Page 30 of The Crown of a Fallen Queen
Seth gives my elbow a soft nudge. “You’re still bleeding.” He grazes the back of my arm, and the faint caress is too careful and too intimate for me to keep a straight face. “Are you alright?”
I’m caught off guard by the intensity of his gaze. “It’s nothing.”
He stands and moves behind me, curling his hand around the lapel of my raincoat and giving it a light tug, as if he were helping a lady out of her coat at some grand ball.
I huff and shrug off the jacket. Percy flies out of my pocket and lands on my shoulder as Seth inspects the wounds on my arm.
The prince drums his fingers next to the marks where the wolf’s teeth tore through my long-sleeved shirt and pierced my skin. The area is now sealed by bright red clots, and his brows knit together. “Doesn’t look like nothing.”
“It’s definitelysomething,” Percy clips.
“Now, don’t fuss. It’s not that deep,” I warn them both.
My Faeling flies up to the puncture wounds and grimaces, shaking his head. “I can’t heal them.”
Seth’s grip tightens around my lower arm. “Nightmares’ teeth and claws can carry an array of poison.” He turns to Elio. “Send for the palace healer.”
Elio squints at the prince, his ice-blue gaze raising goosebumps on my skin. He’s not used to being ordered around in his own kingdom, but his look holds more curiosity than annoyance.
Sara hurries out of the room. “Right away.”
Seth’s fingers hover for a moment in the wake of Sara’s departure, then gently trace down the length of my arm. His gaze follows the silvery scars zigzagging across my skin. I’m covered in them, but they’re faint enough to escape most people’s scrutiny.
Very few people notice them—fewer still understand what they are.
Seth does.
I jerk back and cradle my arm against my chest. “You’re fussing.”
“Am not.”
“Are too.”
Elio links his long fingers in his lap, still observing us with his head cocked to the side. It won’t be easy to sell him on this whole ‘engaged to my mortal enemy’ thing. Maybe I shouldhave discussed an exception to the rules with Seth, so I could let Elio in on our secret, but before I can goad the Winter King into speaking his mind, Iris’s doppelgänger enters the room.
I freeze, gobsmacked, as Elio leaps to greet her.
I’ve never seen him smile like that since he joined the Winter Court—or maybe ever.
He looks simply radiant as he slips his hand in hers and leads her over to me, eyes bright with excitement and pride, the happiest I’ve ever seen him.
“Lori, this is Devi Eros. Devi, this is my wife, Lori.”
Chapter 10
Ravenous
DEVI
By Eros… I hold my breath, my fingers digging deep in the armrests of the chair. I’d heard of the resemblance, of course, but I wasn’t prepared for Elio’s new wife to be an exact, carbon copy of my Iris.
She’sexactlylike her—but younger, untouched by the burdens of time, the sadness of being stuck in an arranged marriage, and the weight of her mother’s expectations. The same luminous brown skin, the same elegant arch of her brow, the same graceful, slender figure. The way she carries herself is familiar, yet not. Her posture is more fluid, her movements more assured, and her clear gray eyes are joyful.
She holds my gaze like few others have ever done upon first meeting me, as if we’re already well-acquainted. “I can’t believe I finally get to meet the famous Devi Eros. It’s an honor.” She extends her hand, which tells me she was raised in the new world.
I stand and shake it with the faintest hesitation, half-expecting my fingers to pass through air. But Lori isn’t cold ortranslucent or untouchable. She’s warm and solid. Flesh and bone.
A strange wave of nostalgia crashes over me, tangled with a sharp pang of loss. It feels like I’m staring into a twisted, phantom mirror of the past. This girl is alive and unscarred, while Iris is dead and I’m just a shadow of who I used to be.
