“Sam.” Kieran stepped forward and cupped my face in his hands before kissing the corners of my mouth. “Stop panicking. My feelings aren’t hurt. You had just bonded with Alaric, and I had just done the same with Draven. We don’t have to rush this.”
“Are you sure?” I closed my eyes and leaned into his touch. “Because in my heart, you’re already my mate, Kier. I just wanted to give you and Drav some time to settle into your mating bond before we threw ours on top of it.”
“I figured.” He smiled, and there was so much joy and love in it that my worries instantly evaporated. “Because I very much want to be your mate—in both the name and magic bond kind of way—but I want us to be able to celebrate it.”
Alaric sighed. “You want a party, don’t you?”
“Of course I want a party.” Kieran sniffed and stepped away from me so he could shove his friend’s shoulder. “Samara is obviously saving the best for last. That deserves a celebration.” He looked at Roth. “Think your parents will be up for throwing a double wedding or something?”
Roth rubbed their forehead. “They would no doubt be thrilled.”
I opened my mouth to tease them when Rynn stalked off to the table of books and started flipping through them.
Shit. I exchanged a look with Cali before we both looked at Rynn in concern.
I hadn’t thought about how all this talk of mates would affect her.
Normally, Moroi didn’t refer to their spouses or lovers as mates, but the Velesians did. They’d been the only ones to pick up that habit from the Fae. It was a big deal for them, although I didn’t know the specifics of what it entailed. They kept it all very hush-hush, and it was one of the few things Rynn never talked about.
I did know that mates wereneverforced in the Velesian realm. Rynn might not have had a choice in joining the Alpha Pack, but she didn’t have to choose them as mates. Nor did they have to choose her.
But the chances of her finding a mate outside of her pack was complicated. Technically, she could, but how would she know if they truly wanted her or just wanted a way to join the Alpha Pack, who rarely accepted anyone into their inner circle?
Rynn had been a political pawn her entire life. The only people who had ever chosen her just for being who she was were me and Cali. We might be her best friends for life . . . but we weren’t her mates.
A good fuckfest might make Cali happy—at least for a while—but I doubted that would work for Rynn. She wanted something more than that.
My heart ached for my friend. I couldn’t fix her problems now—or possibly ever—but I could at least distract her.
“Mate bonds aside, there were a lot of other interesting things I learned from the Seelie King.” I walked over to one of the tables and perched my butt on it. The others settled intochairs or leaned against tables while I recounted everything Erendriel had said.
“What is with people wanting to marry you?” Vail muttered.
“Jealous?” I arched a brow at him and already started thinking of a pithy response for when he no doubt lost his temper.
“Marriage is too simple a word for what I want from you,” he said in a low, deep tone that had me clenching my thighs together. “If Erendriel tries to take you from me, I will tear him apart limb from limb and offer you his still-beating heart as a gift.”
The snarky response I’d had ready to go died on my tongue. For once, I had no idea what to say. The sincerity and intense need I saw on Vail’s face was echoed in the bond. He really did mean it.
“Wow, Rynn.” Kieran clapped slowly. “You should knock Vail out more often. He finally figured out how to use his words.”
Instead of getting angry, the corners of Vail’s mouth twitched.
May the moons damn it all. Did he almostlaugh?
“I definitely plan on punching Vail again,” Rynn said absently as she stared unseeingly at a spot on the floor while she processed everything I’d recounted before her gaze snapped to me. “He said the Unseelie Princesareliars? Notwere?”
“Definitely present tense,” I confirmed. “No idea where the rest of the Unseelie are or if they’re still alive, but their princes are still kicking around somewhere.”
“There’s something in the mountains,” Draven mused. “Erendriel spends most of his time there.”
“Maybe the princes are there.” I looked at the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves that lined the room. “Or maybe there are more places like this in the mountains that don’t have wards in place preventing him entry. I don’t think he liked that we were ableto get into this room. Either because he wants what’s in here for himself, or he thinks there is something here that we’ll be able to use against him.”
“Probably both.” Draven snorted and reached behind himself to swipe a dagger off the table. Then he tossed it to me, and I snatched it out of the air.
“These glyphs . . .” I ran a finger down the silver handle. “They’re like the ones the rangers use on their weapons but way more complicated.”
Erendriel hadn’t been wrong when he’d said we were like children bumping around in the dark. We’d only figured out that we could use the magic in our blood to reactivate the Fae glyphs a century or so ago. From there, we’d been able to derive spells of our own, usually by combining glyphs. It’d taken us a while to figure out that we had to pour our intention into the spells as well as our blood.
