The Stolen Heir by Holly Black

I stand and take a step, so certain I am about to be caught that the anticipation makes me dizzy.

Two more steps, and the tree line is in sight.

That’s when I hear Oak’s voice behind me, thick with sleep. “Wren?”

I turn back, attempting not to panic, not to snarl and run. I can’t let him see how afraid I am that he’s caught me.

“You’re awake,” he says, sitting up.

“My mind keeps going around in loops,” I say, keeping my voice low. That much is certainly true.

He beckons to me. Reluctantly, I come over and sit beside him. Leaning forward, he pokes the fire with a stick.

I can’t help but see his face, soft from slumber, and remember what it was like to kiss him. When I recall the curve of Oak’s mouth, I must force myself to think of the way it looks pulled into a sneer.

I don’t want her. I remind myself of his words. And if there’s any part of him that does, it’s because I am, as Hyacinthe said, a coin to be spent.

I take a deep breath. “You’re not really going to send me away, are you?”

“I should,” he says. “This is a grievously foolhardy scheme.”

I wonder if he believes the thought of being parted from him is what kept me awake. “I knew that from the first.”

“I should never have gotten you into this,” he says, self-loathing in his voice. Perhaps he is slipping a little, tired as he is. He cannot like what he plans to do. He is not that much of a monster.

“I can stop Lady Nore,” I remind him.

He gives me a smile, a strange light in his eyes. “If we were capable of putting mistrust aside, we might be a formidable pair.”

“We might,” I say. “Were we sure of each other.”

His hand touches my back lightly, making me shiver. “Do you know what I admire about you?”

Truly, I cannot imagine what he will say next.

“That you never stopped being angry,” he tells me. “It can be brave to hate. Sometimes it’s like hope.”

I hadn’t felt brave in the Court of Teeth. Or hopeful. I had felt only a clawing desperation, as though I was forever drowning in some vast sea, gulping seawater as I sank, and then just when I felt I was going to let myself drop beneath the waves, something would make me kick one more time. Maybe that thing was hate. Hating requires going on, even when you can no longer believe in any better future. But I am shocked that Oak, of all people, would know that.

“You will make an interesting High King,” I tell him.

He looks alarmed. “I most definitely will not. The Folk adore Cardan, and they’re terrified of my sister, two excellent things. I hope they rule Elfhame for a thousand years and then pass it down to one of a dozen offspring. No need for me to be involved.”

“Honestly, you don’t want to be the High King?” I ask, puzzled. It was all Lord Jarel and Lady Nore wanted, the entire focus of their ambition, the reason for my creation. It seemed almost an insult for him to shrink from it as though it was equivalent to eating an apple with a worm inside.

Even if I happened to agree with him.

“Cardan was smart not to want it before I slammed that crown on his head,” Oak says, his mouth quirking at the memory, then flattening out again. “The desire to rule Elfhame ruined so many lives. Just being the heir is bad enough.”

“What do you mean?” Watching him in the firelight, the sleepmussed fall of gold curls against his cheeks and the curious intensity of his expression, I could almost believe he’s telling me this because he wishes to be my friend, rather than knowing that the appearance of vulnerability is likely to make me drop my guard.

He stretches a little, like a cat. “Some people would prefer to see me on the throne, either because they think I’d be easier to manipulate or because they’d do anything not to be ruled by a mortal. They make no secret that were I to say the right word, they would pour poison in my ear and down my family’s throats. Meanwhile, my sister Jude—I suspect she isn’t having children to make it clear I will be next in line. She says not, but she’s too good of a liar for me to know.”

I picture the High Queen as she was in that final battle, blood flecked across her face. Chopping off the head of the serpent who’d once been her beloved, even if it doomed her side to failure, all to save a land that despised her.

Now, that was hate that was somehow also hope.

He laughs, surprising me. “I am grim tonight, am I not? Let me show you a trick.”

I eye him suspiciously. But he only takes a quarter out of his pocket, then spins it on the edge of his finger.

I snort despite myself.

He tosses the coin up and catches it in the other hand, then opens both his palms. The coin is gone.

“Do you know where it is?” he asks.

“Magicked away into Faerieland?” I guess, but I am smiling.

With a grin, Oak reaches behind my ear, and I can feel the metal, warmed by his skin, against the side of my neck.

I am foolish for my delight, but I am delighted all the same.

“The Roach taught me that,” he says, tucking the coin away. “I’m still practicing.”

“I remember him,” I say. “From your Court of Shadows.”

Oak nods. “And before that, from the Court of Teeth. He wasn’t just held there by himself, either.”