Epilogue

Epilogue

Two months later, my hair had turned completely blue to match my eyes. I still got a shock whenever I looked in the mirror, but I loved it. It marked me as truly fae, not some outcast human girl who didn’t belong.

I patted my hair as Ronan and I walked along Piccolo Street to the Ogre’s Nose to meet the others. “Do you think I should grow out my hair?”

He shook his head. “I like your pixie cut.”

“Faery cut,” I corrected with a grin.

We were heading to the tavern to celebrate our official cumulative rankings, which Gaia had just released. It was some kind of average of all the trial results over all the years, and I hadn’t been sure how my score would be calculated. Obviously, I’d gotten zero in all the previous years…or did I inherit Sebarah’s scores?

Ultimately, my average annual score was three out of fifteen, putting me at the bottom of the pack. But since then, I’d Ascended, was getting better at spell work, and getting stronger and faster every day, so next year’s trials would be a different story. I had every expectation of coming near the top.

Ronan was still ranked first overall, though he’d dropped some points after scoring zero in the third trial this year. Still, his average was a respectable twelve, with Gabrelle close on his heels on eleven. Leif and Dion were third and fourth, with nine and six. And I was dead last—but not for long.

We pushed into the Ogre’s Nose. Low lighting, dark wood, and some jazz funk playing from the enchanted ceiling. The place smelled fruity, like someone had painted the walls in Fae Fizz.

The others were already here, grouped around a marble table and perched on barstools. Leif wore silver and gray, as usual, though his face was drawn. Dion wore simple jeans and a shirt, but Gabrelle looked stupidly beautiful and coiffed, with her pink hair piled effortlessly on her head and a white jumpsuit outlining every curve.

Dion called out a welcome. “Hey, the winner and loser are finally here.”

“Enjoy it, Double D,” I grumbled, climbing onto a bar stool beside Gabrelle. “This is the only time I’ll be last. I’ll be whipping all your asses next year.”

They booed and slid me and Ronan a couple of shots of whiskey. “You’re behind,” Gabrelle said firmly. “Drink up.”

Why not? We’d earned it. It had been a shitter of a year, and we deserved a little fun.

Leif was in better shape than when the slaughter was still fresh, but he wasn’t back to his old self. He occasionally grinned, his cheekiness shining through, but it always faded fast.

I imagined that was how Ronan looked following Sebarah’s death. He told me he never had a smile that stuck until he met me.

We got drunk and stupid, reliving the trials from this year and laughing at the stories from previous years. I cackled my ass off when Gabrelle went into great detail about a time Leif had ended up stranded and naked in the middle of the Hebes town square after a failed navigation trial.

Leif joined in sometimes, laughed once or twice, but his resting face was no longer a wolfish grin but a solemn mask, and my heart pained every time I looked at him.

I told the story of how I got the Floran Bracelet, and somehow it made everyone giggle and snort.

“How’s your evil tattoo overlord now?” Dion asked with a grin.

I held my wrist to my ear and pretended to listen. “It says if you don’t buy me another drink, it’ll make me hunt you down and pour dirt in all your cooking,” I lied. The tatt mostly left me in peace these days. It hadn’t buzzed, burned, or bullied me in weeks, and I had grown to like the thing.

Dion got to his feet. “Well, I’ll definitely have to buy Ro a beer since he can’t afford one himself.”

Ronan flicked a paper coaster across the table and got D right in the mouth. “Eat that, Double D.” We all doubled over at the nickname, and even Dion laughed.

A spellbird whizzed through the front door and landed in Gabrelle’s wine. It was battered and had probably been banging at the tavern door for a while.

Gabrelle was looser than usual, and her genuine, free smile made her even more beautiful than usual, which was fucking unfair. She fished the spellbird out of her glass and handed it to Leif. “It’s for you.”

Leif read the soggy message, his silver eyes narrowing and his pale skin turning pure white. He read the spellbird several times until it ripped under his whitening knuckles.

“Whassup, Leif?” Dion asked.

The wolf ground his teeth and bunched his muscles, completely ruining the mood, lacing the air with tension. His pale face was lined, solemn, his jaw tight. “Mom is dead.” His voice was flat and murderous. “She was killed by a Shadow Walker while visiting a pack on the east coast.”

“Oh, shit,” Dion said.

Gabrelle gasped. “I’m so sorry.”

Ronan frowned, his black eyes glassy. “Oh, Gaia.”

I slid off my stool and leaned against Leif, pressing the side of my body against him as a measure of physical comfort. If there was one thing I knew, it was that wolves got more comfort from physical affection than from words.

He leaned into me momentarily, then took a deep breath and pushed me away.

My wolf friend rejecting physical comfort was unheard of, and that alone shocked me to the core, driving home the enormity of what was happening. I reached for him again, but he slapped my hand aside with a feral look.

“Leave me,” he barked.

“I’m sorry,” I said lamely and kept my hands to myself. Leif hadn’t looked so wild, so fucking furious since the night of his pack’s slaughter. But this arguably hit the pack even harder, losing their esteemed leader, the one fae who held all the packs of Verda together.

Dion’s beer-colored hair curled around his ears, and his thick eyebrows knitted together. “Shit, Leif, you’re the alpha now.”

We all stared at Leif, who stood tall among us all dotted on barstools, looking like the only adult in the room. He dripped anger and determination, and not a single line of the light-hearted joking fae I knew was visible.

His personality was erased.

“Yes,” he snapped at Dion. He looked around at us all with his lip curled in a sneer. “I have to go now.”

We watched him march from the room. I always thought he’d be a relaxed alpha, probably one who delegated the actual ruling to a beta while he ran off to have sex. But Leif was turning into a darker, scarier fae, one I barely recognized.

What sort of alpha would he make?

We discussed his mom, her leadership, and the crazy-ass fact that our good friend was now the leader of all the Verdan wolves. None of us voiced our concerns about his mental state, but we must all have felt them.

Leif was going off the rails, and now he had all the power in the world.

“Only one more of our parents can die before we all become rulers,” Gabrelle said quietly.

Holy crap. I was not ready to rule. I’d only just arrived in this realm and found my place here, found my friends, found Ronan. I wanted to spend time messing about and enjoying myself before the mantle of responsibility weighed me down.

“Let’s assign them all some damn bodyguards,” I said, then downed another shot.

Everybody joined in the cheers and skulled a shot. I locked eyes with Ronan, seated across the table from me. His black hair framed his chiseled, tanned face perfectly, and the soft smile on his face was just for me. He was too far away, I wanted to be on his lap or beside him, touching him somehow, but a longing gaze would have to do.

Besides, there was no hurry. We had the rest of our lives together.

* * *Hi, I hope you enjoyed A Court of Greed and Excess!

The second book in the series, A Court of Fur and Fangs, features a very cranky Leif battling wits with a badass wolf shifter—she might be way down in the pack hierarchy, but she doesn’t let him get away with anything.

And of course, you’ll get to meet up with old friends. Get A Court of Fur and Fangs now!