28

Mor Trisencor and the Big Fairy Sleepover

Dranian appeared the most horrified by the cathedral. He grunted toward the dust, he grunted toward the bugs, he grunted toward the unlit hallways.

Shayne, on the other hand, stretched and yawned as he headed up the stairs. “I’m the only King here so I’ll take the comfy bed.” He stole a subtle look at Cress as if to see whether Cress would challenge him on it.

“Whatever, Your Majesty,” Mor said from the dim living space off the lobby where he tossed a blanket on each of the spare couches for Cress, Dranian, and himself. Mor was used to sleeping on the couch anyway since it was where he’d decided to sleep from now on until…

Shayne’s bare feet slapped over the hardwood floors of the upstairs hall, and Mor’s eyes widened. He sprang back into the lobby and called up the stairs in a loud whisper, “Stay away from that bed!”

From right outside Mor’s bedroom door, Shayne glanced back down the hall. The white-haired assassin had to lift to his tiptoes to see Mor at the bottom of the stairs. He raised an eyebrow at first, until a look of realization filled his face. He pointed toward the bedroom door. “Is she in there?”

Mor bit down on his thinned lips. “I… I don’t know. I think so,” he admitted in a panicked whisper.

Shayne took a patronizing step toward the door and flittered his fingers over the handle. Mor airslipped so fast he sliced dust particles, cutting between Shayne and the door and tossing Shayne across the hall before he inhaled another full breath.

“I’ll snap your fingers off!” Mor warned with a voice that sounded calmer than he felt.

Shayne sighed. “You’d better have a guest bedroom fit for a king,” he said.

Mor nodded to another bedroom down the hall where he knew an old mattress rested in the corner. To his relief, the white-haired assassin released a dramatic sigh and headed that way.

Only when Shayne moseyed down the hall and into the other room did Mor return to the stairs. He waited a moment at the top, listening to see if Shayne was about to come back out and complain about the accommodations. When all seemed still, Mor returned to the living space where Dranian was already snoring on one of the couches.

Mor sat on his couch parallel to Cress’s. “It’s not like I care about that human,” Mor felt the need to clarify, “it’s just that I can’t stand the thought of her being tormented more than she already has been. Though, I’ll admit, I don’t know why it bothers me so much,” he added. “I never would have even looked twice at her before I realized she was writing the articles I was reading, and then I discovered there was fairy trouble in her past. The more I’m around her, the stronger I can feel it, and the more it bothers me.”

Cress just sat there with his arms folded, listening. A second later, he swatted a spider off his shoulder.

“And I can’t even touch her, so trying to slip into her human mind and see her memories is out of the question. Not that I would try without her consent anyway. I mean, unless she was in peril, of course, and I had to… Queensbane,” Mor cursed and dragged a hand through his hair, pulling strands from the tie. “I can’t decide if I want her to keep taking her cold iron or to stop altogether. It’s driving me faeborn mad.”

When he looked up, he found Cress smirking. “You’re mad because you can’t touch her, Mor?” he challenged.

Mor sighed. “It’s not like that.”

Cress’s wicked smile widened. “I can’t begin to express the joy and merriment it would bring me to learn that you like a human after all the harassment you bequeathed me for it.”

Mor shot a doubtful look across the living space. “This is not like your situation. You were enchanted in the beginning and even if you hadn’t been, you fell like a delicate forest flower.” He leaned back on the couch and rested his arm across the backrest, splaying his impressive assassin muscles. “I’m nothing like that.”

Cress’s smile dropped. “Careful,” he warned. “I’ve been stress eating and losing sleep for two months over these dreadful wedding plans and I’m one ripe comment away from ripping your tongue out from your head.”

Mor stuck out his tongue and spat a little in invitation. Cress’s fingers twitched like he was truly thinking about doing it. Mor’s face broke into a smile around his tongue.

“One of these days…” Cress mumbled to himself, tearing his gaze away to look out the window. A second later, he said, “What spell does that nine tailed fox have on you, Mor? What about him are you trying so hard to hide from us?”

“I wasn’t trying to hide anything from you. I was trying to hide you from him.” The humour left Mor’s face.

“Very well. Then what does he know about you that’s got him pulling your faestrings and has you bumbling around like a fool?” Cress’s turquoise gaze cut back to Mor.

“He knows everything about me, Cress. He knows my birthstory, my childling story, my Shadow Army story, and what I did to the army the day I left. He knows why I left. He knows how I fight and how I think.”

Cress tapped a finger on his knee. “I also know all of those things. Let me handle him for you.”

Mor shook his head. “It’s not just that I must do this myself, Cress, it’s that I want to do this myself. He is my greatest enemy, and I am his. This has always been between me and him, and I wish to defeat him fairly.”

“That sounds like a statement that’s about to get you killed,” Cress remarked.

Mor ran his fingers through his hair again. “I want to deal with my past and burn it with my own two hands. I wish I could forget it all, but I can’t. And I’ll never feel settled about it unless I end things.”

Cress nodded slowly. “I suppose I can allow that. But soon, I’ll have to get involved against your wishes, Mor. And when that moment comes, I will do whatever is necessary to keep you. I will even trade that human for you.” He nodded toward the stairs, and Mor’s eyes flashed at the words. “He seems to want something from her,” Cress added.

Mor shook his head. “Don’t.” A half growl, half plea. “Don’t do that. That is not a noble trade.”

Cress studied Mor. “Is that really why you don’t want me to? Because I couldn’t care less about being noble these days.”

“I would consider it a betrayal.” Mor clasped his hands together and squeezed them. “Because you know I want to keep her alive.”

Cress stared too long and hard until Mor dropped his gaze again.

After a moment, the Prince’s low voice filled the living space. “You know you have to send her away if you want her to live. Keeping her in such an easily penetrable place is like dangling hogmeat before a starving crossbeast. Send her to Shayne. He’s secretly worried about her survival, you know.”

“Why?” Mor sighed.

“Because Shayne knows you. He knows what it’ll do to you if you get a human killed.”

Cress had a look in his eye, one Mor had seen before. One that promised the moment Mor gave the go-ahead word to Cress, this war would look very different.

Mor dragged his blanket over and unrolled it. He kicked off his boots and laid back on the couch, draping the thin fabric over himself.

“You three better make sure you’re out of here early in the morning. I’m not sure how I’ll explain this absurd sleepover if Violet wakes up and catches us all,” he said to change the subject.

Cress smirked and unfolded his own blanket. “Tell her to mind her own human business. Tell her it’s brothers before lovers and all that.”

Mor rolled his head to glance at Cress. “I don’t think that’s how the human expression goes.”

“It is. Kate’s-brother-Greyson said it,” Cress said.

It took Mor a moment of thinking before he spoke again. “I think it’s bros before hoes. I heard Greyson say it also.”

Cress’s face scrunched. “Hoes? What are hoes?”

Mor shrugged. “It must be how human males refer to their women.”

Cress was quiet for a long while, nodding and thinking that over.