Chapter 38 Kerym
Kerym
He watched the eagle fly over the ship, its wings wide as it headed to the fleet they had almost reached, and Kerym knew.
“I’m sorry, brother,” Kerym mumbled under his breath as his eyes shifted toward the witch sisters standing to his side, realizing Pellie had approached him for the first time since they’d boarded this ship.
“We’re almost there.” Setting her hands on the railing beside him, she looked out over the sea.
“Are you worried? Or… scared?” she asked softly as Kerym let out a long breath, trying not to pull her to him and kiss some damned sense into her.
“I’m never scared.” Kerym grinned at her, noting she did not believe him then either.
Stubborn, beautiful, thought-consuming witch.
He wasn’t scared. He might not have his gift anymore, but the other one—the earthly gift flickering under his skin—had awoken something in him. A confirmation that he truly didn’t care where he’d come from, that he did not seek to figure anything out, that the only thing that mattered was now.
Pellie mattered. His friends mattered. This war mattered. Kerym’s heritage? Not so much.
Besides… he would hopefully have a day or two to train his new skills, and having firsthand insight into how the enemy’s magic worked? Priceless.
“I am worried, though,” Kerym offered when silence stretched on, his lips curling up again as Pellie turned to him, her green eyes falling right into his as if they’d never left.
Gods, she was so beautiful. He couldn’t help looking her up and down, and the pink on her cheeks nearly severed all self-control he had left.
“What are you most worried about?” Pellie seemed to fight the wish to step into his arms, her hands locking behind her back, and Kerym choked down a disappointed groan when she appeared to win the war she’d waged with herself.
“That I am losing my charm.” Kerym tilted his head, his eyes moving to her feet, watching how she bounced back and forth from her heels to her toes. “That would be such a tragedy.”
A shocked giggle fell from Pellie’s lips. “You’ve lost your gift… we’re about to go into war… and you’re worried about your charm?”
“Yes.” Kerym didn’t have to fake the frown he shot her.
“I have asked you to marry me. I have told you I’d go anywhere with you.
I have been inside you, and don’t pretend you didn’t love it because we were both there.
Still, you do not believe me when I say I do not care about anything other than you. ”
“Kerym…” Pellie warned, her hands landing on his chest as he stepped into her space.
But she didn’t back away as she continued.
“I… I don’t know what will happen when we go home.
After what the other witch said, it might not be anything like what we remember it, and I…
I can’t ask this of you. To leave all your friends?
To leave the world you grew up in? Or the one you didn’t, but that you come from? It’s too much to ask.”
So. Fucking. Stubborn.
“Do you know what’s too much to ask?” Kerym said, his voice going gravelly as he bent down to close the distance between them. “Too much to ask is being this close to you and not getting to kiss these lips.”
His mouth nearly brushed hers, and he could have died for the little gasp she sucked in.
He moved his fingers to trace a featherlight path over her collarbone, over her slightly exposed shoulder, and finally down her side. “Too much to ask is seeing this body and not getting to worship it.”
Kerym moved his lips to her ear. “Too much to ask is smelling you right now and knowing that you’re getting wet for me, but not being able to satisfy you.”
Pellie reached for him as he took a step back, but Kerym shook his head.
“No, beautiful. I fell for your goodbye last time. You do not have to marry me. You do not even have to love me. But until you believe me when I say where you go, I go, and that I’ll never regret that decision for as long as I shall live…
I am keeping all this”—he playfully swept his hands over his body—“to myself.”
With a laugh, Pellie stepped toward him.
But a voice he knew so well but hadn’t heard sound so…
Was the voice happy? Yes, it was Raine’s happy fucking quip that interrupted them.
“Don’t be fooled, witch. Kerym talks a big game, but he’s as mushy as they come.”
Kerym dipped his head over the side of the ship, and sure enough, Raine and Frelina were riding beside their ship.
A shudder went through him. They were riding on fucking snakes. Large black serpents weaving their way through the water as if they belonged there. Which they definitely didn’t.
“I take it back,” Kerym muttered as Pellie came up to his side, her eyes also going big at the scene unfolding beneath them. “I am scared of one thing.”
Raine shook his head as he waved for Kerym to let down the rope ladder. “You’re as bad as my female over here. I think it’s best we send her up first because otherwise she might stab me in the back for making her do this.”
His female?
