“Why would you even bother? What good is being a consort anyway? You would lose any power you had as soon as you killed her.”
“Unless we had a daughter together,” he says evenly, studying me closely as he says it. “A new heir—one who didn’t irritate her quite as much as her first.”
I laugh, smiling despite myself. “That was your plan? To dethrone me? Did it ever occur to you that if my mother had wished to carry more children, she would have?”
“I would have convinced her,” he says confidently.
Lord Cavinder looks like he wants to say something, and I turn to him, impatient. “What?”
“Could Queen Marison have conceived a child at her age?”
“The aging process is different with the Fae,” Ian explains impatiently. “Our women can bear children much later in life.”
Elgin returns with a tea tray—a perfectly friendly thing that seems at odds with the tense situation.
“But none of that matters now,” Ian says. “I chose Marison because I expected her reign to be long. Now that she’s on her deathbed, I can safely admit I’m pleased to have her daughter instead.”
“You think I’ll marry you?”
“I think you will if you care about your favorite human’s welfare.”
I clench my hands, beginning to rise. Before I’m up, Lord Cavinder says, “And that brings us to our terms. We can all leave this room with exactly what we want. Sabine, as soon as you sign my business proposal, we will officialize the betrothal agreement between you and Lord Ian, and he will agree to transfer Alex’s tether to you.”
Tiny dots prick my vision, and the room begins to tilt on its axis. That’s their plan—to trap me with formal agreements. A pitfall for our kind, eternally binding.
“And if I don’t yield to your demands? You’ll kill Alex?”
Ian brings me a cup of tea, sitting on the settee as he offers it to me. “Of course not. I cannot promise his life will be pleasant, but it will certainly be long.”
“And what will keep me from commanding you to give him to me the moment I become queen? Why would I sign the betrothal?”
“I’m afraid you’ll never wear the crown if you don’t agree to work with us,” Lord Cavinder says. “You won’t even leave this room.”
“Imagine how distraught your family will be when I bring them your body,” Ian says sorrowfully. “Poor Sabine, killed by the hands of humans. What do you think your brothers will do with Alex once they learn he was the one to bind your magic?”
They’ve cornered me.
“Fine,” I say, my voice wavering. “I’ll sign your contracts.”