Page 143 of Their Wicked Cage

I don’t look at her again as I flee from the room, with Achlys and Carver trailing close behind.

“I didn’t mean—” Carver starts.

“Be. Quiet,” I growl. “And follow me.”

We race down the corridor and up the stairs in the east wing, straight to Arkyn’s suite.

I bang on his door.

He yanks it open, trousers unlaced, chest bare.

“Sovereign Sisters,” he mutters. “I’ve got five more minutes.”

We push past him and enter the room.

“By all means,” he says, “come on in.”

I collapse into a cushioned seat by the unlit hearth. “The female in the dining room? She’s not my little witch.”

Arkyn blinks. “What are you talking about?”

“She looks like Gwyn, but she isn’t her.”

Carver’s gaze darkens. “If that’s not Gwyn, then where’s Avaline?”

I look at him and shake my head. “I don’t know.”

Arkyn folds himself into the chair beside me. “If you’re having second thoughts about marrying her, Riv, you can just say that. Because right now you sound insane.”

“I don’t care how I sound,” I grit out. “That’s not Gwyn.”

“I think what you’re experiencing is typically called cold feet.”

“I disagree,” says a voice from the doorway.

Lettie, wrapped in a silk sheet, steps into the room. Arkyn cuts her a look that very much says What the fuck, which she answers with a shrug.

“You truly didn’t think I’d stay hidden while you discussed my lady, did you?” She turns to me. “May I speak freely, Your Majesty?”

“You may.”

“I think your instincts are correct, King Riven. The female who came back from the gardens… She might wear Gwyn’s face, but that is not her.” She comes closer, sheet dragging behind her, and perches on the tufted arm of Arkyn’s chair. “Up until an hour ago, Gwyn never took issue with me helping her in the baths. Yet when I walked in to give her a fresh towel after she returned from the gardens, she became irate. Screaming at me. Forbidding me from attending her.”

“Could be nerves, Lettie,” Arkyn interjects.

“I thought so too, or discomfort due to her monthly bleed.”

The hairs on the back of my neck stand up straight as my stomach churns with dread.

After Death sent me back to walk among the living, I no longer had a monthly bleed.

Calmly, I ask, “Are you certain Gwyn is on her monthly bleed?”

“I found the bloodied underthings when I scooped up her dirty gown.”

“Lettie,” Carver cuts in. “Have you seen Avaline since they returned from the gardens?”

“She’s asleep in Gwyn’s suite,” she says. “Gwyn said the nymph felt ill, so she gave her a tonic.”