The Traitor Queen

Chapter Eighteen

Despite being left to rest, I couldn't force my eyes to close. I could only keep my focus trained on the entrance to the secret passage that lay directly in front of my bed. Though nobody else had used it and I doubted they would again for a long while.

Not too long after the two males had gone to the council room, Auron had returned to keep me company. He told me about how stressed and panicked Trik was at the fact that we both hadn't returned home last night after what had happened at the ball. The blacksmith hadn't even been allowed in to see either of us. Thankfully, Auron had been allowed to leave more or less as soon as he had woken up, putting our father out of his misery and suffering.

We continued to talk of simple things like we used to do before the threat of war loomed over us. The orders that were piling up on the front desk of the blacksmiths, plans for when we would next visit The Lost and Found — simple topics that I didn't realise I had missed dearly.

Auron stayed as long as he could, but he was forced to leave when the High Fae Queen entered with the task of healing me. She didn't appear as if she wanted to be sat in a room with me nor did she even speak to me much, only barking commands as to how I should position myself. There was no thank you for taking the arrow for her, as if she merely expected lives would be sacrificed for her safety.

It made me angry enough that I had to keep myself from talking too, otherwise, I might have bitten her head off. Figuratively and literally.

I would have to ask Kayne to get the information out of her about what she did to Icrodeia. It didn't feel like the right moment to press her for answers while she was healing my wound anyways.

As my mind drifted to the prince, my mind snapped to a realisation. If the queen was here with me and Kayne had gone to speak to his mother, where was he now? What had they spoken of? Had something happened? Perhaps that was why the queen didn't look amused in the slightest.

Once the High Fae Queen had left the room, my wound nearly fully healed, I felt well enough to be able to stand on my own. My head was still heavy, causing my vision to spin, but I made my way to the wall where Mace had appeared and vanished from.

I searched for any sign of an entrance, a hairline in the wallpaper that indicated there was something behind it, but there was nothing. Even as I rummaged around the items on the tables or removed the painting beside it, there was nothing to open the passage with. How did you get in and out? There had to be some way.

After concluding that I wouldn't be able to find a solution at that current moment in time, I decided to make my way back to the blacksmiths to write a note to Mace. It was a place where I knew there would be no prying eyes, no secret halls where anyone could barge in on me at any moment. I didn't have time to waste, especially if I needed to find a way to hang the note in a tree.

When I returned home, I found the blacksmith's empty aside from the door to Auron's workroom closed. Either Trik or Auron had to be in there, and I couldn't let either of them find out what I was doing. From what Mace had pulled at the ball, I didn't know if they'd be hurt if I dragged them into something that was clearly only intended for me.