Chapter 10

TEN

Sulien

I urge my horse to move faster. Too many days have passed without any word of where Cassia is, and there's no telling what she's enduring. My stomach twists at just the thought. I have to do the only thing I can do, no matter how foolish it is.

Craning my neck to see behind me, I spot the rest of the princes pushing their horses to catch up with me, and my jaw clenches. We have to do something about this, apparently. I'd tried to leave without them, tried to not involve them in what I was about to do, but there they are. I want to be pissed off, but I'm actually almost relieved they've come too. It feels better not doing this alone, even though it's wrong.

The risk is… too great.

No matter what happens, I can't let them get hurt. As much as they drive me crazy, they're my family. Closer to me than my own parents. The thought of losing them makes my throat feel tight .

Don't think about it. They'll be safe. You won't let them come to harm.

My mind shifts to my mother. I don't know why, but if I were to close my eyes right now, I'd see her, staring back at me with a scowl that always seemed to be etched into her face. She hated everything: my dad, me, being alive. Every moment of living was pain for her.

I swallow hard and try to focus on the journey, but my mom's image stays in my mind. I don't know if there ever was a good time with her. My memories are of her screaming at me for waking up in the morning, like she'd wanted me to die in my sleep. Or of her hitting me – over and over again – with no explanation as to why.

But as I got older, I knew why. It was my father's fault. She hated that she was forced to get married. And she hated that I was a product of that marriage.

I don't know what hopes or dreams my mom had as a young woman, but they didn't include my dad or me, and she broke into a million pieces because of it. I was never enough for her, and man, did I try to be. I couldn't help waking up in the morning, though. I couldn't help that I'd been born, and she resented me so much for it. And she hated my dad. What she couldn't do to him, I realized later in life, she ended up doing to me.

When I think of my mother and father and love, all I think about is pain. I've tried so hard to ignore the darkness in my mind, but its whispers are impossible to escape. Sometimes when I catch my expression in the mirror, for a minute, I think I see my father, and I hate myself even more.

Hate that I look just like him.

I shake my head and sigh, digging my heels further in to get my horse to move even faster. I was trying to avoid forcing someone to marry me. It'd been the perfect plan, and I fucked it up.

Anger and frustration stir my gut. I'd made that deal with Cassia to avoid the pain and the resentment and every other ugly thing that came from marriage. And here I am, putting another woman in that exact situation. Instead of this being about a deal, she felt forced into a marriage she didn't want.

Did I try too hard to avoid my destiny? This is a hell of a way to pay me back. Cassia's innocent in all of this. All she was doing was trying to take care of her family, and I presented her with an offer she couldn't walk away from. One she no doubt regrets now.

Damn it, she probably hates me. I know I fucking hate myself. Because of me and my stupid deal, she's in danger. I'll never forgive myself if anything happens to her.

"Sulien, these horses need a break!" one of the princes calls out to me.

Break? I pull the reins on my horse to slow her down. I look at the three of them and realize we all need a break, horses and men alike. Damn it. My intention was to get help as quickly as possible, not hurt fine beasts or good men.

I wait for them to catch up with me and speak, hoping my voice comes out steady. "Let's make camp here."

It's a lightly wooded area. I can hear water flowing, and there's good wood for a fire. It's a proper place to rest for the night, but in all honesty, I would have stopped here regardless of what it was like.

We quietly water our horses in the creek and tie them to trees nearby before removing their gear and getting them fed. I start a fire, something that's easy as a fae with magic, and we set our bedding up around the fire. Once we're settled, we sit quietly on some logs one of the men had found, eating tough jerked meat and chewing on trail mix.

Part of me wants to discuss the plan, but they know the plan. Breathing more life into it feels unwise. Speaking of what we must do may bring a curse to shadow our steps, if there isn't one already.

"Well, we've learned a few things from all of this, haven't we, boys?" Cobar asks with a sad smile on his face.

Zane furrows his brows and glances at Cobar. I stare blankly. Some part of me feels like we've joined him in the middle of the conversation, and we have no clue what it was about.

Forrest interrupts the awkward silence. "What the fuck are you talking about?"

He's tactful, as always, but I have the same question, so I let it go.

"We've learned a few things about how to treat Cassia from all of this." Cobar sighs, his words accurate, even though her name brings me pain. "If she were still here, we'd likely have just been pursuing her like assholes, making her hate us more with every day. But the time away has given us time to think. When we get her back, I'm sure we're all going to handle her differently. And this time, we'll know she wants to be with us."

We all end up nodding in agreement. He's not wrong about that. Each of us did something that overwhelmed or downright ran her off, although he may be wrong about us finding her again, and about her ever wanting us.

Cobar leaps to his feet with an energy I can't imagine feeling and sticks one arm out and the other is at his waist. He fake waltzes around the fire we've built like a prince from a fairy tale. "We've got to woo her when she gets back. Take things slow and be romantic. Just because she's our mate doesn't mean she's automatically going to fall in love with us. Something we now know." He pauses to dip the imaginary Cassia. It's a comically low dip. Her hair would drag on the ground if she was really in his arms.

"Graceful," Zane says, an almost smile on his lips.

"Only the best for my lady!" Cobar says, bowing to all of us.

Zane shakes his head, but I guess he's decided to play along. "I'm going to take her to the library when we get back. For some reason, I think she'd like that."

"I'm going to take her on a moonlit stroll and plan a surprise picnic for her," Cobar says, sitting back down with a satisfied look on his face.