Kerym was about to shoot back a playful remark as he threw the ropes over the side when he noticed the words settle within Frelina, softness layering over her face as she watched Raine get everything ready for her to get up.
Adoration. No… love. It was love that made Frelina’s tired face brighten as if the sun hiding behind the clouds above them had broken free, its rays falling only onto her devoted features.
Raine saw it as well, and something warm took hold of Kerym’s heart when his friend kissed her cheek as she allowed him to lift her onto the ladder, his gaze following her as if he were a blind man who’d finally been able to see.
So his friend had finally stopped being a fucking idiot.
Turning to Pellie, he watched her realize what had happened as well, and when she avoided his seeking eyes as she helped Elessia’s sister onto the ship, Kerym mumbled, “I can’t have found someone more stubborn than Raine. I refuse to accept that.”
But there wasn’t room for envy within him. Nor was there room for sadness as Raine flung himself onto the deck, and Kerym caught a glimpse of how his friend had once looked as he quickly pulled Frelina to him and kissed her until her cheeks burned.
This was the pre-Solana-dying Raine.
Carefree. Happy. Passionate. Loving.
Kerym shot a look out over the sea, watching gray clouds gathering over it, and while it made their world darker, there was enough light from the couple beside him to fight it.
Solana would be happy to see Raine like this.
Thissian would as well.
Thissian would have also told Kerym to have patience with Pellie—would have told him that not everyone fell as fast and as hard as Kerym did.
But neither patience nor waiting was Kerym’s strong suit.
Kerym could almost feel his brother’s hand squeeze his shoulder, and he breathed in the steadiness his phantom touch gave him as the sound of drums started in the distance.
It was almost as if Thissian had warned him—as if he’d told him to be careful.
Kerym looked to the horizon, where ships would soon flood the ocean.
Everything about this war was different from any other he’d fought.
Kerym wasn’t sure what his place would be in this one.
He wouldn’t have Thissian to calm his hammering pulse.
Raine didn’t seem as if he would fling himself in front of an arrow.
And Merrick… Well, they’d have to see what state he was in when he and Lessia returned.
The ship had gone quiet when Kerym finally tore his eyes away from the still-empty line between the sea and the sky, and while everyone was turned toward the ship floating at the front of the armada, where Iviry’s fiery hair and Loche’s dark strands betrayed the two leaders standing in the bow, their ears weren’t on the sounds of weapons, of people milling about, or on the sails shifting in the wind.
They were listening to the building sound of war behind them—the one they’d heard only weeks ago.
When Kerym tasted dread, worry, and fear in the air, he threw a look over his shoulder, grimacing at where he imagined Thissian was standing, and dipped to place his hands on the deck of the ship.
“Shake,” Kerym whispered, imagining the planks moving under his fingers, and to his surprise the creaking wood indulged him, although it did so a bit more literally than he’d planned.
Every person ahead of him tumbled into a heap of limbs and bodies as the wood beneath their feet danced, and startled shouts cut through the air as Kerym cursed.
“Sorry! Sorry!” Kerym quickly lifted his hands, and the ship stilled again.
“What the fuck was that?” Raine looked absolutely feral as he threw his vicious glare around the ship, as if one of the enemy might have sneaked onto it.
“Erm… that would be me.” Kerym gave him an apologetic smile as Raine stormed toward him. “I was just trying to lighten the mood a little bit. You all became ever so serious.”
“What do you mean that was you?” Raine snarled, shoving Frelina behind him as he halted before Kerym. “Get the fuck back, Frelina. I am not above pushing you overboard to those snakes again.”
As Frelina rolled her eyes at Kerym, he shrugged at her. “I don’t doubt he means it.”
Moving to face Raine, Kerym thought, Come on, Raine. Don’t kill me in front of the females. That’s just poor manners. Besides, I am trying to prove to Pellie that I am all strong and handsome, and you ripping my head off won’t exactly help my cause here.
What the fuck is going on, Kerym? Are you one of them? Raine’s eyes flashed with the protectiveness a male experienced only once they mated, and Kerym threw a look at Frelina’s neck.
Sure enough, a mating mark could be found there, stark against Frelina’s skin, and Kerym wiggled his brows at her when her hand flew to touch it. “Ah, so he got there first. I was going to offer if he didn’t stop being an idiot.”
The growl ripping from Raine shook the ship almost as much as Kerym had done.