Page 153 of The Courting of Bristol Keats
Bristol’s anger ripped loose. “I am not done!” she yelled, and her hand swept up in a quick stopping motion, like it would block her dismissal. Instead, a fireball erupted from her palm and barreled across the room toward Tyghan. He dove aside and swiped his hand upward as he fell to the floor, sending the fiery ball roaring up to the cupola. Sparks rained down and the knights drew their swords, but Madame Chastain stepped forward first, throwing her hands up. A stream of blinding light shot from her palms, slamming Bristol against the wall, twisting around her limbs like rope and across her mouth like a gag.
“Yes, youaredone!” Madame Chastain declared. “And you’ll stay up there until we decide what to do with you!”
Tyghan got back to his feet, brushing sparks from his shirt singed with holes. Bristol struggled to twist free from the force pinning her high on the wall, but the more she struggled, the stronger Madame Chastain’s force became. Bristol’s eyes landed on Tyghan, furious, betrayed, but he had seen the momentary shock in them, too, her chest sucking in a fast breath as the ball of fire flew from her hand. Was she as taken by surprise as the rest of them? He thought about the fire in her room. Was that an accident? Had she come into more power she didn’t know she had? He remembered the faint line of golden scales on her shoulder blade . . .
“Let her down,” he ordered.
“She just made an attempt on your life! She’s trying to finish what her father started!”
Tyghan’s fingers dug across his scalp. He couldn’t deny that was how it appeared, but he shook his head. “Let her down,” he repeated. “Now.”
Madame Chastain’s hands dropped in disgust, and Bristol fell to the floor on her hands and knees.
Tyghan stepped forward to help her up, but she cut him off. “Get away from me.”
He reached down and grabbed her arm anyway, bringing her to her feet.
She jerked free, taking a few steps back before addressing the room again. “As you’ve probably gathered by now, I’ve found and spoken with my father. We had a long and interesting talk.”
“We’re aware,” Tyghan said. “We saw you both. We used hair in your brush to find you—”
“But by the time we got there, you were both gone,” Kasta said, twisting the narrative so Bristol wouldn’t know they had captured Kierus—at least temporarily.
“How did you find him?” Tyghan asked.
“With no help from you. He sent a note for me to meet him. Someone left it in my room.”
Tyghan’s jaw clenched. It was getting worse by the minute. Kierus had access to someone in the palace. “Who was it?”
“I didn’t see who delivered the note, nor would I tell you if I did.”
The veins in Quin’s neck rose, and Dalagorn’s hand curled into a meaty fist.
“Easy,” Melizan warned. “If one of these knights snapped right now, no one would blame them.”
Tyghan pulled out a chair and sat down. “So, you snuck out behind my back after promising you wouldn’t, took my horse without permission, and, no doubt, your father has now told you his version of events.”
“That pretty much sums it up,” she answered unapologetically.
Kasta huffed out an angry breath. “There are not two versions to this story.”
Bristol laughed. “Is that so?” She tapped her lips. “All right, what about a third version? Mine. I can definitely vouch for that one. All these past weeks, I thought I was hunting down trows.Fucking trows.” Her chin dimpled briefly. “What a laugh you all must have had, feeding me leads that went nowhere. Well done.” Her eyes glistened, and she blinked several times. “It was you all along. You were the ones who hunted my family like we were animals. That’s the version I grew up with, because it wasn’t only my parents you made run for over two decades. My sisters and I had to run, too. Do you have any idea what it’s like to run from something your entire life and not know what it is? To live out of a duffle bag in one dingy motel after another? To have to flee in the middle of the night and not even know why? To never have any place you could call home?”
She paused, looking down, her lips twisted, then looked directly at Tyghan. “I was named after a shithole flea market in some obscure town my parents couldn’t even remember because of you. They didn’t understand their world any better than I did. Thank god they didn’t give me a middle name, because it probably would have been Avenue.”
“The way your parents raised you reflects on them, not us. It was their choice,” Tyghan replied.
“What choice did they have? When they finally stopped running, two kingdoms tracked them down!”
“Get to your point, Miss Keats,” Madame Chastain said.
“My point?” Her palms met like she was trying to hold back from barreling another fireball across the room. “You lied to me!” she finally answered. “Do fae have any kind of conscience at all? You weren’t helping me find my father. Just the opposite, you were hunting him down.”
Eris cleared his throat. “Yes,” he admitted, his tone grave. “We were. But your father committed a serious crime. We had no grievance against you.”
“He wanted out. That’s it. A different life. That was his crime.”
A different life?Tyghan jumped to his feet, the chair screeching behind him. He’d heard enough of this version. “What about my life? He stabbed me! And damn near killed me!”
