Page 22 of Wolf Caged
Vyr held her ground, almost masking her flinch but failing to mask the pain that glittered in her silver eyes a moment before she concealed it. She tilted her chin up and flicked her sleek black hair over her shoulder, defiance shining in her fierce gaze.
“Leave me, Vyr.” I went to turn away from her, in no mood for arguing with her when I needed to figure out why Neve believed the little wolf was vital to my vengeance and what her role might be.
My sister proved just how stubborn she was as she stepped further into the room instead of marching her backside out of the door, the click of the heels of her black leather riding boots loud on the onyx marble floor.
“You tried to infiltrate the Summer Court many times, starting battles that always ended with you having to pull your forces back. Battles that almost got you killed. The high king had to intervene to stop you and I thought you were done with this… but here we are… with you doing something I truly thought you would never be capable of.” She stalked towards me, passing the large black desk, not stopping until she was only inches from me and her anger buffeted me. She folded her arms across her chest, pulling the navy material of her long-sleeved blouse tight across her arms as she stared me down. “Youboughtanother livingcreature. You paid for an innocent female who now believes you intend to use her body as you please. This is not you, Kael.”
I shot her a warning look; one she did not heed.
Darkness writhed around me, my shadows reaching for her as my anger rose, as my blood pounded and her words echoed in my mind, the reproach in them cleaving great grooves into my calm veneer and provoking a response. I bared jagged teeth at her, something which would have made most in my court back down.
But not my sister.
It only made her bolder.
She stood her ground and bared fangs right back at me. “Our own high king went as far as creating new laws and forming an accord with the seelie high king to prevent you from going to war. You cannot cross into the Summer Court. If you do, the full force of Ereborne will come down on your head… and this court.”
I growled at her for that one. She dared suggest I was placing my court in danger when all I had ever done was try to protect them?
“When you were young… I thought things would be different.” Disappointment rang in her soft voice as she gazed at me, as if she was seeing that boy I had been when our parents had been wrenched from us and I had been thrust onto a throne, too young to keep hold of it and too naïve to know how to run a court. “But then you began plotting the demise of those who had ordered our parents’ deaths, and then it was the destruction of the entire Summer Court you wanted, and it took both myself and Oberon to talk sense into you when you wanted to march over the border and invade that land on a crusade that would have ended in your death.”
I bared my fangs again, despising her for reminding me of that day. “I should not have listened to either of you.”
She scowled at me. “You do not believe that.”
I did not.
She and Oberon had been right to stop me. Anyone who had come with me would have been either slaughtered by the Summer Court or executed by their own high king for treason. That day I had realised I needed to find a subtler way to carry out my revenge, and I had gone to the Forgotten Wastes to clear my head with a little slaughter.
And I had found a weakened, starving dragon.
And when I had touched her, she had seen the death of the seelie king of the Summer Court—not at my hands—and that there was an heir as wretched as him now vying for the throne.
Infighting in the Summer Court had stolen my vengeance from me, but there was still my brother to save, and a court to make pay.
“And let me remind you of the time you crossed the border through the tunnels in the Black Pass and broke into the Great Library of the Summer Court, seeking information on their strongholds. You were lucky you were not seen!” Jenavyr wisely stormed away from me across the gold-veined black marble floor, my shadows snatching at her heels.
If it had been anyone else speaking to me with such disrespect, I would have allowed my shadows to rip them to shreds, but I held them at bay, despite the dark urge to silence her and put her in her place.
“I was seeking a location where they might be holding our brother. I was careful. The ancient tunnels are not warded to the unseelie, so none of their breed would see me, and I expended great magic to shield myself and slip through the shadows. Any who might have sensed me were put to sleep.”
A feat that had taken great restraint.
I should have killed them all.
Death was what they deserved.
“And how did that work out for you?” Jenavyr planted her hands on her black-leather-clad hips.
“I retrieved valuable books, records of their kings and bloodlines, and maps of their strongholds.”
“And almost got yourself killed when you made the rash decision to check one of those fortresses without support!” she bit out, her eyes brightening as her skin paled, her darker side coming to the fore as anger got the better of her. “This obsession is unhealthy and dangerous, Kael. You no longer risk the Shadow Court, but the entire unseelie courts. If you break the accord?—”
My shadows struck at the desk between us, cleaving long grooves in the wooden surface as they lashed at her but I pulled them back in time to stop them from reaching her.
She snapped her mouth shut, her shoulders going rigid.
For a moment, I feared she might continue the argument and risk my wrath, but then she pivoted and stormed away from me, heading for the door.
