remained silent, even pinched his lips together. But there was no denying the truth of the holographic message I’d just replayed for him and the camera.
“Faith is mine. Where is her mother? Where did you take the queen after you dragged her from her bed like an animal?”
“Thor, you’re insane. What are you doing?” he asked, instead of answering my question. “We’ve been friend for years. We grew up together.” Sweat ran from his temple, down his cheek and into the creases in his neck. I watched the slide of liquid, oddly detached. Numb. My parents were dead. My life was in ruins. Worse, Faith could never be mine. I would not drag her down with me. I would watch her take another male as her mate, raise a family, live and breathe and love another.
Numb was better than the pain I had locked away at the idea of her in the arms of another. I wondered if I’d ever feel again.
“We grew up together, but we were never friends.” I slid a jeweled dagger—my mother’s dagger—from my boot. It was a work of art. Polished platinum, it was a ceremonial piece, not meant for battle, but bestowed upon her with honor when she had retired from the Optimus unit after four decades of service. The blade was not made for war, but it was wickedly sharp. To prove the point, I walked around Pawl until I stood behind him and placed the dagger on the side of his ear. Slicing up toward the ceiling of the dark room, I cut the hair along that side of his head on a single sweep, chuckling out loud as the dark strands fluttered in a scattered mess onto Pawl’s lap.
“Thor?”
“Faith is my mate. Lord Wyse—your fucking grandfather—tried to have her killed. He sent you to Earth. What do you think Trinity and the royal guard will do to you when they find out you kidnapped the fucking queen!”
“Thor!” he repeated, this time his tone pleading.
I ignored it and continued. “Lord Wyse is the reason my parents are dead. My mate will be dead if he’s not stopped. What value do you believe I place on your miserable life?”
He exhaled shakily. “None.”
“Now you understand.” I pressed the flat of the blade to his sweat covered cheek and waited.
“I don’t know where the queen is now. But I know who does.”
Now we were getting somewhere. “Tell me.”
“He’s Lord Wyse’s personal guard. His name is Marish. He has a scar on his face, from the corner of his mouth to his neck, like a hook. He went with me to Earth. When we transported back, he took her. I don’t know where. I went home—”
“To take out Trinity.”
He was shaking now, the fingers of his hands trembling against the arms of the chair. “Yes. I was sent home, back to the palace, but they transported somewhere else. I don’t know where they took her. I swear I don’t.”
Damn it. I believed him. I knew I wouldn’t trust such information to a male of his low caliber. “And Lord Wyse? Why does he want the queen now? After all these years? Why not leave her alone on Earth?”
“He needs the royal gemstones. He wants to be king.”
The idea was ridiculous. “Alera has never had a king. Not in thousands of years.”
“Tell that to him,” he countered. Now that he was talking, he’d relaxed, a bit of his arrogance settling back around his shoulders. He even had the nerve to smile as he continued, telling me of his plans to seduce Trinity when she first arrived at his parent’s home, how he’d learned of her Ardor from Lord Wyse and decided to take matters into his own hands. He’d intended to fuck and murder his own cousin. But he’d been late arriving back at the palace and the royal consort had slipped into her bed first.
“You thought, what? That you’d mate your own cousin? Do you fuck your mother as well?”
That had made him angry, and he puffed up, face turning red as he cursed at the male. “No. Fuck you, Thor. Insult my mother again and I’ll—”
“What? Go on. Do tell.” I pressed the flat of my knife into his cheek so that the meat covering his bones edged over the blade, a shallow sliver slicing open from the pressure, just enough to make him wince. “Thor. No. I wasn’t going to fuck her. I do not need a mate. I said I’d seduce her into bed. Get her alone. Then kill her.”
“Lord Wyse needs all four heirs to die, and all four spires to darken before the people will accept him as their new king. Kill Trinity in her bed and there are only three to go.” I said it aloud as I worked through the ludicrous plans. I lifted the blade and didn’t even try to pretend the sight of that small sliver of blood didn’t please me. This bastard had every intention of murdering Faith’s sister, had kidnapped her mother, and would, without hesitation, have moved on to Faith next. He deserved to die. But not yet. I needed more information first. “Take them out one by one?”
He nodded. “Exactly. It wasn’t like my father could seduce her. Trinity had already met him and he’s too old for her. Seduction wouldn’t work.”
“And after?”
“After, it was brought to light that Leo is her mate. Since then, he hasn’t left her side… or her bed. Their bed. I had no chance again.”
“But Zel did, at the royal reception.”
He nodded but didn’t say anything. I knew what happened there, when Trinity had been taken prisoner and nearly killed by one of my mother’s guards. I had already left the reception for the night and, thank the goddess, Leo and Nix had been there to save her. Otherwise, that would have been one more sin, one more death my family was responsible for. I didn’t want or need to hear Pawl’s account of that evening. But Trinity did.
I walked over to a chair and sat, facing him once more, the bloodied dagger twirling in my hand. “You should be thankful, Pawl, for I have no doubt Leo would have made quick work of you if you dared crawl into Princess Trinity’s bed. Especially if you had tried to kill her.”
I saw agreement in his eyes, the hint of fear at the thought of being ripped to pieces by Leo. “I told you about Marish and the queen. What else to you want from me? Let me go! I haven’t killed anyone. I’m not a murderer. You have to let me go.”
“Do I?” I sighed deeply and slid my thumb carefully along the edge of the blade collecting the scant remains of his blood into a small drop. He watched, his eyes glued to the movement as I smeared the blood between my fingertips. “I will promise not to kill you, on one condition.”
“Yes. Whatever you want. Anything. Just let me go.”
“Start talking, Pawl. And start at the beginning. What do you know about the events that led to the king’s death twenty-seven years ago?”
“I wasn’t even born then.”
“But your father and Lord Wyse were adults. And you, now their trusted confidant. Their assassin.”
“I didn’t kill anyone.”
“You kidnapped the queen.”
He sighed, perhaps resigned that his involvement couldn’t be concealed any longer, that talking was the only way
