“Oh, of course not, my dearest Ilara. I wouldn’t harm you in any physical way. However, I have been known to harm a lady’s reputation a time or two.” He gave a sultry smirk and waggled his eyebrows again.
I couldn’t help but laugh. “To their parents’ horror undoubtedly?”
“Absolute horror,” he replied with mock sternness. “A few even complained to my father about it.” He held out his hand to help me up.
I accepted it, and his warm palm closed around mine.
“And were you punished?” I tilted my head up to see him better. Like his brother, Nuwin also had a cleft in his chin, adding to his handsome appeal.
“Of course not.” He said it with such indignation that I laughed again.
“And what happened to those innocent ladies that you deflowered?” I batted my eyelashes playfully.
He chuckled, the sound entirely genuine, as he began guiding me back to my chambers. “Well, let’s see. There’s quite a few, so it might take some time to recall all of them, but the latest one—”
The door to my bedroom chamber suddenly banged open with such tremendous force that I yelped.
My feet stopped short when I beheld the crown prince seething at the threshold. His chest rose and fell quickly, his hair tousled and his expression thunderous. But the second he caught sight of my horrified expression, his face smoothed, and the pulsing aura rippling around him tempered.
“Ah, dear brother!” Nuwin called good-naturedly, as if not having a care in the world that the Death Master had appeared out of thin air and looked on the verge of enacting his terrible affinity. Not to mention, he’d been missing for weeks, and well . . . that had been quite the entrance.
“I wondered how long it would take for you to mistphase back as I’m guessing I triggered your perimeter enchantments.” Nuwin’s grin broadened. “Naughty indeed of me to thwart your attempts, I know, but it was quite rude to keep me from our guest.”
“How did you get in?” the prince asked through clenched teeth.
Nuwin’s cheeky expression grew. “That’s for me to know and you to wonder.”
The crown prince’s gaze flickered from his brother’s face to our joined hands. I hadn’t even realized that I still held onto Nuwin after he’d helped me to a stand in the garden, but when I tried to let him go, his grip tightened.
“I was just about to recount all of my court conquests to Ilara.” Nuwin tugged me closer to him. “Lady Seary has shown interest in hearing all of the tales.”
The prince’s lips thinned. “I’m sure the last thing she wants to hear about is the females you’ve bedded.”
Prince Norivun’s gaze flicked again to where his brother held my hand. His giant wings tightened into razors at his back as the talon tips glinted like obsidian claws.
“Oh, I don’t know about that.” Prince Nuwin stroked his chin with his free hand. “Some females quite enjoy hearing the details. It can get them quite arou—”
“That’s enough, Nuwin.” The prince strode toward us, his eyes narrowed. When he reached us, he looked his brother in the eye as his aura pulsed again. “Remove your hand from her.”
Prince Nuwin’s mouth formed a surprised “O” when he looked down. “Oh, I hadn’t even realized. I suppose she and I are naturally quite comfortable with each other. It must have slipped my mind.”
He finally let go, and I brought my hand back to my side while I wondered what in the realm was going on between the two brothers. It was obvious that an underlying game was being played, but why I’d been brought into the middle of it, I didn’t know.
“Have you returned to take me home, my prince?” I gazed up at the Bringer of Darkness.
My heart hammered when he looked down at me. I told myself it was because of his sudden return and because he had the power to decide my fate. It certainly wasn’t his scent that rolled toward me or the way his shoulder muscles flexed when he turned in his fitted tunic.
“No,” he replied stonily.
I scowled, drawing on all of the anxiety and anger that had been swirling inside me since the morning he’d left. “Still no explanation for why I’m being kept here either, I presume?”
He glanced over my shoulder, toward the garden. His eyes widened, and his mouth dropped open. “You did it.”
He strode toward the glass doors and was outside before I could reply.
Nuwin and I shared a confused look before following him.
Outside, a look of excitement lightened the crown prince’s face as he moved from plant to plant, stroking each leaf, and testing their strength and flexibility. I watched in absolute bewilderment as the strength of his aura rose until it was a crescendo of epic proportions.
Taking a step away from the seismic energy that surrounded the prince, I crossed my arms and was about to demand that he finally return me to Mervalee Territory, but he turned to confront me.
A look of complete satisfaction covered his face. So much so that my words caught in my throat. In the same breath, a wave of his magic washed over me, and his illusion cracked and broke all around me.
My hair cascaded around my shoulders in soft waves, curling lightly and returning to its true pitch-black color. I gasped at the sudden change just as Nuwin’s breath sucked in.
“She’s like Mother?” the youngest prince asked in shock.
The prince nodded, his smile still in place.
Nuwin glanced back at me, his eyes widening as he reached up to stroke a piece of my hair.
The prince growled, low and deep, and his brother’s hand instantly dropped before Nuwin grinned. “But she’s wingless.”
“She still holds the magic.”
“What magic?” I finally said, volleying between the two of them as I reeled from the feel of the prince’s magic touching me so intimately when his illusion affinity had peeled away.
“The magic to save our continent, Ilara Seary,” the prince replied. “You have the ability to create orem, which means that you can save us all.”
CHAPTER 15
“What?” There was no way I’d heard him right. The words he’d just uttered were pure lunacy.
“Your affinity is the ability to create orem,” the crown prince repeated.
I blinked. Then blinked again before I finally found my voice. “I don’t have magic or an affinity,” I said patiently, in a way I often spoke to children who struggled to understand a topic. “And I most certainly cannot conjure orem. I’m a defective.”
The prince’s gaze cascaded over my black hair, his icy-blue eyes sharpening at my condescending tone. “You’re not a defective. Your affinity bloomed late, but it’s manifesting.”
I frowned, my eyebrows knitting together so tightly they felt joined. “That’s not possible. I’m twenty-four winters, a true defective. My affinity should have bloomed ten winters ago like all Solis fae at maturing age.”
“No, Nori’s right.” Nuwin’s eyes gentled. “It can happen like how it has for you. It’s rare, but it can. Our mother, the queen, was similar. She bloomed late and has black hair, although she has wings.” He shrugged. “But no matter, you and she are the same. She also has extraordinary magic, although her magic is different from yours.”