As if he’d somehow picked up on my thoughts of her, he said, “I came to Dublin because I learned the Sinsar Dubh had been sighted in the city. That was when I met your sister.”

I went still inside. I wanted to hear about Alina, even if it came from him. I was starved to know about my sister’s last days.

“How did you meet?”

He’d walked into a pub where she was sitting with friends. She looked up, and he felt as if everyone else in the bar had melted away, just vanished into the background, leaving only him and her. She’d later told him she felt the same thing.

They’d spent the afternoon together. And the night. And the next and the next. They’d been inseparable. He discovered she wasn’t like other humans, that she, too, was struggling with a new state of being she didn’t understand and had no idea how to handle. They learned together. He’d found an ally in his quest for the Book, in his quest to restore his Fae nature. They’d been fated for each other.

“You lied to her. You pretended you were a sidhe-seer,” I accused. “She’d never have helped you otherwise.”

“So you say. I think she might have. But she was skittish, and I was unwilling to take chances. She made me feel things I did not understand. I made her feel things she’d longed for all her life. I set her free. The way she laughed.” He paused, and a faint smile curved his mouth. “When she laughed, people would turn to stare. It was so … Humans have a word. Joy. Your sister knew it.”

I hated him for having heard her laugh, for knowing she knew joy, for ever having touched her, this monster who’d arranged to have me raped, body and soul, and my eyes must have burned with it, because his smile faded.

“I told you the truth. I did not kill her, which means someone else walking around out there did. You are so certain I’m the villain. What if your real villain is closer to you than you think?”

“I’m going to bottom-line this again: You made me Pri-ya.” I spat, then fished. “You set four Unseelie Princes on me.”

“Three.”

I stared. I knew there’d been a fourth. “You were the fourth?”

“That would have served no purpose. I am not Fae at the moment.”

“Then who was the fourth?” My hands fisted in my lap. Being raped was bad enough. Being raped and not knowing if your fourth rapist was someone you knew was even worse.

“There was no fourth.”

“Not believing a word you say.”

“The fourth Unseelie Prince was killed hundreds of thousands of years ago, in battle between the queen and king. That child”—he shot a glance out the window—“killed another when I tried to reclaim you at the abbey.”

A memory from my fractured state of consciousness surfaced sharply: Lying on the cold stone floor, believing salvation was at hand. A flame-haired warrior. A sword. I remembered. It was a shameful memory. I’d wanted to kill Dani for killing my “master.” And I was still mad at Dani for killing the prince—but for an entirely different reason: I wanted to be the one to kill the bastards.

“The princes want revenge. They want me to let them have her. They are mine to command.”

I stared at him, not missing the threat but still trying to digest that there was no fourth prince. How could the LM not have known a fourth was there? Was there a fourth, or had I imagined it?

“What has Barrons tried to make of you, MacKayla? And V’lane? A tool for their purposes. They’re no different than me. My methods have merely been more direct. And more directly effective. Everyone is trying to use you.” He glanced out the window. “If not for her interference, I would have succeeded. I would have had the Sinsar Dubh by now and been back in Faery.”

“Leaving our world a complete mess.”

“What do you think Barrons would do? Or V’lane?”

“At least try to put the walls back up.”

“You’re so certain?”

“You’re just trying to make me doubt everyone.”

“If you obtain the Sinsar Dubh for me, MacKayla, I will reclaim the Unseelie and restore order to your world.”

Not a word in there about restoring the walls. “And give me my sister back?” I said dryly.

“If you wish. Or you may come visit us in Faery.”

“Not funny.”

“I did not intend it to be. Whether you wish to believe it or not, she mattered to me.”

“I saw her body, you bastard!”

His lids half dropped, his mouth tightened. “As did I. It was not done by me or at my direction.”