These Hollow Vows (These Hollow Vows 1)

“Then how?”

“You’re using yours.” Then he disappears, and the dream fades to nothing.

* * *

“The healer said she needs her sleep.”

Puzzle pieces swirl in my head, weaving and shifting. Answers just out of my grasp.

“Well certainly, but she can sleep after the coronation.”

“The prince will want her there.”

The prince. Sebastian. Sebastian’s sudden appearance in my life two years ago. He moved in next door and charmed me from his first smile. Seven years after my mother left. Almost to the day.

“These are the first days of these new times. If she’s to be his queen, she should be by his side.”

“She’s been through too much. I don’t think she’s ready to wake. The potion takes a toll.”

The potion. The potion Sebastian had with him. The one he somehow knew he’d need.

I feel something important there. Like a word on the tip of my tongue. But consciousness slips through my fingers alongside the answer that’s just beyond my grasp.

“She’s coming out of it. Just look at those eyes.”

“Princess Abriella?” There’s a gentle shake on my arm. “Princess, you need to wake up. We have to get you ready for the coronation.”

I drag my eyes open, sit up, and look around the room. I’m still in Sebastian’s chambers, but everything is just a little different. Brighter? More . . . defined?

“Oh, Prince Ronan will hate that he’s missing her first look at the world through her fae eyes.” Emmaline says, practically squealing. “Someone send for him.”

“You make a beautiful faerie, milady,” Tess says.

“As if you were born that way.”

Faerie. I’m a . . . faerie? It all comes back to me in a flash. Choosing the rune, saying the bonding vows with Sebastian, the ever-weakening pain of death . . . The Potion of Life.

“I’m so sorry to rush you, Your Highness, but if you’re going to make it to Prince Ronan’s coronation, we need to get you in the bath quickly now.”

Died. I died. But why? How did Sebastian know I’d have that reaction to the bond? He knew the bond would kill me. He knew he’d have to make me fae or lose me forever.

One of the servants takes my hand and leads me from the bed. I waver on legs that don’t feel like my own.

Another servant holds up a dress. “You will look beautiful standing by the new king’s side in this.”

I’m still woozy from sleep. From the potion. What they’re saying doesn’t make sense. “The new king?”

The ladies laugh. “Prince Ronan, your Sebastian, will take the throne today with our lady by his side. So many reasons to celebrate.”

I close my eyes to that blow. In my dream, Finn said the curse had been lifted. The queen has died and it’s my fault.

There’s too much to take in.

I open my eyes again and give a start. Emmaline and Tess aren’t the women I knew. They’re faeries, with pointed ears, glowing skin, green vines tattooed down their arms. “You aren’t human?”

“The prince had us glamoured,” Emmaline says. “To make you more comfortable.”

“But now we can be our true selves with you,” Tess says. “Why do you look so sad? You will make a wonderful queen.”

“Beautiful too,” Emmaline adds.

Why do I look so sad? Why do they sound so joyful? “Queen Arya,” I say, swallowing. “She passed while I slept?”

Emmaline’s eyes go wide, and she and Tess share a long look before she looks back to me. “No, no, milady. The queen is well. Prince Ronan will take the Throne of Shadows.”

I stumble backward until my legs hit the bed. I sink into the mattress, shaking my head. Oberon’s crown would have shifted to Sebastian when I died, but . . . “I don’t understand. I thought only a fae with royal Unseelie blood could take the Throne of Shadows.”

“Yes, milady,” Tess says. “And Sebastian is both Seelie and Unseelie royalty.”

Emmaline nods. “We were unable to speak of it until he wore his father’s crown and the curse was broken, but now we can celebrate who he is.”

“A joyous day,” Emmaline says, and all the other servants in the room chorus in agreement.

His father’s crown? Anger surges, even as I grapple with this information, trying to reorder the puzzle pieces, make sense of them. “I thought King Castan was the prince’s father.”

“King Castan, rest his soul, raised the boy,” a servant behind Tess says. She has horns, and her wide blue eyes glow like a summer sky. “But Prince Ronan is Oberon’s blood. Conceived in the mortal world during the eclipse, our prince brings day and night together. Light and dark. He is the new king who has been raised to unite our kingdoms.”

Sebastian is Unseelie.

He’s Unseelie, and he knew I’d die when I bonded with him. He knew I’d have no choice but to take the Potion of Life, even though I never wanted to be a faerie.