Lochlan needed to find his bed again to try to obtain the elusive sleep. Maybe then he'd receive some clarity.
Some answers.
But he'd never claimed to do the smart thing.
"Loch," Finn called him back, but Lochlan brushed past him on his way out the door.
He needed to speak to Brea. He only planned to ask questions, to find out the whole truth. Her mother refused to help Iskalt, but it was his kingdom and he'd do what he could.
But that was logical Lochlan, and all logic left him the moment he learned what his uncle was doing to their people.
Brea reached her rooms and stopped with her hand on the door. "I know you're following me."
"We need to talk," he growled.
"Fine." She pushed open her door. "By all means come berate me in the middle of the night. I haven't had enough people lecturing me lately."
He didn't miss the sarcasm in her voice, but he also didn't care. There were two Lochlan O'Sheas. One was stuck as a teenage boy wanting to protect the princess and experience just one of her smiles.
The other, the cold Iskalt prince, he'd do anything necessary to get answers.
The latter won out as he kicked the door shut and advanced on Brea. Her eyes flashed yellow as she stood her ground, refusing to move.
"My uncle." His jaw clenched. "Tell me everything."
She crossed her arms. "Only if you back up."
With a sigh, he did as she asked.
She nodded in approval. "I really don't know much. It's not like my aunt let me into important meetings, and everything Griff told me was a lie."
A growl rumbled low in his throat at the mention of his brother and the thought of them together. "Tell me what the Iskalt delegation did after I left Fargelsi."
She shrugged. "Honestly, I don't know. I was kept away from many of the state dinners because I'm a bumbling fool, and my aunt was embarrassed of me."
He took a step toward her, wanting to erase the self-conscious flicker of doubt across her face. "You are no fool, Brea Robinson."
She stepped back, pressing her back against the wall. "I—"
"Is it true?" His voice lowered. "Regan and Callum have formed an alliance?"
"Yes."
"You should have told us the moment we brought you to the palace."
She pushed at his chest. "Oh, you mean when you were all mourning Alona? Or when you left for weeks with no word, leaving us scared out of our minds that something happened to you too?"
She was scared for him? He lifted a hand, planning to cup her cheek. Instead, he gripped her chin and forced it up as he hovered over her. "This was important, Brea."
She hit his hand away. "How was I to know? I've lived my life in the human realm, not this messed up fantasy sideshow. I. Am. Not. One. Of. You."
He leaned down to look into her eyes, his power meeting hers. "You are. You always have been."
"Maybe I don't want to be," she whispered.
He wanted to kiss her. More than anything else in the world, he wanted to feel her lips against his again. But the next time he kissed her, it would be real. He wouldn't be trying to enrage her to fuel her magic. And it wouldn't be a result of this heated anger between them either.
When he kissed her, she would feel in one moment everything he'd bottled up over the years of watching her in the human realm. All the sadness and the pride. Even the tiny bits of joy he'd watch her capture. She'd feel dancing in an abandoned barn and sitting under a gorgeous tree with blue skies overhead.
That was how he once saw her.
And now? The princess of two kingdoms who'd escaped an impenetrable palace and made the population of the entire capital fall in love with her.
"You infuriate me," she said, staring into his eyes, unflinching.
"Not as much as you infuriate me." He stayed where he was, his chest pressed against hers, for a moment longer before reminding himself why he'd come.
Something was happening in Iskalt, something terrible and dangerous.
He took a step back, giving them both space to breathe. "It's time I help my people." All these years he'd been safe in Eldur while they suffered under Callum. "I've abandoned them long enough."
"My mother won't allow it if she thinks it's not Eldur’s problem." Brea pushed away from the wall, the yellow fading from her eyes.
Lochlan rubbed the back of his neck. Brea wasn't wrong, but maybe that didn't matter. "I love Faolan like she is my own mother, but she is the queen of Eldur. Iskalt blood runs through my veins, and it's time I let that guide me."
Brea's lips twitched into a smile. "I feel like I'm watching a little boy become a man right before my eyes."
The scowl he unleashed on her had no venom behind it. "I know it must be a foreign concept in the human world, Brea, but you do not need to voice every thought that comes into your mind."
"So, I guess I shouldn't tell you I'm proud of you for choosing your people over my mother's wishes?"
He turned away from her to hide his smile. "Pride is a useless emotion." In three strides, he reached the door and opened it. As he stepped into the hall, he heard Brea calling behind him.
"I'm proud of my little silk-robe wearing princeling, and I don't care how useless that is."
He shut the door and shook his head with a laugh, his chest expanding with Brea's pride. It may have served no purpose, but he felt her words in every bone of his body.
He glanced down at the robe he'd forgotten he was wearing, and a flush crept up his neck.
Even in his embarrassment, the moment he lay down and set his head against his soft pillow, he fell fast asleep, Brea's pride like a blanket protecting him from the troubles the next days would bring.