Seamus’s dark eyes shifted toward Ruhn once more. We can smell you on her, you know. Seamus’s teeth flashed. Tell me: Was it like fucking a Reaper?
A low growl slipped out of Ruhn, and Lidia turned at the sound. She showed no surprise. As if she’d been aware of their presence this whole time, and had been waiting for some sort of signal to interfere.
She looked coolly between his cousins. “Seamus. Duncan. I’ll thank you to stay out of my mind.”
Seamus bristled, pure Fae menace. “Did we talk to you, bitch?”
Ruhn clenched his jaw so hard it hurt, but Lidia lifted those golden eyes to the twin princes and said, “Shall I demonstrate how I make males like you talk to me?”
Duncan snarled. “You’re lucky our uncle gave the word to stand down. Or else we’d have already told the Asteri you’re here, Hind.”
“Good dogs,” Lidia said. “I’ll be sure to advise Morven to give you both a treat.”
Ruhn’s lips twitched upward. But—she’d told him to act like the prince he was. So he schooled his face into icy neutrality. A mask as hard as Lidia’s. “Tell Morven we’ll send word if we require his assistance,” he said to his cousins.
The dismissal found its mark better than any taunt. Duncan pushed off the bookshelf, hand curling at his side—shadows wrapping around his knuckles. Darker, wilder than Ruhn’s. As if they’d been captured from a storm-tossed night.
“You’re an embarrassment to our people,” Duncan said. “A disgrace.”
Seamus stalked over to his twin, his identical face displaying matching disdain. “Don’t waste your breath on him.”
Seamus said into Ruhn’s mind, You’ll get what’s coming to you.
Ruhn kept his face impassive—princely, some might say. “Good to see you both.”
Again, his failure to snap back at them only riled them further, and both of his cousins growled before turning as one and striding from the archives.
Only when they’d vanished through the massive doors did Ruhn say quietly to Lidia, “You all right?”
“Yes,” she said, her golden eyes meeting his. Ruhn’s breath caught in his throat. “They’re no different from any other brute I’ve encountered.” Like Pollux. She turned back to the catalog. “They’d get along with Sandriel’s triarii.”
“I’ll remind you that a good chunk of that triarii has since proved to be on our side,” Ruhn said. But he could think of nothing else to say, and silence once more fell—inside his head and in the archives—so he began to search again.
After several long minutes, it became unbearable. The silence. The tension. And simply to say something, to break that misery, he blurted, “Why fire?”
She slowly turned toward him. “What?”
“You always appeared as a ball of fire to me. Why?”
She angled her head, eyes gleaming faintly. “Stars and night were already taken.” She smirked, and something eased in his chest at this bit of normalcy. Of what it had been like when they were just Day and Night. Despite himself, he found himself smiling back.
But she studied him. “How …”
He met her wide, searching stare. “How what?”
“How did you wind up like this?” she asked, voice soft. “Your father is …”
“A psychotic dickbag.”
She laughed. “Yes. How did you escape his influence?”
“My friends,” he said, nodding toward the door they’d exited through. “Flynn and Dec kept me sane. Gave me perspective. Well, maybe not Flynn, but Dec did. Still does.”
“Ah.”
He allowed himself the luxury of taking in her face, her expression. Noted the kernel of worry there and asked, “How did it go with your sons before we left yesterday?” He’d heard she’d gone to say goodbye, but nothing about the encounter. And given how haunted her face had looked when they’d left the Depth Charger …
“Great.” The word was terse enough that he thought she wouldn’t go on, but then she amended, “Terrible.” A muscle ticked in her jaw. “I think Brann would want to get to know me, but Ace—Actaeon … He loathes me.”
“It’ll take time.”
She changed the subject. “Do you think your sister will actually find something of use against the Asteri?”
Given how many people over the centuries had probably looked for such a thing, Ruhn didn’t resent her question. “Knowing Bryce, she’s up to something. She always has a few cards up her sleeve. But …” He blew out a breath. “Now that she’s in the fucking Cave of Princes, part of me doesn’t want to know what those cards might entail.”