Seven Black Diamonds (Seven Black Diamonds #1)(83)

Rhys followed her silently.

Zephyr paused. His queen hadn’t ordered him to go or to stay, and truth be told, he would be of little use in a conflict with fighters of her caliber.

The king sighed. “Come on then. She’s liable to kill them if I’m not there, and that son of hers isn’t much on caution either.”

“He’s . . . my father,” Zephyr said, not quite defending Rhys but feeling like he should say something.

“Of course he is,” Leith said cheerily. “My wife has particular plans for the offspring of that experiment. Why do you think all of you are together?”

Zephyr gaped at him.

“The get of those she hand-selected were all put in your team, Zephyr. She made sure that you commanded the highest born—the very best.”

Then the king sauntered off, whistling cheerily as if they weren’t headed toward violence, as if he hadn’t dropped a giant revelation on Zephyr, as if all of this was somehow mundane.

Dazedly, Zephyr followed. He wasn’t sure if the Seelie King was any less frightening than the Unseelie Queen. At least with Endellion, there was no confusion as to whether or not she was livid. Zephyr couldn’t honestly tell if the king was happy or insane.





thirty-three


LILY

Lily paced around the damp cave where they’d been imprisoned, assessing the situation as best she could. Both Torquil and Creed were injured, but she and Violet were fine. It was as if the two Seelie fae outside the cave had forgotten that the most ruthless faery in history was a woman. Lily might not aspire to the ferocity of her grandmother, but she had Endellion’s blood in her veins and Daidí’s teaching in her mind.

Although she wasn’t sure what she was going to do, Lily knew there wasn’t long to figure it out. Torquil’s wound wouldn’t stop oozing blood, and he was drifting in and out of consciousness. Creed appeared to have no permanent damage, but she’d learned many years ago that internal bleeding wasn’t always obvious. Violet was uninjured so far, and Lily was . . . being threatened with marriage. That wasn’t going to happen, not as long as she had any breath left in her.

In the world Lily had known until now, marriages could be dissolved. Divorces were possible, and if that was a problem for some reason, she knew that Daidí would happily remove any unwanted husband in a more permanent way. Unfortunately, Lily suspected that marriage to a Seelie prince, one who lived for a virtual eternity and presumably couldn’t be killed without massive consequences, was a bit more complicated. She simply could not, would not, allow herself to be forcibly wed—especially to Nacton.

Her only fae advisor was not of much use currently, and Violet and Creed looked to her for answers. So that left Lily to figure out what to do. First problems first. She needed everyone alive.

Torquil was flat on his back with a handful of moss clutched to his wound. Violet squatted at his side with a pile of moss that she’d collected. There had been precious little of it, but Lily had coaxed it into growing larger for their purposes.

“Well?”

Violet looked up at her and shook her head. “It’s not slowing at all. If he keeps bleeding—”

“So stop the bleeding,” Torquil interrupted in a broken voice. “You’re fire. You can stop it for me.”

“You want me to . . . burn you?”

“To cauterize the wound. It makes sense,” Lily told her gently.

Violet gaped at her. “So I can burn the good faery, but not the ones who attacked us? What kind of plan is—”

“The only one we have.” Torquil opened his eyes and looked at her. “I know you mean me no harm, Violet Lamb, and I need your help.”

He pressed the moss tighter to his side. It was already thick with blood; the dirt turned to red mud and dripped down to pool on the ground beside Torquil.

“Will you help me?” he asked her softly.

Lily considered telling Violet what she suspected of their true relationship, but she wasn’t sure if that would help Violet or make her more hesitant to do what he was asking.

Torquil looked at her and shook his head once. Did he somehow know what she was contemplating?

“What?” Violet said. “I saw that. What was it? What aren’t you telling me?”

“Can you do it or do I need to try to grow the moss again?” Lily snapped.

Violet didn’t reply. She looked over at Creed, who was trying to push to his feet. He stumbled toward them.

“Please, Vi. I need you to do this,” Lily said.

“I’m so sorry,” Violet whispered. Then she brought both hands down on Torquil’s bloodied side. With one hand, she jerked the moss away, and with the other, she cupped fire onto his flesh.

Torquil screamed, a horrible raw sound that was more animal than Lily had thought a voice could be, and then he passed out. Violet turned away and vomited as soon as she pulled her hand away.

Creed lifted her with his good arm and pulled her to his side.

Lily couldn’t look at them though, couldn’t stand seeing Creed hobble away on his broken leg or Violet sobbing after searing a wound. Torquil’s skin was sizzling like meat on a grill, and Lily had to pull moisture from the air to cool and wash it. She couldn’t draw as much as she wanted because they would need water to drink if they were left here too long, but she washed the blood away so that she could see that the gash was closed, and then she covered it with clean moss and earth to sooth the ache.