“Absolutely.” He presses a hand to his chest and bends at the waist.

“We’ll also come with you,” Tristan says to Bronte, and Willow nods.

“We should make it nice,” Willow says. “Find some decorations.”

“Willow, that’s not necessary,” I say.

She turns to me, eyebrow raised. “My little sister isn’t bonding to her mate in some dusty mountain cave without a little something to liven it up.”

She glares, daring me to argue. This emerging form of Willow is so different from the sister I knew.

I offer her a grateful smile as everyone goes silent, lost in their churning thoughts.

It feels like the end. Like we’ve been running towards this place for almost three hundred years when our grandparents made a mistake that has rippled across centuries.

“Then we have a plan,” Nadir says after another minute, returning to the business at hand.

“Not a very good one,” Mael drawls.

“No,” I say. “But when have we ever let that stop us?”

CHAPTER 54

The next day, Nadir flies me to the Keep, landing us on the balcony outside his father’s library. Mael and Amya have returned the more conventional way and are busy blocking off the King’s apartments from visitors under the guise of investigating his disappearance.

It’s not a complete lie. We are looking for him, but we have ulterior motives.

The door has already been unlocked before we enter the room and survey the disaster of our surroundings. It looks even worse than Mael and Amya described. Broken glass and furniture lie everywhere, and it smells like we’re in a distillery.

“What do you think happened?” I ask.

Nadir stands with his hands on his hips and shakes his head.

“I don’t know. My father has always been in control of his emotions.” He pauses and I see some long-buried memory pass over his expression. “Mostly, I guess. The only time I’ve ever seen him lose it was when he was drunk.”

He runs a hand down his face.

“If you’re feeling conflicted about going to hunt down your father to kill him, that would be understandable,” I say, and he looks at me as his shoulders slump.

Then he takes a few steps into the room, slowly surveying our surroundings. “It’s not that I feel conflicted, it’s just that . . . I’ve never really known a single thing about him.”

He spins around to face me, his arms spread out.

“What if there was a reason for all of it? I don’t want to make excuses—nothing can justify so many of the things he’s done—but what if, in his mind, he thought he was doing it for a reason? I’ve always assumed he just enjoys causing pain, but . . . all of this seems like a man who’s in pain.”