Chapter 1

One

Your Royal Highness.

I just gape at Stanley bent low on his knees on the wide front porch of Duval House and struggle with the urge not to laugh or cry or vomit.

Your Royal Highness?

What complete and utter bullshit.

It can’t be true.

No fucking way.

Right?

Right ?

“Get off your knees, old man,” Bran says and surges ahead, hooking his hand beneath Stanley’s arm. Stanley comes easily and follows Bran into the house. “You.” Bran points a finger at me. “Come.”

I scurry after him, ever the dutiful little mouse, as he leads Stanley through the foyer, then down the hall and into Damien’s office.

When we’re all inside, Bran shuts the door and goes to the wet bar. The cork top lets out a loud fwop as Bran pulls it out of the crystal decanter and fills a glass with liquor. He slings it back. All of it. All in one gulp.

He bows his head, sets the glass back down.

Stanley and I share a look. It’s odd seeing him outside of the diner. Like a deer that has wandered into the milk aisle at the grocery store. Not that Stanley doesn’t deserve to have a life outside of The Greasy Spoon. I’ve just literally never seen him beyond the four walls of the place.

He spins his hat in his hands, working at the brim with gnarled fingertips.

He seems nervous. I don’t blame him. Bran is on edge and Stanley just dropped a bomb.

“This is a mistake,” I say, trying to ease the tension from Bran’s shoulders.

Stanley takes a deep breath, pushes it back out, and says, “I assure you, Your Royal?—”

“Stop that.” I shake my head. “You’ve been making me grilled cheeses for years. Now you’re trying to tell me you’re a brownie and I’m some…what, royal fae?”

He blinks. “Yes. That’s precisely what I’m saying.”

“But I’m not a royal fae .”

“Jessie—”

“Stanley—”

“Enough!” Bran’s voice cuts across the room even though his back is still to us.

Stanley clamps his mouth shut, curling the brim of his hat like an ocean wave.

Bran refills his glass and captures it in a white-knuckle grip before coming over to us. His energy is different than mine—less jittery, more raw chaos like a tornado about to touch ground.

He points a finger at Stanley. “You can’t just barge into my house and start bowing in front of the whole fucking place!”

Stanley’s bushy gray brow furrows over his brown eyes. “It’s customary to bow before a?—”

“I don’t fucking care what’s customary! You expose us all and risk far too much by getting on your fucking knees.” A vein pulses down Bran’s forehead. He turns away again, takes another sip of the alcohol, and paces the length of the room.

“Bran,” I try but he holds up his hand, cutting me off.

“I need to think, Mouse.”

I thought if we made it through my Pledge, Bran and I would be returning to the house and to our bed to celebrate. Instead, my sister and his brother are in some kind of magical coma and my favorite grilled cheese cook is a brownie who claims I’m royalty.

I’m starting to expect the unexpected, but even this is too much.

Plopping into one of the leather chairs, I prop my elbow on the arm and set my head in my hand. I’m exhausted. Mentally. Emotionally. Physically.

I’ve barely had time to think about what might be wrong with my sister let alone what any of the rest of this means.

I stopped an entire room with my voice. Dozens of extremely powerful vampires and shifters and witches.

Stopped them in their tracks with nothing more than four letters.

Everything is moving far too fast. I’m strapped to a speeding train and I can’t get off.

When Bran has had several minutes of silence, he drains the second glass of liquor and then sets it on Damien’s desk. The vein in his forehead has relaxed, but there’s still a pinch to his eyes, a hardness to his jaw.

As much as my world is spinning, Bran’s is too.

“What is she?” he asks.

Stanley licks his lips, nostrils flaring. “That’s a very complicated question and I?—”

“Wait.” They both cut their gazes to me. “What if I don’t want to know?”

I can’t get my mom’s words out of my head.

The things you did, Jessie…

There is a monster lurking in the shadows and that monster is me.

Do I really want to put a name to it?

Maybe it’s better if I don’t know.

Bran scowls at me. “You went against me.” He takes a step toward me and I sit up straighter in the chair. “You removed your necklace and refused to put it back on.” I stand and lurch backward as Bran’s eyes bleed to gold. “ You made this decision. You made a show of force. This is not a genie that can be stuffed back into a bottle!”

I back into Damien’s desk and a pencil holder rattles on top.

“Okay,” I say, and hold up my hands. “Okay.”

Bran heaves out a breath, fangs protruding from his mouth. I know he won’t hurt me, but I’m worried he’ll run away because he’s worried he will.

I take his hand and bring it to my chest. “Make me a promise.”

His face softens. “Now is not the time?—”

“Make me a promise, Bran Duval.”

He tilts his head and squeezes my hand in his. “Very well. What is it, little mouse?”

“Whatever I am, whoever I am, you’ll stay by my side no matter what. Even if it terrifies you.”

“I’m not afraid of you.”

I know he’s lying.

I know we’re both terrified of the truth.

“Promise me.”

“ Fine . I promise.”

There is nothing Bran values more than his word.

The relief that washes through me is nearly palpable.

I give him a nod. “All right then.” To Stanley I say, “Tell us. Tell us everything you know.”

Stanley sets his cap on the arm of the chair and folds his hands in his lap. He clears his throat, then swallows, the sharp line of his Adam’s apple sinking like a weight. “War has been brewing on the fae side for a very long time. The Autumn Court and the Winter Court are both of the Unseelie, but the Winter Court had always held more power and had always been a little crueler than the others. They lost that power in the Autumn Revolt many, many years ago. Long before you, vampire.” He eyes Bran with a wary look, the same kind of look a grandfather gives to the kids who think they know everything.

“The Autumn Court had the full support of the Summer and Spring Courts, and during the war, they were able to wipe out the entire royal line of the Winter Court.”

My heart hammers a little harder beneath my ribs.

“Or at least…that’s what we thought,” Stanley adds.

I suddenly can’t breathe.

“When I crossed paths with your mother in the park,” Stanley goes on, “I realized someone must have escaped.”

Cold dread spills down my spine.

“You smelled like the Winter Court, but more than that, you spoke like one.”

What you could do, Jessie…

“The royal line of the Winter Court had always had one very distinct power—the ability to control anyone—and I mean anyone — with nothing more than the sound of their voice.”

“Like a siren,” Bran says.

Stanley nods. “That’s a mortal term that’s been combined with mermaid, but yes, it is fitting. They could make men jump to their deaths. Women bow at their feet. Stop armies in their tracks. And worse, they were the only fae that could lie.”

Stanley sits forward in his chair. “And you, Jessie…you seem to be the only surviving member of the Royal Winter Court. The only living fae who can command others with nothing but the power of her voice. And now that you’ve used the power, the fae realm will be looking for a way to get to you.”

My chest rises and falls with several deep breaths. “Why, though? Why do they care now?”

“Because…the entire reason they were at war? It was because your family tried to overthrow all of the courts so they could rule the faerie realm under one banner. And they were using their voice to do it.”

He levels me with a heavy gaze. “As far as they’re concerned, you are the villain of their story.”