I snorted. “None taken.”
“But taking the Maiden’s head?” He blew out a low whistle. “She’s just a girl.”
Just a girl.
Poppy wasn’t just anything. “My father isn’t a cruel man,” I said as Delano came to me, a wet towel extended. “Thank you,” I murmured, taking it to clean my hand. The irony of me having done a similar thing earlier tonight was…well, it was something. “Years ago? Before everything? He wouldn’t have considered that.” Especially if he had spent any time with Poppy and saw that she hadn’t chosen this life. “But after what was done to me? To Malik? And all those who have been taken by the Blood Crown?” I rubbed at the blood on my hand. “He is capable of anything.”
Delano took his seat. “And what are you going to do with her, Cas?”
Tossing yet another stained towel into the fire, I laughed, and it sounded just like the spitting, hissing flames. “I don’t plan to do that.”
“No shit.” Elijah snorted. “I figured keeping her head on her shoulders fell under the whole no-one-touches-or-harms-her warning from earlier.” He smirked at Orion’s body. “But I suppose he was too busy collecting his thoughts to have heard that.”
“You knew he was here?” I stepped over Orion’s legs as I went to the credenza, feeling a sudden dull twinge of discomfort in the side of my stomach. It came and went fast.
“I knew he was here, but I didn’t know who he was. Only that he was Atlantian,” Elijah said. “You going to Berkton?”
Pulling the cork from the whiskey, I took a swig. The liquor was smooth. “I have to.” I took another drink and waited for that fleeting sensation to return. It didn’t. “What is the condition of the Berkton manor?”
“We keep it together and stocked with supplies,” Elijah said.
“Good.” They would have to make use of those supplies because I could not allow my father to come here. Not yet. “I’ll leave in the morning. Make it there by the afternoon and then come back.”
“You’ll have to ride fast to beat this storm. It looks like nothing right now, and there will be weaker bands, but once it gets going, it’ll be a big one,” Delano said, resting his elbows on his knees.
“Fucking wolven,” Elijah laughed, shaking the table. “They’re like your own little forecasters.”
Delano ignored that. “It’s blowing in from the east, so if you spend just an hour too long in Berkton, you’ll get stuck there or in between.”
“I won’t.”
“I’ll go with you,” Delano said.
“No. I want you here.” I put the cork back on the whiskey. “To guard her.”
“The message has been sent and received by those in Haven Keep,” Elijah assured, staring pointedly at the floor. “No one here would be foolish enough to cross you.”
“I’d rather not risk that.” I scratched my fingers through my hair. “By the way, her name is Penellaphe. It would be better to call her that instead of the Maiden.”
“Yeah.” Elijah nodded, chuckling softly. “It would be.” He pulled his boots off the table. “Magda said she was nice if a bit nervous.”
“She is—” I turned at the sound of pounding footsteps. “What the hell now?”
The door swung open, and Naill burst in. “We have a problem.”
I raised a brow at the crossbow he held. “What kind of problem?”
“The remaining guards are attempting to run off with your Maiden,” Naill answered, frowning at the body on the floor.
“What the fuck?” I spat, snapping into action. I stalked forward. “Where are they?”
“In the stables,” Naill answered, and Delano and Elijah rose, their long-legged gait keeping pace with mine as I entered the hall. “Cas, we have a bigger issue than just the guards trying to run off with her,” Naill added. “They saw Kieran.” Bright golden eyes met mine. “In his wolven form.”
“Fuck,” Delano rasped.
Ice drenched my veins. “How? How did that happen?”
“From what I could quickly gather from what I saw, Phillips tried to take her. She put up a fight, and Kieran intervened. He was wounded—he’s okay,” Naill quickly added.
That odd sensation earlier—
“But he shifted,” Naill continued. “He’s at the stables. They barred the door from the inside.”
They.
Poppy.
For a moment, I was frozen where I stood in the hall of the keep. I couldn’t move. Something akin to terror exploded in my gut. I could’ve told her. I should have told her. It would’ve prevented her from finding out this way, but it was too late. It was over. Everything with Poppy. The closeness. Her warmth. The ability to be in the now and not the past, not the future. The peace I’d found with her. I knew it immediately. It was over. I moved then, staggering back under the weight of the pain. It felt like a hand had gone through my chest and ripped my heart out. I looked down just as Orion had, but there was no gaping wound. Still, I felt pure agony.
“Kieran couldn’t control it if he was wounded,” Delano said, and I looked at him somewhat dumbly. He was eyeing my fists. Worry filled his tone. “It kicks in our instinct.”
I knew that.
“You didn’t tell her anything, did you?” Elijah asked.
Finally, I found my fucking voice. “No. I didn’t get…I didn’t get the chance.”
“Okay, then what’s the game plan?” Elijah’s eyes were narrowed, alert—watchful and knowing. “Do we let them make a run for it? Get them out there? We can have Kieran lay low for a while, play it off as if we had no idea what he was. That would give you time to deal with your—”
“No.” There was no point in doing that. It was over. “They will not take the Maiden. She stays here.”
I shut it down like I had under the willow—all of it. The pain. The guilt. The terror that she would forget that what we shared wasn’t a lie. That it was real. I had to pull it together. There would barely be time for any explanations, let alone a convoluted lie to temporarily soothe Poppy. I put all those emotions behind a wall so thick that I couldn’t even feel them. Ice filled my chest and gut, and I felt nothing when I took the crossbow from Naill’s hands. That wouldn’t last, but right now…
I was nothing.
“Delano, circle around the back of the stables.” I glanced at Naill. “Go with him.”
Both nodded.
“They won’t be able to get the horses through the back doors,” Elijah told me. “If they plan to make a run for it, they’ll need to be on horseback.”
“If any of them have truly discovered who we are, they’ll go on foot,” I said, then turned to Naill and Delano. “Take out the guards, but do not touch her.”
“Understood,” Delano answered.
Pivoting, I prowled out of the keep and onto the frozen ground. The snow had stopped. The night was quiet, except for the sound of wood cracking coming from the stables. My jaw locked.
“Hold on,” Elijah said.