Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 115347 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 461(@250wpm)___ 384(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 115347 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 461(@250wpm)___ 384(@300wpm)
“Oh. Wait. Your clothes. Amber mentioned you would need fresh duds.” Cookie tossed her a new garment—a silken blue robe Viori caught and donned hastily, shoving her arms through the proper holes. “Now that my corneas aren’t scorched from your hotness—serious props, girl—let’s get on with this, please. But why are you covered with blood?”
“Fix him,” she commanded, motioning to Micah. “Fix him right now or rue the day you were born!”
“Oh. That’s the big emergency, is it? Ha ha, very funny, Amber,” she called over her shoulder. “Like I’m really going to save my enemy. Especially when his wife is threatening my precious life.”
“He is your enemy no longer. Rather, he is your ally. He has agreed to accept your truce, with certain tweaks.” If he’d meant his words. And he had. Viori truly believed he had. Except, he didn’t know the full truth yet. He didn’t know the identity of her brother, that he’d really never stood a chance of winning her to his side and that a marriage to her meant forging a familial bond with a (once) hated foe. He might be a bit reluctant to trust Viori and her motives a third time. Might regret the accord and seek to nullify it.
No, no. Surely not. He’d jumped in front of Graves, saving their child. Theirs. He’d insisted. He would not turn away from his family.
Would he?
She needed to tell him everything, and she would. As soon as he healed. “Well?” she demanded. “Fix him.”
Cookie winced. “Sorry, baby doll, but that agreement is now off the table. Why would I agree to a compromise with a dying man? If I let him pass on to the other side, my problem kind of solves itself.”
“Save him,” Viori snarled. If she mentioned her connection to Kaysar, Cookie might be more amenable...or less so. “Refuse, and I will awaken every cell in your body to attack you from the inside—”
“Oh, my gosh, shut up already. Your voice is giving me a headache. And a stomachache!” The queen shut her eyes and rubbed her temples. “Fine!” Her eyelids popped open. “I’ll do it. But only because I’m so benevolent. Just give me a second to breathe, and I’ll make sure he lives or whatever.”
His next breath... Viori heard a death rattle. Desperation sharpened into despair. “Do it now. He might not have a second!”
“Girl, please. He has plenty of seconds. Amber assures me he’s going to be fine, so stop worrying already.”
“You will help him now or I will... I...”
“Okay, okay. I’ll get to work.” Her brother’s wife sighed and motored forward, only to stop when someone caught her wrist.
She followed a tanned arm to a stunning face that belonged to a female with a short cap of blond hair. Big curls framed delicate features. Big blue eyes. Heart-shaped red lips. She perched atop a small metal horse known as a...scooter, maybe.
“Let go, Pearl Jean. If this is a trap, I’ll kill everyone and that will be that. No harm, no foul—for me. But you know Amber also assured me this is necessary.”
That is Pearl Jean? The old crone? The hag of the highest order?
The blonde looked Viori over, challenge crackling in her eyes, and humphed, but she also released the queen. “If she makes one move in your direction, I’ll run her over with my scooter. See if I don’t.”
Forget the woman’s beauty. Her concern for Micah proved all-consuming. He must live. She couldn’t lose him. She wouldn’t.
Cookie huffed and approached them, utterly unafraid. “Here.” She extended her hand, revealing a dark, coin-size disk resting in her palm. “Feed him this and he’ll power up lickety-split.”
She accepted the disk, snatching it with lightning-fast speed before the other woman changed her mind. “What is this?” What if it hurt Micah? Would he be able to eat it?
“That,” Cookie said, “is elderseed.”
Her eyes widened. Elderseed? Truly? Well. Micah would be eating that disk if she had to shove it down his throat. Talk about a treasure beyond value. Produced by enchanted trees, far before Viori’s time. Used as the most potent of medicines, as well as a temporary supercharge of a fae’s glamara. But wars had been won and lost over the few shards of elderseed left, and several courts joined forces to eliminate the trees themselves. How had Cookie gotten this? And why part with it...unless she hid a stockpile?
“You should use only the barest sliver to heal him,” the queen explained, as if they discussed how to bake a common sweet bread. “Too much of a boost too fast and he’s likely to jump out of his skin. Besides, you can save the rest for his next catastrophic set of injuries or, I don’t know, start your garden or something. Enchanted trees grow under any conditions. Totally up to you. But one day, I’m told our kingdoms are gonna join forces to defeat a big bad unlike anything we’ve ever known.”