The Shattered Dark
Page 35

“I don’t think what I wear will make a diff—”
“Go, Aren,” she says.
He clenches his jaw as he nods once, reluctantly accepting her order before he turns and leaves. I actually agree with Lena. Aren and the rest of the rebels should look like they belong in this palace; they shouldn’t look like they’re…well, rebels. This is just an odd time to insist on the clothing change.
I’m struck by how exhausted Lena looks. Her hair, usually shiny and smooth, is pulled back into a simple ponytail, and the silver in her eyes is dark. They don’t have that sharp edge that they used to.
“When was the last time you slept?” I ask.
As if she’s suddenly conscious of her appearance, she straightens. “When was the last time you slept?” she fires back.
“I just woke up,” I point out.
“Unconsciousness doesn’t count as sleep.” The almost petulant note in her tone reminds me of Kelia, which is a comparison I really don’t want to make. Lena and I are allies. It’s best that I think of her as a queen and a means to keep the people I love safe.
“So tell me what’s wrong.”
“Everything,” Lena says. She draws in a breath, lets it out. “The high nobles. They insist I tell them who…” She stops, closes her eyes and begins again. “They’re insisting I tell them who killed Atroth.”
Kyol killed Atroth. She’s keeping that from them? “Does it matter who did it?”
She gives me a look. “It’s illegal to kill a king.”
“Okay. And?”
“And nothing,” she says, almost dismissively. “Let’s not talk here.”
She turns to head back inside the north wing of the palace. I have to jog to catch up with her.
“I received a message today,” Lena says, when I reach her side.
When she doesn’t elaborate, my gut tightens. “What did it say?”
She looks at me a moment before focusing ahead. Her face is rigid when she says, “If I let you go, I have to let them go. It could be a trap, and…” She sighs. “And nothing can happen to you. I’ll lose both of them if you die.”
I grab her arm, make her stop walking. “What did the message say, Lena?”
She easily shakes free of my hold as she faces me. Then she hands me a folded piece of paper she removes from beneath her jaedric belt.
I open it.
“Shane said it gives Paige’s location.”
A good number of fae can speak my language, but I don’t know of any who can read it. What looks like a UK address is written in the center of the paper. Below it is Paige’s name. That’s it. No explanation.
“Who’s this from?” I ask.
Lena’s lip twitches. “It’s anonymous. It came with a stack of other correspondence.”
I sniff. Of course. I look back down at the writing. It could be from Lorn. It could also be from the remnants. “How do we know it’s not a trap?”
“We don’t. That’s why you can’t go.”
Refolding the paper, I slip it into my pocket. “I can’t not go.”
“I know that, too.” After a moment, she adds, “Most of the time, these tips turn out to be nothing.”
“And sometimes they turn out to be solid. London is a big city. Humans will be everywhere.”
“I can’t send you there alone, and I need Kyol and Aren both at this meeting. We might be able to force the high nobles to vote.”
My eyebrows go up. “Really?”
“The fae you tracked to Eksan,” she says. “We were able to recapture him and the three fae he met. Two of them confirmed that the remnants don’t have a Descendant they can put on the throne.”
“That’s good,” I say. An understatement. It’s really good, and a tension I didn’t realize I felt slowly lifts from my shoulders. If the high nobles approve her, things should get better soon.
Lena nods. “I need my lord general and sword-master with me when I talk with them. They respect Kyol’s opinion, and Aren is good at reading people. I won’t be able to send them with you until after the meeting.”
I play with the scrap of paper in my pocket. “Any guess how long Paige might be at this location or how long the meeting will last?”
“On how long Paige might be there, no. On how long this meeting will take? Forever.”
I’m not sure how much of an exaggeration that is.
“How long have you had this?” I ask.
“It just came.”
“And there’s no way of knowing how long ago it was written,” I say.
“No,” she answers, even though I wasn’t quite asking a question.
“Can you send a couple of other fae with me?” Without knowing more about the tip or Paige’s condition, I can’t convince myself to wait for the meeting to end.
Lena nods. “I can. But what am I supposed to tell them if you don’t come back?”
“I’ll come back,” I say. “If there are too many remnants in London, we’ll leave.”
She looks at me dubiously. “You’ll leave even if you see your friend there?”
“I don’t have a death wish,” I say. That’s not exactly answering the question, but Lena doesn’t press it.
FOURTEEN
LENA SENDS SHANE with me. Apparently, he lived in London for a year before moving to Houston. He says he knows the area of the city where Paige is, possibly, being held. That will save time. If the tip doesn’t pan out, we should be back in Corrist before Aren or Kyol know we were gone.
The stretch of the Inner City between the palace and the silver wall is shortest in the northeast corner. That also happens to be where Corrist’s gate is. Lena said she’d have two fae meet us in the antechamber, so Shane and I wait there for our escorts.
“I found a house we can rent in Vegas,” Shane says, leaning against the wall and playing with something in the pocket of his jacket. The jacket is made from a soft, expensive-looking black leather. I grabbed a longer coat from the palace’s supply of human clothing. It’s white and a little big, but it hides my dagger, and I didn’t have much else to choose from. Atroth kept only a limited amount of my world’s textiles here. It’s ironic he kept any at all considering how adamant he was about keeping our cultures separate, but there were enough occasions when he needed his fae to be visible on Earth that he decided to keep a stash here.
“Where?” I ask Shane.
“It’s on the west side of the city,” he says.
“Is that an expensive side of the city?” His place back in Houston was huge. At the time, he worked for Atroth the same as I did, but he demanded the king pay his mortgage along with an insanely high monthly allowance. I was happy in my little apartment—it was my home for almost eight years—and I’ve never been comfortable with accepting more money than I need to get by. All I need is attention from the IRS. Honestly, I don’t know how Shane hasn’t set off red flags with his lifestyle.
“About that,” Shane says, hooking his thumbs in the pockets of his jeans. “You have to ask Lena for a raise. She won’t pay me more than she pays you.”