“Will die,” Everest said, his voice flat.

Everyone whimpered and groaned.

Everest’s face fell. “I am sorry. I did not want to rob you of your hope⁠—-”

“No. I would rather know right now. I’m not going to sit by her bed—-” Jackson’s voice broke as his breath hitched. Tenn and Tim held him tight. “I’m not going to sit by her bed waiting on bated breath for her to wake up at any moment if you’re telling me she’s not going to wake up.”

Everest’s eyes were sad. “She will not wake until we perform the spell that is inside this tome.”

Jackson’s legs gave out, but Tim and Tenn gently sat him on the couch, then sat beside him. He took a shaky breath. “Thank you for your honesty,” he whispered.

Tegan shouted a violent curse and tugged on her mostly purple hair. “Okay, okay, fuck. Absolutely not. I am not losing—-we are not losing any of them. So, let’s all focus, push aside all of anything else and figure out how to remove the magical barrier on this.”

Everest tapped his fingers on the armrest. “They are on the move, moving to destroy all we’ll need to remove this. The Prince knows more than we do, so we must act quick.”

Tenn frowned. “Prince?”

Memories of him replayed in my mind. “You warned me to stay away from him.”

Everest’s eyes took a sharp, murderous turn. “The Unseelie Princess, daughter to the King, had two children. The younger one is Sweyn, fathered by a Nephilim, but the elder was fathered by a high-ranking Unseelie knight. That’s the Prince. He is Sweyn’s older, crueler sibling. And no, I do not know his name.”

Bentley looked up with wide eyes. “So that’s true, then?”

Everest nodded. “Yes. Knowing an Unseelie’s name allows you some power over them. Especially the royals, which is why no one has heard their names. Thorne and Sage don’t even know the son’s name and he’s older than me.”

Tegan ran her fingers over the Book of Shadows. “Should we fear the King’s arrival?”

“No. He is ancient. He was already ancient before Atzaran was born.”

Warner whistled.

“The Unseelie King is a siphon. He consumes from other life forms and takes their power for his own. He is able to spread this gift to whomever he chooses—-thus the creation of vampires, and much more recently, Joseph. This is why the civil war began in the first place. That was how he became King of Seelie in the first place. It wasn’t until Atzaran came along with his rebellion that he was dethroned and their kind banished from Seelie forever.”