Page 107 of Royal Captive
Eve stood with Calten, both of them wiping their faces.
“Stop it!” Eve cried out. “We’re better than this. We’re more than Lord Trenton, murdering children. We’re better than the fae who think death games will be good for politics! We have to work together, don’t you see?”
Annie turned from Eve, gesturing to Calten and the other woman. “Let us keep traveling. There’s a foul smell in the air.”
The group moved on without us, traveling north.
The more I thought about it, the more sentient the weather seemed.
I didn’t know what to make of it. I was too exhausted to do anything but keep moving. The goal of the mountain ahead of us was the only thing that mattered. Get to the barrier and get home.
I’d sleep and reflect on strange fae females when I was dead. Ha.
Yet, Feyanna never complained throughout the trip. She kept up admirably, though it was likely that had to do with her fae blood than her being in any kind of outstanding shape. And yet, the fourth morning of our journey found Feyanna looking alert and bright for a princess who’d spent the night outdoors. The reason soon became clear.
“The barrier is up there,” Feyanna said softly, pointing with one hand to the top of the mountain.
Eve whipped around and stared.
It took me a moment to figure out why: she’d spoken in perfect common tongue. She spoke in the language of Eve and me.
It was the first time Feyanna had spoken all morning as we’d awoken to a dead fire, shivering in the brutal fae air, and she’d spoken in our language. By accident, or design?
Eve jerked and stared at her, shivering in the brutal morning cold. “You knew where the barrier was this entire time?”
I stared as well. How long had Feyanna been playing with us?
Feyanna’s face froze in fear, her mouth parting.
“I … That’s where you’re going. Was I wrong to assume that? Everyone knows where the barrier is. It is a major landmark.” She spoke in fae again, so I repeated that back to Eve, who glowered.
The mountain that jutted up in front of us was intimidating and large with angry points and sharp cliffs that curled around—not unlike claws from a monster of my childhood. The claws were similar to my father’s hands after I’d gotten caught putting snakes in my brother’s bed or he’d found another one of my stashes of drink.
Eve’s gaze followed Feyanna’s finger, her mouth pursed in a line before she spoke. “I’m not going anywhere until she explains why she’s been pretending this whole time to not understand me.”
A valid point that I didn’t bother translating to Feyanna because she didn’t need me to translate, did she? I found myself more frequently not bothering to translate at all between the two women anyway, who kept themselves on either side of me this entire trip as though they were two sisters squabbling over the last bit of honey and bread.
Wait, was I the honey or the bread in that scenario?
“I’d also like an explanation,” I said to Feyanna. She hadn’t been the one who’d taken advantage of me like Fallon had, but I remembered the disapproving expression on her face before it happened. She’d known, and not done anything to stop it. That meant she’d lied once, and now twice.
And she’d likely lie again.
She said, “The portal—”
I cut across Feyanna, tired of the bullshit.
“Speak so Eve can understand you,” I insisted, rather unkindly.
Her eyes watered, but I was over the little game. “You screwed up. Own it or we’re not taking another step.”
Her scared little princess routine dropped from her face as if someone had smacked it off.
“Fine,” she bit off shortly. “Portal is at the top.”
Eve’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t be ridiculous,” she said to Feyanna. “Surely, we can’t climb that. There must be another way to go, or she wouldn’t insist we go this way, would she?”
Feyanna eyed Eve warily like she had been for the entire three days it had taken to get to the base of the mountain. Now I knew it was likely because she feared her secret being found out.
