The Hunter and the Mage (The Raven and the Dove #2) - Kaitlyn Davis Page 0,122

cheek.

"Xander hasn't done anything to her," Cassi murmured, all her focus on Luka. The sun did little to hide the wet sheen to her eyes. "I promise, the only thing he's done is try to help her."

"Where is she?"

"I don't know."

A long breath escaped the dove prince's lips as he tried to absorb the information. Then he nodded once, coming back to life. The frantic fear in his gaze cleared, replaced with awareness and the smallest shred of pain. He glanced down at her hands held against his chest and swallowed tightly before stepping back. Cassi pulled her arms away and let them fall to her sides as she bowed her head. Luka shifted toward Xander.

"My informants told me she was taken by your bastard brother. Is it true? They said he was an agent of Vesevios, and that if he has her, it means he took her beneath the mist."

At that, Cassi looked up.

Xander didn’t know what to say. The panic in her eyes was surely a mirror of his own. He knew the rumors would get out eventually, but he wasn't prepared to face the truth, not yet. They still didn’t have answers or a plan. And if the doves learned the truth, it was only a matter of time before Aethios's chosen took over the search. If they found Lyana, they'd never let her leave the crystal city again. His people would be left even more lost than before.

"I—" Xander started. "I—"

"He didn’t take her," Cassi cut in without hesitation, her tone final. Xander's stomach flipped and he sucked in a breath. Of course she'd betray his secrets. For Lyana. To see her safe. Of course she'd want the doves involved in the search. It didn’t matter to her if Lyana returned to the House of Whispers or the House of Peace—all that mattered to Cassi was that she returned. Or so he thought. "She left of her own accord."

"What?" Luka and Xander said the word in unison, one a stern snap and the other a whisper. Xander swallowed, hoping no one had heard. And no one had. Cassi's revelation had shocked them all numb.

She lied.

She lied…for me.

"She left?" The dove prince shook his head as though attempting to dislodge the thought. "She wouldn’t do that, to me, to you. She would never just leave."

"Wouldn’t she?"

"I don’t believe it."

"Luka," Cassi said apologetically, as though sorry for revealing the truth. "You know as well as I do that she never wanted this life. She's always seen her destiny as waiting just over the horizon, somewhere far, far away. I always thought I’d be the one to go with her. But she fell in love, and they ran away before I could stop her. I think maybe she knew that if she told me, I'd talk her out of it, the way I always did, but this time she didn’t want to see sense. She only wanted to be free."

"So she just…left?"

"I'm sorry," Cassi insisted, her tone soft with sympathy yet hard enough to deter questions. "I never wanted you to find out. We kept it a secret to try to save her honor, to save Xander's honor, and we said she was taken. We hoped we'd be able to find her and convince her to come home before the rest of the houses learned the truth."

"Then why did you go to the House of Wisdom?"

"Xander and I were studying their maps for places she and Rafe might've gone to hide. We were relaying the information to the ravens so they could send guards to search. But we couldn't find them."

"And what about the dragon?"

"A coincidence. Lyana and Rafe snuck away in the chaos, and we used the presence of the dragon to help push the story that it was Vesevios who had taken her instead of Lyana leaving by herself."

"But— But—"

Luka searched for an excuse, the muscles in his throat tensing with the effort of defending his sister. But Cassi's story was convincing, so convincing even Xander almost believed it—he would have, if he hadn’t been in the sacred nest to see that man with his own eyes. For every question, she had an answer. The lie had enough depth to come off as truth, filled with so many layers he had no idea how she'd come up with it so quickly. Not only that, but her voice, her expression, and her words all begged to be believed. Though he'd never known Cassi to be a liar, she