A Dawn of Onyx (The Sacred Stones, #1)(106)

He passed the group of them and approached me tentatively. When I couldn’t avoid his eyes anymore, I turned to him.

“How are you, bird?” His face was a mask of regret, but his voice was like a spirit—for an instant, relieving, even pleasurable, before turning bitter on my tongue.

“Don’t speak to me,” I said. Even if this wasn’t all his fault, I was so emotionally destroyed it had to fall on someone. He seemed more deserving than most.

Ryder stepped in front of me protectively, arms folded.

“Give us a moment, Ryder.” Kane really did look brutal.

Ryder looked to me, and I shook my head vehemently. I didn’t want to be anywhere near the man.

“I don’t think so, Your Majesty,” Ryder said with as much courtesy as he could muster. Kane paused, then nodded his understanding.

“I am so sorry for your loss,” Kane said to all three of us. Leigh wouldn’t even look him in the eye.

He walked toward the left side of the deck. I looked at Ryder and then to Mari. Neither met my eyes. I knew what they were thinking. I had to talk to him eventually. The ship was only so big.

“Let’s go inside, I need some food,” Mari said. Ryder followed her, looking back at me once.

I kissed Leigh on the head and pulled together what little strength I had left. “I’ll be right behind you.”

Griffin, Eryx, Amelia, and the rest of the guards and soldiers on deck had moved to the bow of the ship to continue their argument.

Maybe they sensed the onslaught of tension between Kane and me and didn’t want to be anywhere near us. I wouldn’t blame them. Besides a few stragglers, Kane and I were the only two left on this side. I met him where he stood, the wind battering his hair. He was closing his eyes to the sun.

Sensing my presence, he turned to me, but I could only stare at the ocean below us. The briny smell of kelp and salt fit my stormy mood. We stood in silence, listening to the waves crash against the ship for far too long.

“I’m the last full-blooded Fae,” I stated.

He stilled, but answered me. “Yes.”

My heart thumped violently. I knew it was true, but it still shook my very bones to hear him say it.

“Griffin is Fae too.”

“He is.”

My cheeks burned. Griffin, Dagan, Amelia—how many had known what I was before I did?

“And you’re both Fae that can shift,” I said. “You’re the dragon that flew me to Shadowhold that first night?”

“Yes,” he said, and still he faced the churning sea.

“And the Blade of the Sun? From the prophecy?”

He turned toward me. His eyes awash with… was it misery? Searing regret? But he hid it as quickly as I had noticed, and tensed his jaw.

“It’s what Halden wanted that had already been stolen from my vault years ago—the only weapon that can kill Lazarus, when wielded by you.” He swallowed hard. “He likely came to Shadowhold looking to murder Fae defectors, but somehow heard the blade was in my possession. Truth is, it could be anywhere.”

My heartbeat pounded in my ears. “I thought it was ‘in my heart?’ That’s what the prophecy said.”

“Most scholars I’ve consulted think that’s not to be interpreted literally. But let’s not discuss it with Amelia. She’s all too game to cut you open and check.” The look in his eyes was murderous, and I could tell he wasn’t joking.

“So, I’m a true Fae, like you said.” The words still felt insane to me. “How does a halfling like you have lighte?”

“I’m not a halfling. Halflings are just mortals with trace ancestral amounts of Fae lineage. It’s barely noticeable if you don’t know what to look for. Often, they’re strikingly beautiful, very strong, or live unnaturally long lives. There are only two kinds of Faeries. Fae—Griffin, myself, all the soldiers, all those trapped in the Fae Realm. We all have some mortal lineage from millennia of crossbreeding. The other kind are True Fae, or full-blooded Fae—only you, and Lazarus.”

“But how? I was born in Abbington, my mother was mortal,” I was babbling. “My siblings are all—”

“We aren’t sure.”

Horror struck me. “Could you and I be… related?”

A grim smile crossed his face. “No, bird. You were born long after the last full blooded Fae female passed on. Your birth is—well, it’s a miracle. One even my father doesn’t understand.”

“So Halden… his mission wasn’t just to hunt down any Fae. He had been looking for…”

“For you, yes. The Fae from the prophecy.”

Horror struck me like a slap.

Halden.

Halden.

He would have killed me in those stables.

Kane stepped closer and I braced myself. “Arwen, I am so, so sorry. For everything. All that I kept from you. For letting him find you.” The pained grimace on his face told me what he knew could have happened on the beach had he not shifted in time.

My lungs tightened. The air trapped inside of them burned. I reminded myself to exhale. “Maybe I should have known all along,” I said. “I never understood my abilities, or why they would dissipate after I used too much.” I thought of the night I couldn’t heal myself after helping the chimera. “Dagan. Did you ask him to train me?”