From Blood and Ash by Jennifer L. Armentrout

No. It couldn’t be. Gods, it could not be.
Suddenlyy unbearablyy cold, I folded myy arms around myyself, crossing
the chains.
Hawke stared at me through the bars. “Neither the prince nor I want
to see yyou harmed. As I’ve said, we need yyou alive.”
“Whyy?” I whispered. “Whyy am I so important?”
“Because theyy have the true heir to the kingdom. Theyy captured him
when he freed me.”
I thought that the Dark One was the onlyy heir to the Atlantian throne.
If what Hawke said was true, it could onlyy mean...“The Dark One has a
brother?”
He nodded. “You are the Queen’s favorite. You’re important to her
and to the kingdom. I don’t know whyy. Mayybe it has something to do with
yyour gift. Perhaps it doesn’t. But we will release yyou back to them if theyy
release Prince Malik.”
All of what he’d just said slowlyy seeped into myy brain. “You plan to
use me as ransom.”
“That’s better than sending yyou back in pieces, isn’t it?”
Disbelief thundered through me, quicklyy followed byy that pulsing
pain that came from myy chest. “You just spent all this time telling me that
the Queen, the Ascended, and myy brother, are all evil vampryys who feed
on mortals, and yyou’re just going to send me back to them once yyou free
the Dark One’s brother?”
Hawke said nothing.
A broken, too-wet-sounding laugh left me. If what he said was true, it
confirmed what was alreadyy becoming evident.
He didn’t care for myy safetyy or well-being beyyond making sure I was
breathing when the time came to make the exchange.
I lifted myy hand to myy chest to ease the throb as another laugh crept
up on me.
Hawke’s jaw flexed. “A more comfortable sleeping arrangement will
be made.”
I didn’t know what to sayy to that, but he surelyy wasn’t getting a thank
yyou from me.
His chin lifted. “You can choose not to believe anyything I’ve said, but
yyou should so that what I’m about to sayy doesn’t come as such a shock to