Fires of Ruin (War and Deceit #3) - Erin O'Kane Page 0,13

glance at me, Vaeril follows her, the entrance hall becoming suddenly empty.

Naril appears in front of us, his jaw tight as he looks from his twin to me. “Well, that was interesting.” There’s a pause when neither of us responds. Eldrin just stares at the floor, and I’m pretty sure I’m in a state of shock as I look around at the now empty hall with a frown. “I thought we weren’t going to tell the queen yet,” Naril continues, snapping his fingers in my face to bring my attention back to him.

Frowning, I reach up and bat his fingers away as my brain tries to comprehend what just happened. “She was berating Vaeril in front of everyone. I wanted to take the attention off of him,” I finally reply, glaring at him. I can’t help but wonder how much of the spectacle Naril saw. Obviously, it was enough to hear me tell her I was part elf, but Naril did nothing to stand up for his brother. How often does this kind of thing happen? At least Eldrin tried to help. “She’s cruel. I’d like to see her survive what Vaeril went through and come out even semi-whole,” I continue with venom in my tone. I reach up and rub at my chest, trying to ease the ache that has settled there.

“Keep your voice down,” Naril snaps, glancing around to check that no one is listening. “She’s the queen, she can do whatever she likes.” He speaks louder this time, as if to placate any listening ears.

Turning, I ignore him and look at his brother who is still staring down at the marble floor, his face twisted. “Eldrin, are you okay?” I place a gentle hand on his shoulder, but this is the wrong thing to do as he flinches away from me, his eyes wild.

Naril suddenly jumps in front of me, placing both hands on his twin’s shoulders. At first, I think it’s to comfort him, but as I see his arms straining, I realise it’s to hold him back. “Eldrin—brother! It’s okay.” His words are tight, as if he’s using all of his energy to keep the other elf in place. “We’re back at the palace. Vaeril is here. He’s safe.” The words seem to break through whatever dreamlike state he’s in, and he slumps against Naril, his breaths coming in fast, hard pants. It doesn’t last long, but for those tense couple of seconds, I’m terrified.

“I need to get out of here,” he mumbles into his brother’s shoulder.

Naril nods. “Let’s take her to the cliffs,” he suggests, patting his twin on the back a couple of times.

Nodding, Eldrin pulls away from his brother and straightens. His gaze instantly falls on me. I stayed completely still during his whole episode, not understanding what happened, but in my soul, I recognised his pain. Whatever he’s been through, it was awful and has damaged him in a way most will never experience.

“Let’s go,” Naril announces, seemingly oblivious to our silent acknowledgement of hurt as he starts striding away, expecting the two of us to trail after him. Eldrin blinks first and gestures for me to follow his brother. What just happened here?

Taking a deep breath, I turn and hurry after the elf, his long, fast strides meaning I have to almost jog to keep up. Eldrin is behind me, I can feel him, but I don’t look over my shoulder to check, I don’t need to. We’re all quiet as Naril leads the way. I should be taking in the beautiful architecture of the palace as we descend to the lower levels at the back end of the building, but I’m too caught up in my thoughts to truly admire it.

It’s cooler down here, and I can hear the rushing of the river beneath us, the steady rumble of hundreds of gallons of water as it travels to the ocean. I’m not sure how many different floors we pass, since the stairs are seemingly endless as we keep walking down, down, down. The architecture here, although obviously of high quality, is much simpler than the main castle.

“You need to learn to defend yourself.” Eldrin’s voice makes me jump, and I clutch my hand to my chest as my heart pounds from being startled. He sounds frustrated, like this is something that’s being playing on his mind for a while, and as I glance over my shoulder, I see he’s frowning at me. I’m surprised he cares about my safety,