Then I realize, this might be the answer I’ve been waiting for, the discovery that could help me talk my way out of the exile that awaits me.
"There's something else you should know."
Ursulette's voice, meek and frail, breaks me away from my excitement.
She hangs her head in shame, as if what she’s about to say next could somehow possibly be worse than any of the previous news she’s given us. I don’t see how that’s possible, and it makes me all the more worried about what’s about to come out of her mouth next.
"Ever since I rose from the dead,” she continues. “I haven't been…hungry."
Their wide eyes reflect the pale moonlight all around the circle, the only thing just barely visible in the darkness.
Caz and Renee brim with questions, concern, and fear.
All I can think about, however, is that our plight might finally be coming to an end.
A cure? Long ago I stopped dreaming of such a thing. But now? Now maybe there’s a way to rid ourselves of the bloodlust that has plagued our kind and the realm.
Maybe I don’t need to earn back my father’s trust. Maybe this new path I’m on has put me in a position to reunite human and noctis once more.
And Charlotte’s blood is key.
"We have to find her," I say to the others, cutting off from their heated debate. No one dares interrupt me, not when I’m using my royal voice. Turning to Ursulette, I have one more command. "Show us where you last saw Charlotte."
30
FORGOTTEN IN THE DEPTHS
"Even?" Flames lick the back of my throat as I rage at the red-haired woman. "You baited me into a noctis trap! You’re the entire reason I'm in this mess! And you have the audacity to stand there and tell me that we're even remotelyeven?"
My throat it's still trying to recover from where Harland's fingers had it clamped so my voice is harsher than I’m used to. But I don't need it to sound pretty. I just need Fox to know that she's fucking batshit crazy if she thinks that saving my life from a threat that she put in my path to begin with makes us anything close to allies.
I don't care how many fingers they cut from her hands. Or the kind of leverage they had over her.
She betrayed her own people the moment she let the noctis use her.
How many girls did she help them ensnare? How many parents did she strip away from children?
On shaking legs, I shove myself to my feet and glare down into her big, blue eyes.
And she has the nerve to lookat me likeI'mthe crazy one. Like she has any right to judge me.
"Don't blame your poor choices on me,” she says, eyes locked on mine. “You've lived in this world long enough to know better than to aid a stranger in the street. I know you weren’t born yesterday."
I balk, unable to form words from the fire on my tongue.
"In some ways," she continues, rising with me. "You might even say you were lucky. If it hadn't been Prince Malachi who baited you, who knows the kind of sickos who might've snatched you up otherwise."
Almost none of my strength has returned, but my anger makes me believe otherwise.
I lunge for her, fists balled and thrashing.
Before I can reach her, firm hands yank me back.
"Wait," Rowland hisses in my ear. I'm so shocked to hear his voice that I actually listen. He’s alive. He’s conscious. He’s here. "You...have your differences," he says. "But shedidjust save our lives."
"Oh, for fuck's sake..." I roll out of his grasp, suddenly less pleased to see him alive. "You know she's the reason you're here too, right? If I hadn't been taken, you wouldn't have had to bring your men to the castle to try to break us out."
He's quiet for a long, uncomfortable moment.
