Total pages in book: 141
Estimated words: 132138 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 661(@200wpm)___ 529(@250wpm)___ 440(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 132138 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 661(@200wpm)___ 529(@250wpm)___ 440(@300wpm)
But I’ve never forgotten my Dark Ones.
I hide along with my guardian, but a war is raging across two lands. Lives are being lost. I want to fight but everyone around me tries to hold me down. They want me to lay low and keep quiet because they see me as a figurehead, but I know I can be more.
And then my Dark Ones find me. Lach and Shim McIver are the future kings of the Unseelie Fae. They believe that I am the bondmate that will connect the halves of their shared soul. They want to take me back to their kingdom and keep me safe.
But my brothers, the true Seelie kings, are taking back their throne, and I plan to be by their side when they do
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
Prologue
Bronwyn
The Seelie Plane
Thirteen years before
I look down at the hole in MY stomach and wonder how long it will take to die. I stumble into my mother’s room, pushing back the ornate double doors. I hold my hand to my gut, trying desperately to stem the tide. Smoke and tears seem to be all I can see now, obliterating the familiarity of my home. I grew up in the White Palace, the marbled floors always beneath my feet. My father’s room was off-limits to all but Beck, but my mother’s room was a sanctuary.
It is why I ran here when the world exploded around me.
But Mother is nowhere to be found.
My hands shake. I am losing control.
Of course you are, Bron. You took a knife to the gut. Not much coming back from that.
My uncle’s men. Torin turned on us all. I make it to my mother’s big bed, pushing past the filmy curtains and collapsing on the mattress. As a child, I pulled them closed and pretended I was in a whole other world. A world where the friends from my dreams were real. Tears blur my eyes. My Dark Ones. They were with me for as long as I can remember, but I stopped speaking of them years ago. My father called me crazy when I told him of their nightly visitations. My mother called in healers. Only Cian listened without prejudice. Beck couldn’t listen. He didn’t have time, and he was almost never allowed out of our father’s sight. Still, he would catch my eyes and wink or ruffle my hair as he walked past. He is going to be a king.
I cry out. Is Beckett even alive? Has Torin killed all of my family?
When I die, will I see them? My Dark Ones?
“You ain’t dead yet, girl.” A menacing voice pulls me from my misery.
I look up and see the soldier who attacked me. He’s dressed in my uncle’s colors, black and gold, with the Finn family crest upon his breast. My crest. My kingdom. But it doesn’t matter. It’s Uncle Torin’s world now.
I try to move, to force myself to run. There’s a nasty gleam in the soldier’s eye telling me he’s happy I’m not dead yet. He wants to play. I shake my head, horror suffusing me. I’m dying and yet, in the moment, the thought of his bloodied hands on my body is more repugnant than death itself.
But I have no choice. None. So much of my life has been thus. Do your hair just so, Bronwyn. Stand up straight. A princess shouldn’t be friends with her servants. Don’t speak so freely to the brownies. Put that book down. A princess doesn’t need to know such things.
A princess didn’t need to know how to protect herself. A princess didn’t need to understand politics.
A princess dies as easily as her sweet brownie friend did.
His hand snakes out, grabbing my ankle and pulling me down the bed. I can see I soaked my mother’s pristine white sheets with bright red blood. My blood.
My mother gave birth to me in this bed. I will die here.
“Don’t,” I beg. I want to close my eyes. Goddess, I want to see them one last time. I’m shocked to find that in my last moments, all I want to do is sleep and be with them again. My Dark Ones. My friends. The shadow men who hold my heart. I want their arms around me, their voices whispering. The dreams changed recently, becoming more physical. I kissed them the night before, a soft touch of the lips, moving from one to the other because I can’t favor either. I love them both.
No more phantom kisses. Only pain and humiliation and death.
I try to kick out, but I’m weak, so weak. My legs won’t move. It doesn’t matter. The soldier can move them. He spreads them wide, shoving my skirt up. Stupid skirt. I tripped over it. It’s how he caught me in the first place, but a princess doesn’t wear anything practical.