These Hollow Vows (These Hollow Vows 1)

She’s sacrificed so much for our court . . . perhaps even more so for me.

My shoulder throbs, and that useless broken thing in my chest makes me feel like I’m moments from caving in on myself. I finish the wine, but it does nothing to numb either pain.

“You are so close to finishing your tasks,” the king says. “Why do you look like you have a broken heart?”

I lift my chin. I’ve let him see too much. “The prince might not allow me back into the castle. I will do my best to retrieve the third relic, but—”

His grin stretches across his face, and his eyes sparkle. “You won’t need to return to the castle, my girl. The third relic I require is King Oberon’s crown. Without it, I can never heal the damage Queen Arya has done to my court.”

I nearly laugh. That’s what everyone wants—what everyone needs so desperately. How does he expect me to get it when even Finn—the Unseelie prince and rightful king—can’t find it. But I’ve lost so much at this point, I feel half crazed. “Okay. Tell me where the crown is, and I’ll go grab it straightaway.” Just end this. Just give me my sister back and send us home.

“This is one thing you won’t have to steal. You already have it. Where do you think your power comes from?”

Now I do laugh. I have the crown? How ridiculous. The laughter spills out of me. It comes and comes until I fold in half with it, imagining both Mordeus and Finn having it within their reach all this time. “If only Finn had known,” I say, still laughing.

“Oh, but he does. So does Prince Ronan. Why do you think they both care so much for your welfare? Why do you think they’re both working so hard to steal your heart?”

I lift my arms. “Okay. Where is it?” I’m so over this. My heart is breaking as I imagine Sebastian back at the Golden Palace with his dying mother—or perhaps she’s already dead. How quickly would stealing that book kill the queen? I’ve never killed someone. Am I a murderer now?

I don’t want to think about any of it anymore. I just want to be done.

The king’s eyes sparkle. “Where else would you carry a crown but on your head?”

I laugh harder, and it rolls out of me in a snort. “Well, in that case”—I mime taking the invisible crown from my head and handing it over—“here you go.”

“If only it were that simple.” He snaps his fingers, and my laughter clogs in my throat when the throne room goes dark. “Look at yourself in the Mirror of Discovery.”

“In the dark?” He doesn’t answer, but I oblige, retrieving the mirror and expecting to see a pitch-black room. But when I look at my dark reflection, chills race down my arms at what I see. There, on my head, is a string of starlight that weaves through my hair to form a glowing . . . a glowing crown.

Chapter Thirty-Two

THE CROWN SITS ATOP MY HEAD, twinkling in shades of purple and blue and everything in between.

I lift a shaking hand to touch the top of my head—to try to grasp the crown I see in the mirror—but I can’t. I watch my reflection as I try to push the crown from its spot, but it stays.

“It’s a magical crown,” King Mordeus says. “This kingdom is dying so long as it’s worn by a human. Only one with Unseelie blood can rule here.”

“I . . .” I stare, transfixed by what I see in the mirror. The crown isn’t just beautiful. It’s mesmerizing. “How?”

“My brother, Oberon, loved your mother.”

I nearly drop the mirror. “What?” It’s so dark I struggle to make out Mordeus’s expression, but this has to be some sort of joke. All of it.

Mordeus snaps his fingers, and the candles in the wall sconces flicker to life, leaving the room cast in long shadows and changing my reflection. I see no crown now. “He was once trapped in the mortal realm and fell in love with your mother,” he says. “But when he was finally able to return to Faerie, she refused to go with him. While he tried to reclaim his throne from me, she remained in the mortal realm, met your father, and fell in love. By the time Oberon had fortified the portals and could safely return to her, your mother was already married and had two little girls—you and your sister.”

Once upon a time the king of the shadow fae was trapped in the mortal world, and a woman fell deeply in love with him . . .

My mother wasn’t just telling us bedtime stories. She was telling us her story.

“Oberon gave her a wind chime,” Mordeus continues. “He told her that if she ever needed him, all she had to do was hang it in the midnight breeze and the music would call him to her. She never forgot Oberon, but she was happy with her life in the mortal realm, with her husband and her daughters. Then one night while you all slept, your house was consumed by a terrible fire.”