A Court Of Shadow and Blood

☆ Hybern Spymaster ☆

Silence fell heavily, a shock running through the room. The only sound was Amren's quiet, rueful laughter. But his eyes were pinned on Eblis’s suddenly very pained violet eyes.

“How long have you known, Azriel?” she asked instead. The room fell away, and he didn’t quite care that his family watched him be picked apart.

He hardened himself, however. “When I found you this morning. I could smell myself in your scent.”

“So late,” she breathed, finally sitting forward as if she cared. “I knew from the moment you walked into the house; but I guess I was fresh from Hybern then. My senses were working in overdrive.”

He nearly choked on his own words, and he asked, almost in disbelief, “The moment I walked in?”

“The moment you walked in.” She braided her fingers together. “It scared me so bad I went and threw up because of what it meant for you to be my mate.” He remembered her returning, the scent of bile on her. He’d thought...no, he’d hardly thought of her at that time. He hadn’t cared that she’d thrown up. She bit the inside of her cheek—the movement so her it startled him for a moment. “It strengthened my resolve to destroy Prythian. I did not want you coming into my life and...changing everything.” 

It felt like a spear to his stomach. 

She sighed and turned to the rest of the room, who, each person slightly different, were still entirely too shocked to really say anything. “Next question?” she said, moving on too quickly for comfort. Later, the words implied. She wasn’t accepting their mating bond.

He scolded himself. He shouldn’t want her to.

“Who are you loyal to?” Rhysand asked, violet eyes sharp.

Eblis seemed to consider it. “I suppose my alliance is with myself.” A growl rent the room, and he only realized it was Cassian because of Eblis’s glance to him. Yet she said, “I am not allied with the Queen. But I am allied with Hybern. I want Princess Madalyn on the throne and the Queen dead. I realized too late that working with you rather than against you would work better in my favor. It’s one of the reasons I am sitting here.”

“What would defeating Prythian do to help you if that is what you wanted?” Nesta asked, frowning. Again; that glint of curiosity. She’d never actually grown close to the female and ever believed her to be a part of the court yet, so it seemed she wasn’t hit as hard as everyone else. Even Amren was relatively calm compared to the sharp eyes of everyone else.

He sighed, speaking before she could, “Less opposition.” Eblis nodded. “Two wars in a row from Hybern is too obvious to be a coincidence. The High Lords would deem the land unstable and want a person of their choice to rule over it instead of her princess.”

“And so, she tried to tear us apart.” Eblis flinched, turning to her brother.

“If you have a question, then ask it,” she said, rather coldly. 

Rhysand folded his arms in a whisper of clothes. “What happened? Five centuries ago.”

Five centuries was too long. I broke within fifty years and never looked back. 

Eblis sighed as if remembering her own words. “Long version or short version?”

Amren quirked a dark brow. “The believable one.”

“Long one it is.” She held her head in her hands, elbows resting on her knees. Her shoulders became tense. “Agh...so...I was...kidnapped. Everything that happened then was true. What I showed you, Rhysand, was not a lie. I endured—” she cut herself off with another groan. “I’m sorry, the army is being difficult.”