My cheeks turned hot. How could he know so much more about my mother than I did?
He scrubbed at his jaw, his calm beginning to fracture. “I thought she would at least… when you said you were taking over for her, I thought…” He raked a hand through his hair, several black strands falling loose from where he’d tied it back.
“Luther,” I snapped, once again on my feet. “Tell me where she is.”
He began to pace, hands clasped tight at his back. Every time I tried to block his path, he simply changed course. He wouldn’t even look me in the eye.
“I thought there was at least something I could tell you without breaking my promise,” he mumbled. “Fuck, you’re going to hate me for this, but I can’t.”
The numbness gave way to panic as I felt the answers I so deeply longed for slipping out of my grasp. “But—but you said—you swore!”
“I said I would tell you what I was at liberty to share. I didn’t realize…” He looked genuinely pained. “There’s too much you don’t know. Anything I say would betray her.”
Last night’s despair roared back to life, opening a pit at my feet and dragging me toward its edge. I shot forward and threw myself at Luther. I clutched at his chest, his muscles hard as granite beneath my frantic grip. He was my only tether to my mother, and I clung to him like a lifeline in stormy seas.
“Please, Luther. She’s my mother. I need her.”
Something in both of us broke.
I felt it viscerally. On Luther’s face, I saw a darkness so profound, my heart squeezed at the sight. Something in my words had awoken a buried trauma that haunted him as profoundly as my mother’s loss haunted me.
His heart hammered beneath my trembling palm. He spoke haltingly, like each word was a battle he had to fight and win, one at a time.
“There was no bargain. Auralie wanted your brother in a Descended school, and I agreed, because—” His shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. There was never a payment. The agreement was a pretense so no one would ask questions. The King didn’t even know about it. Only me. Then…”
He hesitated, and I held my breath. I didn’t dare move for fear that he would change his mind.
“I caught your mother spying. She was collecting information from the palace. I discovered it and confronted her.”
“The argument,” I gasped. “When I saw you—”
“No. This was earlier, months before. I was furious with her. I wanted to ban her from the palace, but she and I had—” He looked down, his throat working. “—a mutual goal I couldn’t ignore. So I let her stay, and I helped her.”
My mother was spying on the King.
And Luther had helped her. He could have had her killed for treason—but he’d helped her.
His hands curled gently behind my arms, our bodies woven together in a strange, intimate embrace. He held me in place as firmly as I clung to him, each of us silently begging the other not to run away.
“The day you saw us arguing, she asked for my help. She wanted to visit a place where mortals are forbidden, and she knew I could get her there.”
“Where?”
The light guttered in his eyes. “I cannot tell you. I’m sorry. That’s a line I will not cross.”
“No!” My fingers bunched in the folds of his shirt. After all this time, I was so close to finding her. I would beg, if I had to. I would cry or humiliate myself, I would throw myself at his feet. For this, I was above nothing. “I’m your Queen. Shouldn’t your loyalty be to me?”
“It is to you. More than you know.” His piercing stare burned with a fierce insistence. “I will accept whatever punishment you give. Lash me. Throw me in the dungeon. Banish me from the family. Exile me, if you must. But I made a promise.” His face lowered almost imperceptibly to mine. “And I keep my promises, my Queen. Whatever the cost.”
The Diem of yesterday would have annihilated him. With words or blades or magic, or maybe all three. I would have screamed and sworn to make him pay.
But the Diem of yesterday had asked Luther to make a promise, too—a promise that guarded everything I held dear. Luther’s word was the only guarantee I had that, even if this damn Crown got me killed, the people I loved would be safe.
And as hard as I tried to summon the rage I had grown so accustomed to, I couldn’t do it. I could not hate Luther for keeping his promises. Not anymore.
“There’s nothing I can do to convince you to tell me where she is?”
His head gave the slightest shake. “I’m sorry.”
His grip resisted as I pulled away, though he let me go. I turned my back to him and walked to the table where the breakfast spread lay forgotten.
“Go. Leave me be.”
A long moment passed with no words and no movement from either of us. Finally, his footsteps crossed the room to the exit and paused, followed by the sound of a door cracking open.
“I will not break my promise, but I can give you this,” he said. “If she isn’t back by year end, I’ll go get her and bring her to you myself. You have my word.”
My heart leapt. The end of the year was two months away. If I could survive the Challenging and make it through the coronation…
I whirled around to respond, but Luther was already gone.
Chapter
Ten
Eleanor and I spent the morning plotting a plan of attack for the Ascension Ball. More accurately, I sat in a stupor, mentally processing my conversation with Luther, while Eleanor kindly pretended not to notice as she deliberated over the most strategic combination of dresses, jewelry, and hair.
I didn’t tell her about Henri or Aemonn, the latter because I was embarrassed, and the former because I had no answers for the questions I knew she would ask.
The need to tell Henri—and my father—about the Crown was growing heavier by the second. The last thing I wanted was for either of them to find out through idle gossip, but no amount of standing in front of the mirror and wishing it away had made the Crown so much as flicker, and I couldn’t very well walk into Mortal City with the Crown on my head and a pack of Royal Guards at my hip.
I had to find a solution… and soon.
Eleanor and I had moved to our favorite spot on the back terrace of the gardens, basking in the afternoon sun. After confiding that she’d always wanted to be an artist, I’d coaxed her into showing me her work. Her drawings were impressively realistic, so vivid they seemed to move across the page.
Having then begged her to sketch me a portrait of Sorae, the one thing about the Crown I was unequivocally grateful for, we’d lured the gryvern to the terrace with a barrel of waxy green apples that I was now waving enticingly to hold her attention.
“Tell me about your cousins,” I said.
Eleanor squinted, studying Sorae’s features. “Which cousins? I’ve got hundreds.”
“Just the important ones.”
“Who do you consider important?”
“I’m more interested in who you consider important.”
I jerked away from Sorae’s snout as she nipped at the apple in my hand. She huffed and whipped her tail in frustration. Despite her menacing appearance, the beastly tantrum was so endearing I gave in and tossed her the fruit.