Starkeeper of the Fractured Crown

He released a breath of relief, placing a hand on his chest. “Oh good, because that would have been a bit unsettling.”

Taken aback by his reaction, I lowered my arrow aninch and studied him. His shoulders were down, his stance relaxed. If he was going to kill me, it didn’t look like he was going to do it now, which could either be really good or incredibly bad. “If you’re really a Fallen, where are your wings?” I finally asked, finding his eyes again.

He rolled his shoulders as if I had reminded him of the discomfort it was bringing him. “Trick likes to hide them when we do things like this. It makes us inconspicuous.”

Right, and wearing that scaled dragon armor was the epitome of blending in. I glanced to his shoulders and back. “Hide them?”

He nodded. “And it worked. You had no idea what I was. You would have thought I was human if I hadn’t worn this armor.”

He was wrong. He didn’t look anything like a human. He was beautiful in an almost godly kind of way. The humans could never achieve that.

I lowered my bow and arrow, my arms getting tired. “Your cut isn’t healing, why is that?”

His eyes hardened, his lips pulling down in a frown. “It’s something I hadn’t expected. My magic stopped working a few miles from here, which is why I’m walking through these woods. I’m somehow mortal.”

Mortal?

What could stop magic? I hadn’t read about something that could do anything like that. He could be lying, but…what if he wasn’t? Why would he need to lie about something like that?

Was my street still there?

I watched the blood drip down his face,his neck. He looked ragged, probably due to the venom now flooding his veins. He had no healing, no magic, supposedly. He was helpless in Terigard.

Was I truly considering taking my possible murderer back to the cottage?

I couldn’t very well just let him die. Not if I wanted to study him and know more about the Fallen.

Shit.

I lifted my chin. “Are you going to kill me?” A stupid question. He could lie. He could kill me as soon as he saw the cottage, but if I just turned and walked away, he could kill me then too. I could either take my chances with helping him, giving me more time to figure out what to do next, or I could walk away, taking a chance at being killed in a handful of minutes.

The former seemed the better option in this moment.

He shrugged, flicking some fur off his armor. “Wasn’t planning on it. Do you believe me?”

“No,” I answered flatly. How many had he killed?

He smiled. “Back to square one then.”

I narrowed my eyes at him and straightened. With a sigh I shoved my arrow away and slung my bow over my shoulders. “I know a place, let’s go.” With that, I turned away from him, heading back for my cottage, wondering what kind of insane person would do something like this.

He was most likely lying, but I wanted to take notes and I couldn’t let him just die out here. The risk was worth it, in my opinion. Besides, I’d rather die by his hands than his High King’s. I was sure his High King would take his time on me. This male might just make it swift.

“Cole Lorily, High General,” he introduced, following after me.

General. His steps should have been lighter. “When did the magic give out?” I questioned, readying my mind to remember any scrap of information he was willing to give me.

“About an hour’s walk from here,” he answered, joining my side. “The demons ambushed me as if they knew I was coming.”

Of course, they knew. These weretheirwoods. “It’s sad you’re not trained to fight without magic.” I’d have to visit the street again today or tomorrow, just to check. To make sure everything was fine. Maybe it was just a fluke. Maybe Cole Lorily just had incredibly weak magic and the venom of the verlacs was causing his brain to forget things.

“We are trained to fight without magic. You just caught me at the end of the fight. There had been about two and a half dozen of them when I got here. I was doing well, but I hadn’t expected them to spit venom at me.”

I kept my expression clear, kept my pace the same. He had slaughtered my verlacs. Killing that many of them would put a dent in their population. It was no wonder they wanted him dead.

It made me want to kill him.

We walked in silence for only a few seconds before Cole looked over. “You didn’t answer my question from earlier. Why do you care about them?”