My scythe, swords, and daggers were respectfully laid on the dresser across from the bed. I swiped up the dripping water glass and crossed to inspect them. My throat was thick as I drank; I must have slept for a while.
“All in order,” I muttered. Every weapon was accounted for.
How in the damn Spirits had I gotten here? Everything before I passed out was a blur of riding through jungle and sand.
Stretching out my stiff limbs, I crept around the other side of the room and picked through the belongings. A nondescript pack and a cloak draped across a chair. Whoever it belonged to wouldn’t need that in this oppressive heat. Those journals though?—
Lucidius’s.
Malakai.
Something nagged at my brain at his name. Something I was supposed to remember. I’d seen him, Tolek, and Ophelia before I’d passed out?—
Get your cousin out of here.
Cousin.
“Holy fucking spirits.” I sank against the wall, head falling back with a dull thud.
Cousin. The fae—I assumed that was Queen Ritalia—had spat that word at Malakai. Aboutme.
My pulse beat against my skin, blood rushing in my ears.
“Malakai is my cousin?” I whispered to myself, evaluating his belongings stacked in the corner.
I listened to the words as if someone else had said them. Waited for them to hit me with the blunt force of a dulled blade. But nothing happened—nothing beyond foggy confusion.
“She had to be lying.”
It was a question I’d asked my entire life—who was my father? One my mother had refused to answer. One I’d let tear me apart—hold me back. And yet when a possible answer was dangled before me, I didn’t feel any different besides the initial shock.
My heart was too shredded, my nerves frayed and anger hot in my gut.
How in the Angel’s bloody realm could it be possible?
With a deep breath, I pushed off the wall and followed that smokey scent down the stairs to find the people who would likely be able to make sense of it all.
“What does she mean she suspected?”The question was whispered, but even from the top landing, Ophelia’s sharp voice was recognizable.
“I don’t know,” Malakai snapped. “I wrote back.”
“To not tell him?—”
A stair creaked beneath me, and Rina’s softer question sliced off.
I shouldn’t have expected anything else from my nosy group of friends. But where I’d anticipated feeling crowded from the attention, a warmth spread through my chest instead. One that gave me enough confidence to descend the staircase and roundthe corner into what appeared to be both a sitting room and dining room.
The windows were open, the ocean softly rolling in the distance. Ophelia, Santorina, Malakai, and Tolek sat on plush sofas in the center of the cozy space. Mila and Lyria were at the rectangular dining table facing the others.
But all eyes in this low-ceilinged room turned toward me.
I found Malakai, and he pushed to his feet as I said the only thing I could think of, “Akalain’s brother—the one who died years ago—your uncle…he was my father.”
Malakai swallowed. “Looks like he was.”
I blew out a breath, and strode to the couch, dropping between the seat he’d vacated and Santorina, across from Ophelia and Tolek. Everyone in the room seemed to sag with relief, as if they feared I’d hole up in my room upstairs.
It wasn’t a far cry from what I’d done in the past. Whenever they’d tried to push me on my father or my heritage, I’d brushed it off.
