Page 106 of A Promise of Peridot
“I’ve read everything that exists about Pearl’s libraries, their scholars, their priests. I’ve studied every interpretation of the seer’s words. And all of her sister’s prophecies and her mother’s for good measure. It might be possible.”
It was a relief of sorts, to speak the words out loud. The plan had been stored in the recesses of my mind for years. A plan I never thought I’d have to attempt once I found the final full-blooded Fae.
“The prophecy says final Fae of full bloodbornat last. You are not full-blooded. You cannot be reborn.”
“It also says a king doomed to fall at the hands ofhis second son. That’s me.” I gave a sardonic grin.
“What about a king that can only meet his endat her hands?” When surprise lit my face, she smiled. “You thought you were the only one who had read the seer’s words a few hundred times?”
“It’s vague, as all prophecies are. Perhaps he takes his dying breath in her arms after I’ve killed him. Or, maybe by meeting her, it led to his end. Look, Briar, either way, I have to try. I love her.”
Briar appraised the crackling flames before us. “Would you still go if she felt the same for you as you did for her? You’ll lose what little time you might have left together.”
“I’d still go,” I answered truthfully. “But it helps that she doesn’t.”
There was no possible outcome in which I allowed Arwen to pay the ultimate price for the safety of the realms. The only way to save her from such a fate was to find a way to take her place. If anything, it was a mercy I’d be long gone before I had to watch her grow old with someone else, Fedrik or otherwise. I could almost ignore the jealousy that infested my mind, crawling across every jagged cleft of my brain until I grimaced.
“I don’t know much about Pearl’s priests or scholars,” Briar continued. “But there’s only one man who can help you: the White Crow.”
I raised a single brow at her.
“He resides on a remote peak in Pearl’s Vorst region. I don’tknow if he still practices magic, but if anyone can turn you from nearly full-blooded to true Fae, it’s him. The White Crow is chief among the most gifted sorcerers to ever grace Evendell. Be warned, though,” she said, her lilac eyes dimming. “He’s never been right-minded. Be wary of what you let him do to you.”
For a while we sat in silence, listening to the cracks and whistles of the enchanted fireplace. I sipped my whiskey and thought of Mari upstairs. Her resilient spirit so like the flame that flickered before us. Her hair, too.
“You were a Foxfire, right? Before you married Perry and became a Creighton?”
Briar dipped her head slowly, eyes now down on her own drink.
“Why do you fear Mari is part of the coven, if they have been extinct for so long?”
“She used my amulet to bolster her magic. She is channeling our lineage. It wouldn’t have done anything for a witch from another coven.”
“What is there to fear? Your last one still living.”
Briar’s eyes fell to mine, fraught and unreadable. “Perhaps you’re right.”
Briar, too, was from a family whose... beliefs she didn’t share. Perhaps that was why she was so quick to join my cause all those years ago. My plight against my father was one she knew well.
As usual, the thought of him turned my stomach rancid. The heat from the flames was beginning to radiate into my wool shirt and make my skin crawl. I stood and stretched my legs. “Thank you. For everything.”
“Good luck, Kane.”
I wasn’t sure what she was referring to, but I needed luck in so many different ways I didn’t bother to ask.
With effort, I dragged my tired limbs up the creaking maple stairs into the dark hallway. I wouldn’t be able to sleep, but perhaps lying in silence could bring some peace to my mind. I’d try not to think of wartime deals or sadistic covens or mad sorcerers.
I’d try not to think of Arwen.
My hand was wrapped around the doorknob of my guest room when light footsteps pattered into the hall behind me. My heart shuddered.
“Why are you awake?” I said into the door. I almost couldn’t bear to look at her. I knew what the sight of Arwen, barefoot, hair mussed, and wrapped in that silky robe from this morning would do to me.
“How did you know it was me?”
Such a silly question. As if I couldn’t sense her the moment she stepped into a room, smell her orange blossom skin, hear the musical tone of her sighs and hums.
“Lucky guess,” I said, finally turning to face her.
