Only the glowing patches from the human lamps on the road gave the night any life. Cress waited at the streetside until the silhouette of Mor’s curly hair appeared in the alley. Shayne’s crossbow was in his grip, but the assassins were otherwise unarmed. Though it was dark, Cress saw that they were dressed in decorative, human-like garments, and their silken fairy hair was smoothed back and not loose as it should be.
“Your Highness!” Dranian’s shadowy shape dipped into a bow, and Cress bristled at the formality. He opened his mouth to speak but Mor cut him off.
“Cress, where in the cursed human realm have you been?” Mor stepped into a patch of light. “We didn’t know if you were alive!”
“It’s complicated. I had to keep my distance. I’ve only come here now to warn you.” Cress hugged his damp arms to himself. Mor pulled off his fancy human jacket and handed it over, so Cress took it without objection and stuffed his arms inside.
“What’s the warning?” Shayne asked from where he and Dranian remained in the darkness.
Cress scuffed his wet hair as he sorted his words, but he was cut off by Mor’s deep voice again.
“Why haven’t you contacted us in a week? Why did you disappear after you were left in that alley to die?”
“Left to die? It was just a few broken bones, Mor. I melded them back together. What in the faeborn Corners did you think happened to me?”
“Kate said you were nearly dead,” Mor said, his brows pulling in.
“Kate…?” Cress said, articulating her name spoken so casually from his assassin’s mouth. He almost said several things in response. Almost, but he held up a hand instead. “That’s not important.” Cress took in a deep breath. “The Shadow Fairies are in the human realm.”
Silence filled all the cracks and spaces between the four assassins. Cress waited as the heaviness of the news settled in.
“You’re not just being funny, right Cress?” Shayne tugged on the drawstring of his crossbow and inched toward the puddle of light.
Cress made a face. “When have I ever done that?” he asked. “I sniffed fresh traces of them in the academy when we were there. Then I smelled them in the park and followed their trail. I saw them for the first time at another human library not far from here.”
“That doesn’t make any faeborn sense. How did they sneak past our Queene?” Mor asked.
Shayne scratched his head. “Do you suppose they came through the Seoul gate and took a human air vessel to get here?”
“No,” Cress said. “They came through our gate. The North gate.”
“How do you know that?” Shayne asked.
“Because Bonswick is with them.”
One of the assassins inhaled sharply—Cress did not see who. Shayne’s blue gaze darted to the rooftops, his fingers drifting back to his arrows to loosen one. Mor looked over his shoulder toward the dark alley they came from, then both ways down the street.
Dranian stepped into the light to meet Cress. His dark auburn brows were furrowed, his flesh appeared tight. “Do you think…” He swallowed. “Do you think they’re here for us?”
Cress shifted his feet. “Our Queene still can’t seem to decide if she wants me as her heir or if she’s jealous of my power and wants me dead. That wicked faeborn female.” He muttered the last part.
Mor had a strange look on his face. His gaze dropped to the sidewalk.
Shayne loaded his arrow and kept his shooting hand on the bow’s trigger. “Do we kill the Shadow Fairies, then? Do we try to negotiate? Do we…” He chewed on his lip. “Do we go back to the Queene and try to beg for forgiveness for whatever we did to bother her?”
“Absolutely not,” Cress said. “The Dark cannot be negotiated with, and we cannot go back to the High Court when we have yet to kill that human who’s enchanted me.”
“Go inside, you two,” Mor abruptly said to Shayne and Dranian. His silvery brown eyes hovered on Cress. “There’s something I need to speak to our Prince about.”
Shayne’s hands tightened around his bow. A beat of silence passed, but the two assassins dipped their heads and left. Their silent footsteps carried them back to the dimly lit café. Neither of them turned their heads or ears to the road to eavesdrop.
“What’s this about, Mor?” Cress asked when Shayne’s white hair disappeared inside.
Mor stared with hard, unblinking eyes. “That enchantment should have worn off a week ago.”
Cress’s mouth tipped down at the corners. “What are you implying?”
“You like her.”
“What—”
“Because she’s innocent,” Mor said. “And she’s kind when she doesn’t need to be. I think you realized a while ago that Kate Kole is everything the opposite of what you hate.”
Dead quiet stole the air, making it hard to breathe. Cress bit his lips and stepped toward his friend with a warning tone.
“And what do I hate, exactly?” he asked darkly. “Since you seem to know my thoughts so well.”
“Levress.”
Cress drew back. “Watch your tongue—”
“Haven,” Mor went on. “All the women of the faeborn court. I know that’s why you refused to form a bond with a mate all these years, Cress. I could see how much you hate them. And I know a mate would have just been one more female you had to try and keep from stabbing a dagger into your faeborn back.”
