Nesta could have sworn the last words were spoken with a sharp look toward Cassian. But Cassian only winked at Rhys.
“What happened to the High King?” Feyre asked.
Rhys ran a hand over a page of the book. “Fionn was betrayed by his queen, who had been leader of her own territory, and by his dearest friend, who was his general. They killed him, taking some of his bloodline’s most powerful and precious weapons, and then out of the chaos that followed, the seven High Lords rose, and the courts have been in place ever since.”
Feyre asked, “Does Amren remember this?”
Rhys shook his head. “Only vaguely now. From what I’ve gleaned, she arrived during those years before Fionn and Gwydion rose, and went into the Prison during the Age of Legends—the time when this land was full of heroic figures who were keen to hunt down the last members of their former masters’ race. They feared Amren, believing her one of their enemies, and threw her into the Prison. When she emerged again, she’d missed Fionn’s fall and the loss of Gwydion, and found the High Lords ruling.”
Nesta considered all Lanthys had said. “And what is Narben?”
“Lanthys asked about it?”
“He said my sword isn’t Narben. He sounded surprised.”
Rhys studied her blade. “Narben is a death-sword. It’s lost, possibly destroyed, but stories say it can slay even monsters like Lanthys.”
“So can Nesta’s sword, apparently,” Feyre said, studying the blade as well.
“Beheading him with it killed him,” Rhys mused.
“A slice from it seemed to bind him into a physical form,” Nesta corrected. “Cassian’s dagger struck true only after Lanthys had been forced to give up his mist.”
“Interesting,” Rhys murmured.
Cassian said, “You still haven’t explained the Wild Hunt.”
Rhys turned a few pages in the book, to an illustration of a host of riders on horses and all manner of beasts. “The Daglan delighted in terrorizing the Fae and humans under their control. The Wild Hunt was a way to keep all of us in line. They’d gather a host of their fiercest, most merciless warriors and grant them free rein to kill as they pleased. The Daglan possessed mighty, monstrous beasts—hounds, they called them, though they didn’t look like the hounds we know—that they used to run prey to ground before they tortured and killed them. It’s a terrible history, and much of it might be elaborated myths.”
“The hounds looked like the beasts in the Hewn City,” Nesta said quietly.
They all looked at her.
She admitted, “Lanthys showed me a vision. Of … what he and I might be. Together. We ruled in a palace, king and queen with the Trove, and at our feet sat those hounds. They looked like the scaled beasts carved into the Hewn City’s pillars.”
Even Rhys had no answer to that.
Cassian’s jaw tightened. “So even while he tried to kill you, he was trying to seduce you?”
Nesta’s stomach churned, but she refrained from mentioning how graphic that vision had been. “There was a fourth object in the vision, but it was in shadow—was there ever a fourth part of the Trove? All I could make out was a bit of ancient bone.”
Rhys ran a hand through his dark hair. “As far as history has confirmed, there are only three objects in the Trove.”
Feyre asked, “What if it’s protected by a spell, like the one to shield all thought of the Trove, to keep people from ever knowing about the fourth object?”
Rhys’s eyes shadowed. “Then the Mother spare us, because even Amren only vaguely remembers a rumor of it.”
The words hung there. Nesta asked, “So. Now I go after the Crown.”
“No,” Cassian said, his pain-hazed eyes sharpening.
Feyre nodded in agreement. “Briallyn knows we have the other two items. She sent those soldiers to get the Harp.”
Cassian growled. “I thought Eris was being an asshole, but when I told him about the two dozen soldiers in Oorid, he said there had been more in the unit that disappeared.” He rubbed his jaw. “I should have listened. Should have looked into it. Briallyn had another dozen waiting to attack.” Self-loathing filled his face, and Nesta suppressed the urge to reach for his hand.
Feyre countered, “Eris spews enough bullshit on a good day that anyone might miss an offhanded comment like that, Cass. At least we can now tell Eris where the rest of his soldiers are.” Nesta could have hugged her sister for the relief that bowed Cassian’s shoulders upon hearing her words. For all his arrogance, the opinions of his friends, his family, mattered deeply. None of them would ever chide him for failure, but he’d punish himself for it.