A Deal with the Elf King (Married to Magic, #1)(96)
Somehow, Hook manages to keep the trail through it all and he leads us to a series of boards leaning against the wall—out of sight with the trash piled in front of them. Hook scratches and then lets out a low growl. As Eldas and I near, we hear the faint echo of people talking, words indiscernible. Through cracks in the boards, the dark line of a tunnel in the wall is visible.
“Stay here,” he hisses.
“But you need—”
“I do not need you. You are a liability because I can’t allow something to happen to you. And if you had been forthright with me from the beginning, all of this might not have happened,” he snarls at me with rage I didn’t think Eldas could harbor toward me. I stagger back as if he struck me. Yet, even through his anger, his worry and compassion for me shines through. It reminds me that the Eldas I’ve come to know and care for is still the man standing before me. “Stay here, hide, and stay safe with Hook. If something happens to you I’ll be forced to rip apart every fae with my bare hands.”
Before I can say anything else, Eldas pushes the boards aside, steps off into the darkness, and leaves me alone. I grit my teeth. Hook lets out another low whine and scratches.
Images of Eldas ambushed, injured and bleeding, fill my mind. Surely Aria knew he’d come after Harrow? Unless they thought they could get Harrow long away before anyone realized? These thoughts swirl around the image of Harrow, drugged to the point of incoherency.
I meet Hook’s luminescent golden eyes.
“What would you do?” I whisper. The wolf looks back to the hole in the wall. “If you insist, I can’t argue with that.”
I fish in my bag for a sprig of briar. I picked the plants I took from the gardens at Westwatch carefully. Every one for a different reason, based on the insights of a past queen. For weeks I’ve been reading and practicing their written methods.
The memory of my last attack lingers. I wasn’t confident with my magic then. I needed Hook and Eldas to stand a chance. But I’m not the same woman as I was. I know how to use my powers and I trust the land beneath my feet to keep me safe.
“Let’s go.” I nod toward the opening and Hook strides into the darkness, unafraid. I try to emulate him, following close behind. As we walk, I push magic from my hand into the briar, charging it with energy to use in a large burst.
The silence is broken in the distance by a sharp cry being cut short with a sickening crunch.
“Go!” I urge Hook and he bounds ahead. I stumble through the darkness, running my hand along the rough-hewn wall. It bites into the flesh of my palm but I keep pressing firm.
Soon, a sliver of light guides me. I can make out Hook’s shadow, racing onward. He crosses into the moonlight before me. The noises of fighting rise in my ears. I keep pumping my feet forward.
I’ve never been in a real fight before. I studied how to heal, not hurt. But I’d never been married before, crossed the Fade, had magic, slept with a man, or loved like this before. I’ve been able to take all those firsts in stride.
I can do this.
I emerge into a forest. Instantly, I notice how the fae lands are different from the Elf Kingdom. Motes of magic drift through the air between the trees, casting everything in shades of blue and green. Vining flowers I don’t recognize hang like curtains from the trees’ leafy boughs. Even the earth seems different under my feet; it’s more untamed, magical, and much more like what I think I originally expected of Midscape.
Hook’s growl followed by a shout brings me back to reality. I sprint forward, dashing around the trees to a lowlying clearing. Two fae lie dead, their throats slit with a violent dark line. Eldas faces off against a beast with paws that match the prints we saw in the road. The animal is the size of a bear, covered in fur around its face and paws, but the rest of its body is coated in wet-looking scales, like a serpent’s.
Hook’s whimper draws my attention across the clearing to where the wolf has been beaten back by another fae with ram’s horns. The man’s eyes gleam a bright violet and his hands move through the air, vaporous magic tracing his motions. Both beast and man wear necklaces weighted by labradorite around their necks.
I hold out the briar and sink my feet into the ground.
An arm closes around me and the blade of a dagger is at my throat.
“King Eldas!” Aria shouts over my shoulder. My ears ring. I was right; it was her all along. I’ve never been so angry about being correct. “If you won’t parlay with us for your dear brother, then perhaps your queen?”
Eldas’s bright eyes leave the beast to face us. A rage unlike any I’ve ever seen twists his handsome features into pure malice. Waves of shadow radiate off of him and the presence of the Fade thickens with his magic.
“Let her go,” he growls.
“Let us go and agree to give us the land that’s rightfully ours!” She pushes the dagger closer to my throat.
“Aria, don’t do this,” the man with the ram’s horns says, voice weak with emotion. “You were supposed to get away.” I see something I recognize—an emotion I’ve seen in Eldas numerous times now. Admiration, compassion. I’m beginning to piece together the simple plot this seems to have been…Aria fell in love with one of the rebel fae. Love was the one thing that could make someone act against their own best interests.
“You insult your people’s—your family’s—attempt at diplomacy and hurt your cause with this.” Eldas holds out his arms and an array of silver blades pop into existence. He summons each one with nothing more than a thought—a true name of a weapon he learned and saved in his memory throughout the course of his life. “Kill her and you kill us all.”