At first, Cress only glared. But then he released a strange, dull laugh. “Nonsense. I’m pleased to marry Haven.”
“Maybe. But you have a fairy crush on a human.”
Cress laughed louder this time. It was dreadful and tacky. “Please.” He waved a hand toward Mor. “How repulsive.”
“Yes, most would say so. But that’s not what I need to talk to you about.” Mor’s hard eyes drained to shimmering glass, and a moment later, he swallowed. “There’s something you don’t know, Cress,” he added. Mor’s lips rounded to form various words, but it took a few tries before he spoke. And when he did, the wind stopped rushing. “You attacked Levress. You tried to take her down,” he said.
It was so preposterous that Cress almost didn’t register the testimony. Mor could spit a decent jest at times, but the fairy’s tone was pure.
Cress’s face changed, draining of all laughter, and colour, and life. Suddenly, he was the one who couldn’t spit out words. All he managed to utter was, “When?”
“Six months ago.” Mor hugged his arms to himself and cast his brown-silver eyes back on the ground. “I stole your memories. It was me.”
All the air was sucked out from between them. It was as though the sky deities themselves had gasped and recoiled. It was as though the night heavens had fallen and crashed down and shattered to a thousand pieces upon the human road, marking the great distance between Cress and Mor.
“You?” The Prince’s voice cracked. It came out barely a whisper.
No. It could not be true. Mor was playing a game. Cress felt his stomach twist and his heart turn to stone. Mor’s face didn’t show signs of falsehood.
“Why?”
“Because you attacked Levress from the shadows. She doesn’t know it was you. No one does, except for me and Thessalie. Thessalie ordered me to never tell you,” Mor said. “We did it to save you from her. She’ll kill you and everyone you ever loved if she finds out you broke a fairy law, crossed into this realm, and tried to take her down in the one place it would hurt her the most.”
But Cress shook his head. “I’ve never been to this realm before.”
“You have. You tracked the Queene’s crossbeast to a secret room below that academy library. You fought it, and you killed it, and you nearly drained the Queene of her power. She was ill for two weeks,” Mor promised. “She’s never been the same since. She hunted for the killer; for you. I made sure she never found out who it was. The High Court demanded that everything about the case stay hidden as they performed their investigation to learn the identity of the traitor. That’s why no one ever spoke of it to you until now.”
Cress dragged a step back, feeling his stone heart sink deeper into his chest. “Why would I do such a thing?”
“Because Levress killed your birth mother.” The streetlights reflected a glint of moisture in Mor’s eyes. “I’m sorry, Cress.”
Cress staggered away, sure the heavens were falling again, and again, and again. That the ground had turned to an ocean, and he was sinking to the bottom of it.
All the days he’d spent pacing, wondering who was trying to trick him. Wondering who was trying to steal his life. All the suspicions he carried for months, never trusting anyone.
Except Mor. He’d trusted Mor.
“I’ve wanted to tell you since the day I did it.”
Cress’s fingers traced over his back pocket where he usually kept his fairsaber handle. He didn’t have it with him. “Levress must have found out,” he said from a dry throat. “That’s why the Dark army is here.”
“I don’t know for sure. Maybe the sky deities are looking on us with favour and the Dark simply came to dally around and mess with humans for a while.” Mor shrugged, but his shoulders dropped heavily. “But yes. Probably they are here for you.”
Cress’s turquoise eyes took on the cold and rage of the North Corner snow. “I’m not afraid of the Dark. Let them come for me.”
Mor raised a finger; his voice wavered. “What are you saying, Cress?”
“You know what I’m saying.” Wind ruffled through the streets, and the lamps flickered as a flush of power prowled along the air.
Mor blanched. “Cress—”
“I will get the Shadow Fairies out of the human realm before they come for the rest of you and punish you for my crimes,” the Prince said.
Mor’s curly hair bounced as he frantically shook his head. “No! You shouldn’t be alone right now! It’s far too dangerous—”
“Give me one day to think all this through. Alone,” Cress commanded, unable to look at his friend for the first time in over five faeborn years.
Mor looked like he wanted to object. But he nodded. “There’s another problem, Cress. I’m sure you’ve picked up on it,” he said.
“Go home now, Mor. I have things to do.”
Cress turned to leave, and Mor’s deep voice followed him. “Why in the faeborn Corners can that human feel your stare? I don’t know what’s going on in your faeborn heart, Cress, but if you’re not careful, this will end badly for her, too. You must see that.”
Cress kept walking. His fingers traced over his belt toward his back pocket where his fairsaber was missing.
“She’s the least of my problems now,” he called back. “Goodbye, Mor.”
Mor did not reply.
Though it was a simple farewell, the tone of Cress’s voice had said, “Stay away from me.”