I shake my head, finish my food, and move to my blankets. The others follow suit until we're all lying around the warm fire, staring up at the stars. Four men with broken hearts ready to do anything and everything to escape the misery we're in.

"I wonder if she likes to fish," Zane says, his words loud in the silence. "I'd take her out on the frozen lake, and we could ice fish. It's one of my favorite pastimes."

"That sounds terrible," Forrest replies, and shoots him a dirty look. "What? It does. Who wants to sit on a frozen lake and fish for hours?"

"We could find a way to fill the time," Zane says, raising his eyebrows.

"Back to getting in her pants, are you?" Cobar asks, the firelight dancing in his eyes.

"What about you, Sulien?" Forrest turns to me.

I don't have a response. I don't have anything in mind past saving her from whoever has her right now. I shrug. "I'm not good at wooing."

"That's not a lie." Cobar laughs and lays back on the pallet he'd set out for himself before turning to Forrest. "Are you going to take your kids hunting?"

All any of us hear about is how the Fall Court hunts. They're experts. Everyone learns to hunt from the smallest child to the biggest warriors. No one's exempt. We've even gone hunting with Forrest a time or two, but it was mostly him boasting and us trying to figure out what the hell to do. Of course, Forrest is going to take his kids hunting, how else will he remind all of us what a big, tough man he is?

"I'm absolutely not taking my kids hunting." Forrest practically growls the words, and all of us turn and look at him, confused as hell. His expression shifts to one I don't recognize. "Since we're all sharing a bride, I think I can trust you all and finally tell you the truth. I hate hunting."

Our mouths all hang open. We look around at each other, but none of us speak. Not liking hunting as a Fall Fae is like not liking the sun as a Summer Fae, or not liking the cold as a Winter Fae.

"Are you joking?" I ask.

He shakes his head. "No child of mine, no prince or princess, will ever have to know what it's like to stalk prey, to hunt regardless of the weather or terrain, to sleep outside or suffer in the elements. I don't care what the other fae think, my children will never hunt unless they want to, and then it'll be done safely." He says the last part through clenched teeth.

How could this be true? It's the fate of his progeny to be hunters. That's what his court is .

He glares into the fire and continues, running a finger along the scar on his face. "My children will never know what it is like to be maimed because their father cared more about the hunt than his own kid." His eyes glisten, and my heart wrenches for him. He's never said anything about his scar before. We all assumed it was from hunting, but also figured he has some arrogant tale about the damn thing.

"I didn't know," I say.

Forrest stares into the fire. "I have nightmares about it. Nightmares that make me want to rip my father's heart out and burn it to ash."

Hate for a father. That I understand. Perhaps we all understand.

But it's Cobar who answers. "Nightmares are the worst." Then he shivers.

"It seems even royalty carry their difficulties." And Zane is right. We do.

"Demons we should do our best to work out while our bride is away," Cobar says, then glances in my direction.

I stiffen. Does he know? I mean, I know he suspects many things, but does he know how deeply my demons have weaved trouble through the past few days?

Fuck. I don't want him in my head, but the damn man is too astute.

Cobar sits up from his pallet, leaning on his elbow and stares quietly. "We're going to get her back, and we're going to make sure she, and our children, are shielded from as much pain as we possibly ca–" His last word is cut off by a hiss of pain, and then we're all grabbing our heads.

I push my magic forcefully out to the boundary surrounding our lands. The iron demons claw at it, thirsting to get in. Tempted by the life and the beauty in our lands. Lands they wish they could wreak havoc on once more. But power flows from all of us, and the boundary straightens until their attacks feel like little more than an irritant in the back of our minds.

"This will get easier with our mate," Zane says, clenching his teeth.

We nod. There's no doubt in any of our minds about that.

Cobar shakes himself, like it'll shake away the headache pounding in the backs of our minds. "We'll save her soon and return her to our sides."

Of course we will, we don't have a choice. She's our bride and our future queen. We wouldn't be worthy of her if we couldn't rescue her. Besides, she's Cassia. The girl from my childhood. The one who always made me laugh. The one I begged my father to keep around, to keep her grandmother working for me. But I was dismissed. Even though I did the one thing I never did… cried and begged.

I see her as a young girl. Smart. Smarter than me. With the kind of smile that stole my heart and made all others dull in comparison. No matter what courts I went to, no matter the pretty fae I saw, no one compared to her and her smile. She made me… miss her, want her. I… ached when she wasn't around, and that ache remained until the day I saw her in my room. The day she offered to bathe me.

It's strange how much I regret telling her no. Maybe instead of all of this, that bath would have turned into her being in my bed, and her being in my bed might have turned into her taking my offer to heart. So that even with the complications, she wouldn't have run away. Or sought a dangerous way out .

Maybe. Or maybe the ache in my chest would have gotten worse, and I'd keep needing her at my side, while she needed nothing from me. I don't know.

"When we get her back," Zane whispers into the darkness, "we're going to have a different kind of family. One our kids can look back at with pride and love."

I think of Cassia. I don't know what our future holds, but I know it won't be more pain. I won't allow it. She, and our kids, if we have them, will be loved and safe. I swear it.

The fire crackles near us and embers slip into the sky, revealing everything that the fae hold dear. Nature. The cosmos. Everything that makes us feel small and insignificant. A feeling that intensifies as I think of Cassia somewhere out in the wide world, too far for us to reach. At least, for now.