MasukFallonNaomi cups her knees while I pace to and from the window in our favorite sitting room, in my suite, which adjoins hers. The shared door is open, and beyond, a flurry of maids quickly unpack her suitcases and trunks. “Tell me again. In detail.”“There’s not much else to say. Mom got a summons from Uncle Sydney. We had to travel to Crescent Falls last night, and now we’re back, and Mom’s turning around again to go to Maatua with a highly specialized selection of our royal forces.”“Because KiloKilo is threatening to attack?” I spit, furious. “I told everyone this would happen.”“In her defense, you did say you’d go to KiloKilo and marry some rando you’ve never met.”“This would have happened, regardless.” I smooth my hands over the bodice of my cream-colored gown with butter yellow trim–one of my all-time favorites. “I told them. I was right. I knew KiloKilo was up to something. I could have been there by now, ensuring peace between our Kingdoms. This never needed to happen. I w
ZaynI hate to admit that Fallon won this time. It took approximately two minutes of threats while waving around my employee file for me to find myself on the edge of my unmade bed with Fallon standing between my knees, her dainty hand gripping my shoulder to keep me still. She danced around the fact that she knows I’m not originally from the Roguelands. She made it clear that she’s under the impression I want my background, whatever it is, kept secret, which is why my file is so thin, and several important chunks on most forms have been left blank on purpose. Her parents didn’t seem to care, but Fallon does. She made a single promise to never ask about my past as long as I’d allow her to fix me up. So I agreed, even if her touch feels like a cool kind of fire–something foreign–something that threatens to undo everything I’ve promised myself I wouldn’t ever consider having for myself. “Stop moving. I can see your skull,” she snaps, dabbing the wound with pure rubbing alcohol. I ca
FallonGrandma Kenna walks around Alyssa’s bed in the clinic at the base of the palace. Beyond a glimmering window on the far side of the room, Moonrise is cast in pearly shades of gold and blue, last night’s storm a distant memory. I haven’t slept, to say the least. Peeved and generally overstimulated, I paced my room until I ran tracks in the carpet and then burst into the hallway the second the sun rose to meet the team of warriors and healers I sent to the temple, and I’ve been here, in the clinic, ever since. It’s not even 9:00 in the morning yet, but I haven’t seen Zayn since last night, when he walked me briskly to my rooms and ordered the knight tasked with standing guard over me all night to not let me out of my rooms until he returned the next morning, which he… hasn’t done yet. Grandma fans her fingers down Alyssa’s chest with a sigh. “I don’t understand what I’m feeling. She’s fine. Perfectly healthy. But something is amiss. I can sense that, I just can’t find it.”“She
FallonZayn stills as the young priestess rushes down the steps, her fingers gripping a slightly damp apron that carries the scent of camphor and chamomile–healing herbs I’m familiar with from my education in matters of witchcraft and the like. She looks incredibly frazzled as she reaches his side, out of breath. She tugs his arm in an effort to hurry him back up the steps, leaving me behind. I stare after them. Somewhere in the distance, over the mountain peaks, thunder rumbles, promising another epic mid-summer storm. My skin prickles. Electricity spices the air, and I’m not sure if it's the weather driving the currents or something else–something slippery, slimy, and uneasy now curling in the pit of my belly. I climb out of the truck through his open door. The hem of my gown snags on the clutch and rips, but the sound is swallowed by another burst of thunder, closer than the last. I’m halfway out of the truck and fumbling with my gown when Zayn disappears through a doorway with t
ZaynBlake, Queen Maeve’s emissary and King of the Mystics, although he hates that title but hasn’t vocally admitted it yet, at least not to me, motions at me to follow him into a wide, spacious kitchen in his modern home on the outskirts of the city. I just arrived with precious cargo who could otherwise spirit from one side of our world to the other by simply snapping her fingers had she not gone against her parents’ commands, but I digress. She was, at least, quiet in the car, enraptured by a podcast about the sordid history of the ancient city of Rifthold, now a barren wasteland near the border of Tarsian and the Roguelands. I’ll remember that the next time she grows bored and starts using me as a paper airplane target again, which will likely be sometime tomorrow. “General,” Blake says in greeting, reaching into a smooth, pale wooden cabinet above a sink made entirely of copper. I know he designed this house from the bottom up. He talked about it often with Alex, the vampire w
FallonMaebelle Yarrows, the daughter of Alpha Yarrows of Diamond Ridge in Veiled Valley, stirs her bland, unsugared tea until it spills over the rim of the delicate, pale floral pink teacup I find myself slightly territorial over. It’s my favorite set, and her spoon clinking against the fine porcelain has my left eye twitching against my will, but I have a duty, and that duty is playing nice with fellow princesses, even if they’re grossly beneath my station and absolutely ridiculous, like Maebelle.She’s beautiful in a Veiled Valley sort of way–ethereally rustic. Her red hair is braided intricately through a tiara of gold and emerald that matches her gown and robe of green silk. She looks like a flower plucked from a mountain ridge.Her golden eyes are fixed to a shadow in the corner of the room, oblivious to everything else. A six-foot-six, two-hundred-and-fifty pound shadow that continues to haunt my every move, despite my gallant efforts to lead him astray.Maebelle blushes deeply
*Isla*The puddle of water sinking into my carpet is the least of my worries as Sydney is panicking. She grabs onto my arm and squeezes, her nails digging into my skin.“What? My water broke?” she shouts. “That means I’m having this baby right now?”“Well, soon,” I tell her, prying her fingernails out
*Maddox*Blood coats the floor in the entryway. I could see it before I even kicked in the door. My warriors, still in their human form, join me as I walk into the house.The body of a young maid, legs prone, arms over her face, is positioned off to the side of the door. This blood is hers. She has bi
*Isla*All the information that Mystica is giving me is too much for my mind to process all at once. I’m going to need a few moments to get it all into my brain. For now, I’m still stuck on trying to grasp the idea that I'm pregnant.I’m pregnant, and my child was not only exposed to the wolfsbane tha
*Isla*I’m underwater again.This time isn’t like the last time, though. I know immediately that things are different.This time, I’m more angry than I am afraid, but I don’t feel the same pressure that I did last time either. I feel like I am storming off, running away, riding my white horse off into







