House of Pounding Hearts (The Kingdom of Crows #2)(16)

Heat crawls up my collarbone, floods my neck, and submerges my cheeks. It wasn’t real!

I wait for him to retaliate with a quip dripping with his usual velvety barbs, but all I get is booming silence. When I turn back around, Bronwen and Keeann are gone, and I am alone.

Alone with Antoni’s note.

What did Lorcan mean about trusting me?

He trusts me not to read it, or he trusts me not to keep what’s written from him?

Rumpling the paper in my fist, I return to my bedroom cell on feet gone numb from the icy stone.

One would think summer would warm the Sky Kingdom, but between the altitude and the narrowness of the windows, the Lucin heat doesn’t permeate the pale gray rock.

As I near my door, it unbolts as though by magic—except it’s not magic, it’s a bare-chested Phoebus. “I’m off to find some food.”

And here I expected to find him burrowed beneath a mound of pillows. “Some food, or some Connor?”

“If I’m lucky, both.” He sends me a saucy wink that makes me shake my head but that also makes me grin, something I haven’t done in too long.

“Hey, Pheebs?”

“Yes, Picolina.”

“Thank you for sticking around, even if you’re only staying for . . . the food.”

He chuckles. “I’m staying for you. Food can be had anywhere.”

“Bring me back some?”

“This may come as a surprise, but I don’t care to become a eunuch.”

“Um, what?”

“Losing the family jewels. Which, come to think of it, should be called my jewels since—”

“I know what a eunuch is, but why would you be castrated for bringing me back food?”

“Oh, I thought you meant for me to return with Connor.”

His comment startles a laugh from me. “This may come as a surprise,” I recycle his words, “but I was not alluding to a threesome, you fiend.”

The boy grins, which sharpens the edges of his beautiful face. “So just food?”

“Yes. Just food.”

“And wine?”

“No wine.” I palm my churning stomach. “Anything I ingest is bound to be pickled considering the amount I drank last night.”

Barking out a laugh, Phoebus strides away. Once he’s out of sight, I close the door and cross to the sliver of glass that overlooks Mareluce. Atop the liquid carpet of blue bobs a wooden vessel varnished entirely black. I try to make out my friends since I imagine this is their ship, but I’m too far above, and they too far below.

Antoni’s note crinkles in my fist. I finally unfold it and read his scrawled words.

I blink, because it’s a poem.

It’s not that I thought a sea captain incapable of penning verses, but here I was expecting a hand-drawn map of the Sky Kingdom’s weaker points.

Wishful thinking.

Lore’s realm probably has no weak points.

You’ve scored yourself into my heart,

Like a knife through the darkest of wood.

But apparently, Fallon, you aren’t meant for me.

However, you are meant to be free.

Tonight, sit at my table and drink in my honor.

I may be gone but my affection and attention, they linger.





My heart hastens, flooding my veins with so much blood that I must lean against the wall to stay upright.

What would Lorcan have done had he read this? I may not consider myself his, but the Crow King is possessive as fuck. Would he have punished Antoni for his sentimental parting?

I press my palm to the unbreachable glass. “You crazy, crazy man. Why would you risk your life to proclaim feelings neither of us could ever act upon?”

Not that I acted upon them when I had the chance. I was so obsessed with Dante that I convinced myself getting him on the throne was my sole purpose in life. I even gave that ungrateful Fae my virginity. Granted, hymens aren’t prizes, but still, I gave Dante everything. But my tongue was too sharp, and my ears not sharp enough.

I picture him standing on his metal wharf, watching the Nebban vessel glide closer to his shores, long braids embellished with jewels snapping against his white uniform. Unless he now wears gold like Marco.

I swap out the white for gold, close my eyes, and picture him again. My imagination is so vivid that it even adds smells—lemon, brine, eucalyptus—and sounds—Dante’s smooth voice, Gabriele’s breezy one. When my brain tosses in Tavo’s and Silvius’s voices, I fling my lids up. For all my desire not to be here, I wouldn’t want to be there, either.

I head to the unmade bed, straighten the sheets with the military precision Nonna taught me and which I’ve desperately tried to pass on to Phoebus, but the man has zero interest in making beds, or tidying up rooms, or . . . Well, the only interest Phoebus has is pursuing every pleasure available to Faekind.

After rereading Antoni’s note, I slip it beneath the mattress. I should probably toss it in the piss pot, but it’s my first love letter, and even though I don’t pine for the captain, I find owning a love letter terribly romantic.

How I would love to share it with Mamma. She so loves romance.

I cut my daydream short.

Agrippina, not Mamma.

Curling my fingers into fists, I raise my gaze back to the island that seems to float atop the ocean like a swirl of strawberry gelato.