Chapter 36
CHAPTER THIRTY SIX
I wanted to race forward to help my master as he gritted his jaw and worked to keep walking on his bad leg, the pain of the wound practically my own as my bond with him begged me to help him, but Cassius reached out to stop me.
His hand almost closed on my arm, and I gasped in panic as I willed my flesh to turn to smoke before he could touch me and risk ripping this pretty dream apart.
If I found out that I wasn’t real then everything I thought I had here would just melt away, and I feared I would find myself still trapped in the coin after all, alone, unwanted and forgotten all over again.
Cassius stared at me in surprise as his hand passed straight through my arm before looking around quickly to see if anyone else had noticed.
Super subtle. Sometimes I think you want to get us banished to the coin again.
“I’m afraid of being touched,” I muttered.
“Sorry,” Cassius said with a frown, though I hadn’t actually meant to tell him that.
I was only reminding myself. “But you can’t go to your master now.
He has to stand before the stage and accept his position in the rankings once the princess has finished offering Kalaviv her condolences on his loss. ”
“But he’s hurt and I-”
“He’s a big boy, he can manage for a little while and we can’t risk anybody noticing anything strange about you or seeing what you can do.
Look, he’s speaking to the princess again now.
” Cassius jerked his chin to point him out and I bit my lip as I forced myself to remain where I was and tried to see him.
I stood on tiptoes to look beyond the crowd of Kalaviv’s servants as their lord walked away from the princess looking a little like a kicked dog.
Master approached the stage once more, this time ushered to stand at the foot of it in the sand as the princess got to her feet, looking down on him with interest though her eyebrow arched like she wasn’t totally impressed by him.
The guards who ringed the stage remained in place this time, forming a barrier between them but my master just called over their heads as if they weren’t even there.
His words were lost to the crowd, but my stomach knotted as a small smile tugged at the princess’s lips in response to whatever he’d said.
The crowd on the other side of the ring were going wild, applauding and calling out my master’s name as he threw them a rueful grin, still bathing in his victory.
Master gave his full attention to the princess again as she called something else down to him.
She was very beautiful. Her eyes glimmered and her long silver hair was so unusual, it drew my attention despite all the other people around us, making my blood hum with old and powerful magic.
Memories tickled at the edges of my mind as I looked at it, but any time I tried to turn my attention their way, they flitted out of reach once more like little birds playing hide and seek with me.
I twisted a finger through a lock of my own hair thoughtfully, watching as the strand changed colour until it looked just like hers, the metallic silver sheen glinting in the sunlight.
Bad idea, idiot. You’re supposed to be normal. Normal Fae don’t just change their hair colour whenever they’re feeling jealous.
“Jealous of what?” I breathed as I returned the lock of hair to my own midnight colour, allowing the curl to spring free of my finger.
Of the way your master’s looking at her.
I frowned at Master as his eyes danced and he said something to the princess which made her eyes sparkle even though her face stayed resolutely impassive. Why should I care what way he looked at her?
Cassius released a huff of irritation so low that I almost missed it, and I glanced at him as he watched their interaction too.
He had a smile on his face that spoke of his pleasure in our master’s win, but his eyes were hard with disapproval and there was a set to his jaw which made that smile look painful.
Green doesn’t look good on him either.
“Cassius isn’t green,” I mumbled and he looked at me as he heard his name.
“What was that?” he asked with a faint frown.
I didn’t mean it literally, you dumb goose. I meant green with envy. He’s jealous.
“Oh. Apparently, I think you’re jealous,” I explained to him and his lips pursed.
“What reason would I have to be jealous?” he asked, clearing his throat as his voice caught on the last word.
Because he thinks the princess is as pretty as your master, and he doesn’t like how good they look together.
I gazed at Cassius with pity in my eyes. “I didn’t realise how you felt about him... Well apparently, I did but not all of me. But it’s okay, maybe it’s not too late to tell him.”
“Tell who what?” Cassius asked, his brow creasing.
