House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City #1) by Sarah J. Maas

Bryce ran a finger over a line of text. It was the tenth time she’d attempted to read it in the twenty minutes since the messenger had left, dropping off a vial of the antidote from the medwitch who’d taken the kristallos venom from her leg. Apparently, she’d found the way to make the antidote work without her being present. But Bryce didn’t marvel. Not when the vial was just a silent reminder of what she and Hunt had shared that day.

She’d debated throwing it out, but had opted to lock the antidote in the safe in Jesiba’s office, right next to that six-inch golden bullet for the Godslayer Rifle. Life and death, salvation and destruction, now entombed there together.

“Violet Kappel said on the morning news that there might be more would-be rebels—”

“Turn off that screen, Lehabah, before I throw it in the fucking tank.”

Her sharp words cut through the library. The rustling creatures in their cages stilled. Even Syrinx stirred from his nap.

Lehabah dimmed to a faint pink. “Are you sure there’s nothing we can—”

Bryce slammed the book shut and hauled it with her, aiming for the stairs.

She didn’t hear Lehabah’s next words over the front door’s buzzer. Work had proved busier than usual, a grand total of six shoppers wasting her time asking about shit they had no interest in buying. If she had to deal with one more idiot today—

She glanced at the monitors. And froze.

The Autumn King surveyed the gallery, the showroom stocked with priceless artifacts, the door that led up to Jesiba’s office and the window in it that overlooked the floor. He stared at the window for long enough that Bryce wondered if he could somehow see through the one-way glass, all the way to the Godslayer Rifle mounted on the wall behind Jesiba’s desk. Sense its deadly presence, and that of the golden bullet in the wall safe beside it. But his eyes drifted on, to the iron door sealed to her right, and finally, finally to Bryce herself.

He’d never come to see her. In all these years, he’d never come. Why bother?

“There are cameras everywhere,” she said, staying seated behind her desk, hating every whiff of his ashes-and-nutmeg scent that dragged her back twelve years, to the weeping thirteen-year-old she’d been the last time she’d spoken to him. “In case you’re thinking of stealing something.”

He ignored the taunt and slid his hands into the pockets of his black jeans, still conducting his silent survey of the gallery. He was gorgeous, her father. Tall, muscled, with an impossibly beautiful face beneath that long red hair, the exact same shade and silken texture as her own. He looked just a few years older than her, too—dressed like a young man, with those black jeans and a matching long-sleeved T-shirt. But his amber eyes were ancient and cruel as he said at last, “My son told me what occurred on the river on Wednesday night.”

How he managed to make that slight emphasis on my son into an insult was beyond her.

“Ruhn is a good dog.”

“Prince Ruhn deemed it necessary that I know, since you might be … in peril.”

“And yet you waited three days? Were you hoping I’d be crucified, too?”

Her father’s eyes flashed. “I have come to tell you that your security has been assured, and that the Governor knows you were innocent in the matter and will not dare to harm you. Even to punish Hunt Athalar.”

She snorted. Her father stilled. “You are incredibly foolish if you think that would not be enough to break Athalar at last.”

Ruhn must have told him about that, too. The disaster that had been this thing between her and Hunt. Whatever it had been. Whatever using her like that could be called.

“I don’t want to talk about this.” Not with him, not with anyone. Fury had disappeared again, and while Juniper had messaged, Bryce kept the conversation brief. Then the calls from her mother and Randall had started. And the big lies had begun.

She didn’t know why she’d lied about Hunt’s involvement. Maybe because explaining her own idiocy in letting Hunt in—being so fucking blind to the fact that he’d led her around when everyone had warned her, that he’d even told her he would love Shahar until the day he died—was too much. It gutted her to know he’d chosen the Archangel and their rebellion over her, over them … She couldn’t talk to her mom about it. Not without completely losing what was left of her ability to function.

So Bryce had gone back to work, because what else was there to do? She’d heard nothing from the places where she’d applied for new jobs.

“I’m not talking about this,” she repeated.

“You will talk about this. With your king.” A crackling ember of his power set the firstlights guttering.

“You are not my king.”

“Legally, I am,” her father said. “You are listed as a half-Fae citizen. That places you under my jurisdiction both in this city and as a member of the House of Sky and Breath.”

She clicked her nails together. “So what is it you want to talk about, Your Majesty?”

“Have you stopped looking for the Horn?”

She blinked. “Does it matter now?”

“It is a deadly artifact. Just because you learned the truth regarding Danika and Athalar doesn’t mean whoever wishes to use it is done.”

“Didn’t Ruhn tell you? Danika stole the Horn on a lark. Ditched it somewhere in one of her flying-high-as-a-fucking-kite moments. It was a dead end.” At her father’s frown, she explained, “The kristallos were all accidentally summoned by Danika and the others who took synth, thanks to the black salt in it. We were wrong in even looking for the Horn. There was no one pursuing it.”