my own skin. Uncomfortable to be touching him, too, so I pulled back my hand, but this time there was no hint on his face that he even noticed.

“Precisely. We saved one another, andnothingis too much. Anything you want in this kingdom is yours if you only ask. I will spare no expense to see you happy,” he solemnly said—and fuck me, he sounded like he meant every word.

I forced a smile on my lips as my heart picked up the beating. “I’ll be fine with a bed and a bathroom,” I said.

The smile he gave me probably made the sun envious. “You’ll have much more than that.”

He returned to my side with a graceful spin and offeredme his arm. We were moving again, walking faster, until we made it to those gorgeous doors at the end. He pushed them both open with a small smile on his face and a sparkle to his eyes that made him look almost like a teenager.

Then I forgot how to breathe.

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