“What should I do?” Lorsan’s eyes opened and met his Queen’s.

“Keep an eye on him. If he seeks her out, then we take her. She is his weakness. If you have her, then you control Trik.”

Lorsan nodded and pulled her to him. He wrapped his arms around her and buried his face in her neck.

He grieved. He was a Dark King. He held power over a great Kingdom, and yet for the loss of one assassin, he grieved.

“He was more than your assassin,” Ilyrana picked up on his thoughts. “He had become a friend.”

“You are the only one that I can trust,” he pulled back and looked down into her face and ran his thumb across her cheek. “Through all of these years still only you remain faithful.”

“And I always will.”

“No matter what?” He asked.

She nodded.

“Things might get ugly before all is said and done.”

Ilyrana kissed him gently and then looked into his eyes. “You will always come first.”

Lorsan pulled her close and laid his head on top of hers. He thought of what had happened that night and of Trik’s deception. He knew it would come down to him taking Cassie. He would have to take her to break Trik. And he would. He would break Trik and have him humbled on his knees before him begging for mercy.

~

“Cassie?” Elora stepped into the storeroom cautiously. Cassie had finally pulled herself together enough to call her best friend. Though she was unable to get out anything coherent, Elora finally deciphered that she was at her mom’s store. It was after eleven o’clock when Elora arrived.

Cassie sat curled up in the far corner across from the mirror that she had emerged from. She eyed it wearily, expecting at any moment for Trik to come crashing through it.

“Cassie?”

She turned at the sound of her name being called a second time. When Elora saw the broken look in her friend’s eyes, she rushed forward. She pulled Cassie into her arms and held her close.

“I’ll kill him,” she growled. “I told him that if he hurt you that he was a dead dark elf.”

Cassie began to cry again as the pain continued to wrack her body. She wanted to go to him , to beg him to hold her and make the pain go away. She needed to hear the words that she didn’t let him finish and she needed him to tell her it was alright, that everything would be alright. But it wasn’t and it never would be. As long as Trik was out there, without her, it would never be alright. She cried for the loss, she cried for the hurt and the lies, she cried as her soul mourned its mate as if he had died. Her eyes burned and her throat felt dry as her sobs poured out. She knew that she was scaring Elora but she didn’t care. She was dying. She was dying and Trik didn’t care.

He had stood there and not denied her words. When she had slapped him he had looked like a whipped puppy, the confident, cocky Trik gone. Part of her had hoped he would have thrown himself at her feet and begged her forgiveness, part of her wished he had been the barbarian he had claimed and thrown her over his shoulder and hauled her off to be with him, and then part of her hoped that he would never contact her again. When that thought crossed her mind she wailed and shook.

“Cassie, please,” Elora patted her friend and rocked her. “Please tell me what happened. Are you hurt?”

Cassie nodded.

“Physically, Cass, are you hurt physically?” Elora clarified.

Cassie pulled back to look at her friend. Tears streaked her face. Her eyes, swollen and bloodshot, were devoid of any life.

“What did he do to you?” Elora snarled.

“He killed me,” Cassie whispered. “He ripped out my heart and threw it in my face.”

Elora watched as Cassie scooted back from her hold and looked up at her.

“He lied. He told me he was leaving Lorsan, but he never told Lorsan.”

Elora shook her head and bit her tongue. Now was not the time to point out that she had said this would probably happen.

Elora pulled her phone from her back pocket and dialed her mom’s number.

“Hey, you need to get the Queen and her man to your store a.s.a.p.,” she said when she heard her mom’s voice.

Elora hung up without waiting for a response.

“Where is he?” Elora asked.

Cassie let out a snort that was filled with indignation. “Who knows, who cares? I told him to stay away from me.”

“You think he will listen?”

“Don’t know, don’t care.”

Just then a leg followed by the rest of Tamsin’s body emerged from the mirror with Syndra hot on his heels. Cassie scampered back quickly , her eyes glazing over with pain.

Tamsin and Syndra stopped short as they looked down at the broken person before them.

Syndra looked over at Elora. “What has happened?”

Elora stood up and folded her arms across her chest. “Trik lied to her. He said he would leave the Dark King, but apparently the Dark King had no knowledge of it. And from what Cassie says Trik didn’t argue with her when she told him that he had lied to her.”

“Where is the assassin now?” Tamsin asked.

Elora shrugged. “Cassie doesn’t know. He didn’t follow her here.”

Syndra knelt down before Cassie and brushed her hair away from her face.

“Cassie,” Syndra’s voice was soft and melodic. “We need to keep you safe. We told Trik that we would protect you if he failed.”

Cassie looked up at the Light Queen. Her eyes were vacant. “What does it matter? He doesn’t care what happens to me.”