Page 94 of Royal Captive
“She has a fae mark. That’s why she’s healing. It will continue to heal her. Now free me, please.” Her voice grew weaker, her eyes unfocused.
Ellis’s gaze whipped around to stare at Alihandro’s mark on my neck. Was it possible that the same ‘blood magick’ that threatened my life also kept me safe? Was that on purpose, or just a side effect Alihandro hadn’t expected?
“Thanks for the information,” Ellis informed her. “Goodbye.”
Ellis grabbed my hand and tried to tug me away. My eyes tore from the ruins of the palace in front of us, the western half completely missing as if a giant beast tore an entire chunk out of it. I glanced at the row of ruined shop fronts and stores, trying to place where I was on the street from the short but wonderful day I’d had with Calten. Where was the cafe? The tailor’s shop?
I couldn’t find any of it. It was all destroyed. Had the tailor and his wife made it away safely? Their poor shop! What about the young girl that had served me my meat pie?
It was too late to help any of them, but not for Shyllon’s sister.
“Wait, we need to help her!” I insisted, refusing to let Ellis lead me away.
The smell of charred bodies and smoke filled the air, clogging my lungs and choking me. Fire and heat, ashes and dust. Screams and panic.
“No, we need to get out of here!” Ellis said. “This will be our only time to escape while everyone is distracted.”
“Escape where?” I argued, my voice rising uncontrollably. “We need to stay. We need to fight!” I gestured at Shyllon’s sister, whose name I didn’t even know. “We aren’t leaving her.”
I fell to my hands and knees, fingers scrabbling uselessly against the rough, heavy stones that trapped her in place. The hot rain made it difficult to grab the edges; my fingers kept uselessly sliding and scrabbling against the edges. My injuriesdidn’t matter. Whatever magick was in the wound in my neck was the good stuff.
Ellis’s face fell.
“Eve, her leg is buried too deep. There’s nothing we can do. I—”
“You’re stronger than me!” I shouted at him, hot tears gathering at the corners of my eyes. “Get over here and help!”
His lips pursed, but he got down next to me, grunting and trying his best to move the first heavy boulder.
This close to Shyllon’s sister, I could see the strain on her face. Her messy bun had disintegrated, leaving dark streaks of wet hair haphazardly stuck around her pale, pointed face. Bits and pieces looked charred off. Her large eyes glazed over with pain.
I leaned in close to whisper in her ear.
“Is there a way I can get Fennis for you? Would he send guards to help free you?” I asked.
Her laugh was bitter and full of despair. “I am not his daughter. Shyllon is my half-brother. And even if I was, he wouldn’t give a shit around me.”
I grit my teeth, but said nothing. It was up to Ellis and me, then.
“Go away, Princess. Your mate has the right idea, even if the execution is piss poor,” she protested weakly. Her eyes lifted to the sky. “Finally. Finally it has come to this.”
Ellis stopped pulling on a rock, turning to narrow his eyes at the fae female.
“What do you know I don’t?” he asked bluntly.
Her grin was weak, laced with pain.
“Did you know those fae marks used to be used to brand slaves? It helped us keep track of them, and told us your whereabouts and if you were all hale and healthy, or in danger. It was protection. Strange how things are twisted, yes?”
I stared at her, confused as hell by a history lesson in the middle of a war zone. Well, Alihandro’s threat to possibly kill me with the mark made more sense, at least.
Slave mark, indeed.
The memory of how he’d made me come was wildly inappropriate considering my surroundings, but it still made my stomach flip.
“I’ll tell you something Fennis doesn’t know,” she continued, panting heavily, “and that fae are dying every day to keep it a secret from him. Get to the barrier before all of this unravels before you. Magick always knows. Magick always restores the balance. Go home. The barrier is open.”
Thirty
