“Come back to bed,” Krew demanded. “That is the only present I need.”
I shot him a look while I headed for the box. “Your father sent you acrobats, whom he may or may not have paid to sleep with you, as the first present. You aren’t even slightly curious as to what is in this one?” I lifted the box and gave it a shake.
Krew leaned back on an elbow, the covers barely covering anything. “Dreading it quite honestly.”
I glared at him.
“Just open it and get it over with.”
I pulled the bow off slowly, wondering what kind of horror could be lying inside. It was a fairly large box, bigger than jewels but not long enough for a sword. Felt pretty light too, so unfortunately it wasn’t housing the king’s dead heart.
I opened the box to find a smaller box residing inside. Of course the king would enjoy even that kind of mind game.
I picked up the smaller blue velvet box and felt nothing but apprehension. It had a hinge like a jewelry box. As soon as I gently opened it, seeing what was laying inside, it slipped out of my hand and fell shut onto the rug with a thud.
My magic was immediately burning in my veins.
Krew had found some pants and evidently thrown them on haphazardly, as he was now dressed before me, but without the buttoning of said pants. “What is it?” he asked as he reached one hand out to me and the other to the floor to pick up the box.
“A ruby ring. Likely for a thumb?”
He went silent as he looked at it for himself. “It’s not his. His is still with Hatcher. And will remain with him for a long time.”
“So it’s a replica then?” I asked calmly as I felt anything but.
He gave me a nod as he closed the box. “Yes.”
“Krew, why would your father give you a replica of the ring we just so happened to steal?” I was fairly certain I knew the answer to that, but I needed to hear it out loud.
“Because he knows.”
CHAPTER25
Two weeks had passed since the ring had been gifted to Krew. Since he’d been forced to wear the wretched thing while around his father. The king had merely told the princes he’d lost his so when he sent for another to be made, he’d made both of them matching ones as well.
But every time I saw that red gem on Krew’s thumb, it made me uneasy.
I felt like the king was messing with us. He knew we’d taken it from him, and I wasn’t sure what the point of all this was, but I was sure that there was some sort of mind game going on.
And that it was very much working.
The good news was that now the Assemblages were down in numbers, the amount of balls were continuing to decrease. So I was personally seeing the king less and less, though the stockpile of my blood we had saved back before the bonding was beginning to dwindle. I couldn’t avoid him forever, but the only good thing about Nara being around was that the king was too busy with his own affair to be overly involved in anyone else’s. Even the royal family dinners were not as frequent now that the Assemblage numbers were smaller. They were now doing late breakfasts instead, so the king’s evenings were free.
I didn’t want to think about that too hard.
Though I was still training at random hours of the day with Owen, and sometimes the princes as well, I had been spending more days walking the gardens with Renna and Molly. I was purposefully trying to run into Nara. I wasn’t sure she’d divulge much of anything. She was being far too influenced by the king. But I wanted to keep seeing her with my own eyes and checking for bruises.
Though Krew told me she was still alive and well, we hadn’t seen her since the princes’ birthday celebration. And that made my uneasiness increase ten-fold. She’d been at the last ball, an odd sort of introduction as being the king’s mistress. So shouldn’t we have been seeing more of her then? Not less?
I was standing on the balcony overlooking the forest after another long day of training. We’d been up from midnight until almost dawn today, and I was shot. But to calm my mind before I dozed off, I was watching the sunset from my balcony. And the best news was that it’d been a gorgeous spring day and I didn’t even need to use my magic to warm me. Spring was finally, finally arriving.
“Oh hey, Rafe.” My smile was immediate.
I saw the gray blur which was Rafe, a black blur not far behind, and numerous other blips and flashes of fur. How those wolves had survived all this time in a dying forest was beyond me. And I’d only managed to bring a caterpillar back, but hopefully soon the wolves would have more to chase in these woods other than each other.
Like he heard my voice even from this far away, Rafe swung his head in my direction, peeking out from the trees.
Another wolf gave out a yip of a bark, and then he was off again, back in the trees. As fast as they were moving now, I knew they went slow when they ran with me. And even at their slowest speed, I couldn’t keep up. But it was still my favorite part of my day.
