Page 67 of The Broken Prince
I didn’t have a clue.
King Rolfe stared at his coffee.
Ivory looked past me, out the window to the city beyond.
“You said a labor camp. What kind of labor?” I asked.
“The prisoners were digging in the earth, mining jewels.”
“I can’t picture these creatures caring about diamonds and rubies.” Fire pumped in their veins, and they had brute strength that rivaled mine. I couldn’t picture them as traders or merchants, just conquerors.
“Neither can I,” he said. “But that’s what they were doing. The prisoner said they were from a great city called Palladium. It fell quickly once the demons emerged. Some have escaped but gone into hiding. The rest have become prisoners to their regime.”
“Did this happen recently?” I asked.
“We didn’t have much time to speak,” he said. “Had to bribe him for what little knowledge he would impart. But yes, I get the impression this didn’t happen a long time ago, that these beings are fairly recent.”
“Why mine for jewels if they already lived underground?” Harlow asked. “They can do this themselves.”
“Why do anything yourself when you can have someone else do it for free?” I asked.
Her eyes switched to me, and a flush of heat burned through her body like a strike of lightning. She quickly looked away, like she remembered every scene of our fuck-a-thon from the night before.
I couldn’t think about that right now, with her father a foot away from me, when this world was on the verge of domination. It was easier to look at Ivory or her husband, to avoid Harlow’s gaze altogether. “Those jewels must be important.”
“Ian agrees.”
“I doubt the Teeth would have come across the beings while underground,” I said. “They must have emerged from the surface before the Teeth arrived. And if they were aboveground when they’re normally underground…something must have made them pop up.”
King Rolfe looked at me. “A need of some kind.”
I nodded. “I think it has something to do with the jewels they’re mining.”
“But why are they important…?” King Rolfe said it more to himself than to the rest of us.
“They know we’ve defeated their army by now,” I said. “Which means they’re going to take us more seriously for the next battle. We need to prepare for war, and the best way to do that is to combine all resources in a single location.”
“The only place big enough for that many people is HeartHolme,” King Rolfe said. “But we would have to evacuate all the Kingdoms—”
“If you leave them behind, they’ll be killed,” I said quickly. “You don’t have a choice.”
“What if they attack the Kingdoms first?” King Rolfe asked.
“Then your cities will fall—but not your people. If my kin come to our aid, it’ll be to the bottom of the cliffs anyway. If the demons attack anytime soon, there’s no chance my people will get here in time. We need to prepare for that reality.” And the reality was that all their soldiers combined probably still wouldn’t be enough.
“It’s hard to prepare for a battle against foes you’ve never seen.” He looked ahead, down the table of endless chairs, all empty. “All I know is they’re full of fire and strength. We need to figure out a way to combat that if we want to save lives. You must know your enemy if you want to defeat them.”
“The humans that have gone into hiding would be good allies,” I said. “They’ll want revenge for their people.”
“But how many of them remain?” King Rolfe asked. “Very few, probably.”
“But I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re working to overthrow them anyway. And they may know something we don’t.”
“And how do you suggest we find them?” King Rolfe asked.
“That…I don’t know,” I said. “But I think this will require another trip to the east, regardless.”
King Rolfe turned quiet for a long time, considering everything we’d just discussed. He turned his attention to Ivory next. “Once Atticus is well, he’ll need to evacuate the Kingdoms and usher them to HeartHolme. General Henry will march the Delacroix army on foot. Removing armies from the safety of their walls would normally be stupid, but in this instance, we need every soldier in one place if we’re to face these demons.”