Page 59 of Broken Hearted
Adrien held the parchment, no thicker than a green bean and no longer than an inch. He squinted his eyes and frowned.
“There’s … a name on it.”
“A name?” I plucked it from his grasp and held the impossibly small lettering up to the lightest part of the cave and gasped.
“Lorelei Maebry, Princess of Spring,” I read out loud.
A vial. A note. For Lorelei? How? It didn’t make sense. But neither did the Wise Ones and all of their knowledge. Had they known about this? I wanted to rip open the small seal and read it right now but it wasn’t addressed to me.
“We have to get this to Zane,” I told him, in a daze, but when I looked over at Adrien, he was still staring down at the piece of the Shadow Heart in his hand, a confused look on his face.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Nothing, probably, but …” He shook his head and then glanced up at me. “It’s just that we always believed that the Shadow Heart is what powered our world. At least that’s what the old stories say. But now half of it is sitting in my hand, so how could that be true?”
“Maybe it’s what was inside that was the true source of power?” I offered, thinking about the mysterious vial. “Or perhaps the stories are wrong.”
I knew from experience how stories could be false. Look at all we’ve been told about the Ethereum lords. Most of that wasn’t true, yet we’d always accepted it as fact back in Faerie.
Adrien slipped his hand into mine. “I guess it doesn’t matter now. Let’s get out of here while we still can and we’ll see that my brother gets that.” He nodded down to the vial still held tightly in my hand.
Nodding, I handed the vial to Adrien who took it and the two halves of the Shadow Heart, and placed them into the satchel. Then we ran for the exit, my mind spinning the entire time.
Chapter Nineteen
After exiting the underwater cave, Marlin used his magic so we could breathe underwater again and we rode to the surface. There were a few dead sirens in the water but Kira and her people had handled it and all lived to tell the tale. Once we got to shore they had a small, weathered sailboat with Adrien’s surviving crew members already aboard waiting for us. We thanked them for their kindness and help before pointing the boat toward Soleum and leaving. Adrien assured me that since he had not checked in back home, there would be an entire second crew and ship coming to look for us as pirate encounters were so common. Sure enough, after just three hours one of his ships found us and took us on board.
“We foundBeatricetwenty leagues north and flying a pirate flag. Got her back for you, but she’ll need some work,” the captain of the new ship told Adrien as soon as we’d boarded.
Adrien nodded. “Glad to hear you got her back, Haron. Any other news I need to be aware of?”
The man glanced at me and then back to Adrien. “A rumor that might interest you perhaps … in private.”
Adrien frowned. “Then let’s step onto the captain’s deck and speak.”
The man started toward the back of the ship, and I prepared to wait for Adrien while he talked with his man when his hand slipped into mine, and he tugged me along with him. We were led onto the captain’s deck where the helmsman was steering the ship. The fae, Haron, dismissed him and then took hold of the wheel himself.
Once the helmsman left, we were alone.
Haron peered at me and swallowed hard. “My lord, are you sure you don’t want this conversation to be private?”
Adrien nodded. “I’m sure. You can say anything in front of her. What is it?”
Haron sighed. “One of your spies got word to me via raven that someone with ice magic, who looks very similar to Lady Isolde, was seen at the southern tip of the kingdom.”
It felt like lightning struck the top of my head as shock rushed through my body. Someone with ice magic that looked like me? That … that wasn’t possible. Right?
Adrien peered at me with confusion. “How many sisters did you say you had?”
My stomach sank. No. She wouldn’t. She couldn’t. Right?
“Seraphina,” I breathed. But how could she be here? I guess it might be possible. She was a Winter princess, and the portal was technically still open. I just hadn’t expected Seraphina to do something so rash and dangerous. Nor for my mother to allow her.
Queen Liliana. Of course. When I didn’t return right away she would have sent Seraphina, probably against my mother’s wishes.
I prayed that she wasn’t brainwashed by Queen Liliana’s lies and didn’t actually try to kill an Ethereum lord while she was here. She might only be seventeen years old, but she was very capable and well-trained in the art of fighting.
“I need to speak to this spy right away,” I said, my heart hammering in my chest.
