Page 49 of The Night Prince 6

Declan’s head lowered, but then he looked up at Aquilan through his lashes and those dark bangs, “Yes.” And then, so soft that he almost wasn’t sure he heard it, Declan amended, “One person ever.”

Aquilan’s heart hammered in his chest and a soaring sensation formed in his stomach. It was as if a thousand butterflies took flight at once inside of him. He found himself beaming wordlessly at everyone, even the scowling humans, who ended up blinking in confusion at his endless good mood.

Getting out of Hope was a far quicker endeavor than their earlier tour of the town. The streets were mostly empty, but the walls were filled with grim men and women with guns and binoculars. They scanned the darkness for dangers that their weapons could do nothing about. He sighed.

“I like Hope,” Declan said softly.

“Yes, I do as well! It is so… human and that is wonderful,” Aquilan admitted.

“But it cannot stay like this,” Declan continued.

Aquilan’s smile dimmed. “I realize that they seem quite on their own here with only some Protector patrols. But, in time, things will become much safer. You struck a massive blow to the Leviathan when you took out that nest in the Under Dark.”

Declan nodded grimly. “I just hope there are no negative consequences for it. My memory… in the song… the massive Leviathan that killed my… my mother…”

“Yes.” Aquilan stroked his arm tenderly. There were so many questions he had about those memories.

“I’m still not sure if she or I created that… that crater. But I’m definitely not certain that creature was destroyed,” he said grimly.

Thinking of the massive crater, he said, “One would be hard pressed to believe it could survive such an attack.”

Declan nodded. “But it came from nowhere. We would not have missed it coming towards us. My mother… no Kindreth would be so careless to let such a thing get that close.”

“Meaning that it has powers–”

“We don’t know about. Have you ever seen anything that large during the war?” Declan asked him.

“No, gods, no, nothing even close,” Aquilan admitted and that disturbed him, too. “We had little exposure to the Leviathans before this war. At least, the records that I found told me little.”

“You think there are others that would have told you more?” Declan asked.

He nodded. “We had a whole age where we lived side by side with the Kindreth. We called Illithor our home, too. Yet there is little to nothing about the Under Dark or the city in our official records.”

“I thought when Finley found very little about the Kindreth in the Athenaeum that it was because they were keeping that out of the hands of the common folk, but if you have nothing in the noble archives…” Declan shrugged. “But your parents worried about you finding out too much about Ailduin so perhaps those books are hidden elsewhere.”

“Perhaps,” he answered with a dissatisfied shake of his head. But then he refocused on Declan. “We have Vex here. What do we need for books? We can simply ask him.”

Declan lifted an eyebrow. “You think he will answer those questions with clear answers?”

“Ah… you have a point there.”

“We should want books to pressure check what my father says. He is a careful creature,” Declan answered, but there was not the cutting tone that he had used before when mentioning his father’s dislike of clear answers. “He knows whatever he says will be picked apart. Even if he only says what he means, a million other meanings could be attached to it. So he says… little.”

“Except for that song?” Aquilan pointed out.

“Yeah, Last Light,” Declan nodded. “It felt so fresh and raw. When he was singing about what happened to Lysanthir, I wanted to go after my grandfather, but then I realized that Vex would have already paid that evil back in spades.”

“His father was the first person he killed, remember?” Aquilan reminded Declan of what they had heard outside the Dawn.

“Yeah, you’re right. He said that.” Declan scrubbed a hand through his hair.

Aquilan stared at the moonlight reflected in those dark locks. Declan looked beautiful as always, but he had seen that starlight hair last night on the balcony. He wondered if he would only ever see it in private. That seemed so wrong.

He was tucking himself closer to Declan’s side when his eye caught something sparkling off in a copse of trees. In fact, the whole center of the copse looked to be dancing with hundreds of wisps.

“Do you see that, Declan? I wonder what is happening there!” Aquilan quickened his step. “We should check it out.”

Declan grunted his assent. Aquilan saw the Niri blade was in Declan’s hand. He lifted an eyebrow, but Declan just shrugged.