“Master. You should tell him how pretty you think he is if it’s upsetting you that he and the princess-”
Fail. Absolute fail. Sometimes I have no idea how we’re the same person. I feel like you’re doing this on purpose just to make me die of shame. Which would be an improvement because I have been desperate to die for about eight thousand years now.
“I... Kyra I think you’re confused,” Cassius said gently, his eyes shining with pity.
He’s looking at you like you’re a horse with a broken leg.
“Oh, I hope he doesn’t like to have sex with wounded horses. Is it just the uninjured ones which arouse him?” I hissed, my wary eyes on Cassius but his attention was fixed on Master and the princess once more.
Gods, that’s not what I meant. Focus on the broken leg part.
“What does that mean?” I muttered.
Too broken to fix. Ready for death. Which is true. I’m so ready for death it’s unreal.
I frowned because that last remark hadn’t held the certainty I’d grown used to from my other self.
It was like I was repeating the same old lines I’d said a million times before, but now they didn’t necessarily line up with the truth.
I wondered if being out of the coin was changing things.
Maybe I didn’t want to die at all anymore.
Maybe I was getting a taste for life again.
Maybe. But that’s only because we’re out here, and I’m not convinced that’ll last. One mistake and we’re back in the coin. Back in the dark. The cold. The isolation. All alone all over again.
A shiver of terror passed through me and I scrunched my eyes shut to try and push the monsters in my mind away. They couldn’t come for me out here. They weren’t allowed out of the coin. I was still here, I wasn’t alone.
I blew out a harsh breath and opened my eyes again, forcing myself to focus on where I truly was and what was going on around me.
Cassius’s tense smile remained fixed as he watched Master and the princess, and I followed his gaze on them too.
She pointed at the rosette which I was only just realising that she had pinned to his – oh by the gods – she’d pinned it to his naked chest and blood was trickling down his pec.
She made some joke or quip about it if his reaction was anything to go by, not seeming upset by the fact that she’d poked a hole in him.
Magic burned through my fingertips as I looked at the blood, the taste of it rolling across my tongue as if I was the one bleeding and not a man who stood so far from me that I couldn’t even hear his words.
If he needed me I was here, though I was forced to fight my instincts and remain in place without getting any closer to him.
The crowd gasped and pointed it out, seeming to have taken whatever joke the princess had made about it as permission to comment on it, and Master did a spin and puffed out his chest like he was proud of where she’d placed it.
Cassius coughed a laugh, but it fell away as a faint blush lined the princess’s cheeks while she looked over Master’s exposed body, the firm lines of his powerful frame fully on show above the now bloodstained britches which hung low on his hips.
The ink of his tattoos was like delicate artwork placed across his bronze skin by the most skilled of artists, and if the comments I could hear from the crowd were anything to go by, then many of the people watching agreed with me.
There was just something about him that drew their gaze, from his appearance to the powerful aura which clung to him and the self-assured attitude which told them he had practically claimed the throne already.
He was charismatic and captivating, and I watched in fascination as he drew the support of the crowd like moths to a flame.
You’re staring at him too, if you hadn’t noticed.
I frowned, wondering if that was true or not as my gaze followed the curves of his muscles where they stood out firmly through his skin, putting his undeniable strength on full display for all in attendance to see.
His body gleamed with sweat after his bout in the ring which should have been off-putting, but somehow wasn’t, making my mouth dry out as I continued to stare.
My gaze drifted down to the muscles at the base of his stomach where they tapered into a deep V before they disappeared beneath his waistband, and I bit my lip.
Oh sorry, my mistake, you’re just ogling him like a piece of meat because you like his personality.
“I do like his personality,” I protested. Or at least I liked what I had seen of it so far.
Before I could respond to myself again, the empress rose from her seat and a chill ran down my spine.
I could see the beautiful features which she presented to the world, but I could see the darkness beneath them too.
Her true face was a wicked, rotting thing.
A black skull with eyes of ice and a forked tongue, like a snake’s.
My heart beat faster as she approached the man my life was tethered to, and magic built in my skin just in case he needed me.
She gazed down at my master with suspicion in her eyes and malice in her soul, and I shuddered at the thought of her getting any closer to him.