38. Maren
38
Maren
I stopped.
The world slowed its orbit around the sun. The silence drank in my shallow breath, and all around me, the air seemed to grow dense and deep with the sound of Kye’s words.
“You loved me?”
A thousand miles away, he murmured into the dark. “Yes. Every day. Since I woke up to those big, dark eyes staring at me on the beach while the sunlight caved in around you.”
I listened to the tumble of our lungs. The halting tremor of mine; the slow burst of his. My hand left the door. My feet carried me to the edge I’d vacated, and I lowered myself beside him.
Kye didn’t look at me. Thumb still drumming softly against his knee, he stared at the floor. “That day on the beach. On Neris Island…” He paused to scrape his jaw. “I saw my mother in the water. I’d stepped in, and my own splash pushed my rowboat out of reach. I was so tired. And burnt. And pissed off that the journey hadn’t just killed me.”
My heart gave a squeeze. Beside my hand, Kye’s fist balled.
“I lost my footing and went under. And just… continued to sink. I watched the light from above until my heels pressed into the seabed. Then I let out all my air and opened my lungs to water instead.
“And suddenly my mother was beside me. She didn’t look like she had when she died. Rail thin with sickness, pale and slow, eyes rimmed with shadows. She was beautiful. She took my hand and looked up at the surface, and I knew she wanted me to swim up. But I was so, so fucking tired. She pulled and pushed. Doubled back and sprang against the ocean floor, fighting to haul me up. Then struggled to keep me afloat as she swam to the sand, crossing the Sea of Stars.
“She finally got me there, and when I stepped ashore, I knew I’d made it. Perpetuum. I stood, facing it. Let the sun stroke my skin. I wasn’t burnt. I wasn’t tired. I wasn’t…” He shook his head, searching for a word. “… Hollow with fucking fear for my future. My mother stood there with me, taking it in. I felt her hand slip into mine. And I realized she was crying.
“She told me I couldn’t stay. That I’d only thought I’d come seeking a way to die. But that I’d realize I’d really been searching for a reason to live . And that the reason was here, on the very sand on which I stood, on the other side of the stars. She kissed my cheek, and I felt this—force—in my chest. Pounding life into me. And I felt your mouth on mine, calling me back to this world. And I tried to stay. But you latched on and dragged me back to the living.”
Did you come to Leihani on purpose, Kye?
In a way. I’m always looking for something I can’t find at home.
Which one was it, when he’d said those words to me on my tiny veranda over a plate of tuna? Had he still been looking for a way to die?
Or had it been a reason to live?
“Kye,” I whispered. “That wasn’t your mother. I found you under the waves. I pulled you to shore.”
He shook his head. “You don’t understand. It was you. And through you… it was her. I was resentful at first. I’d been so resolute to my fate, and you’d caused me to fail. But I healed up a bit, tried to book passage back to Calder, then was rejected. I could have told them who I was but that ruins all interactions. Leads to things like blushing and bowing and cautious conversation. I was content to wait and found myself roaming the island instead. Found you . You were like this exotic bird trapped in a cage. And the islanders were vile to you. To your face and behind your back. They said things that lit fire in my blood. I felt their hostility grow in the weeks I spent there. I knew if I left and came back, I’d find you dead.
“When I pulled back that door flap in Akamai’s house, and I saw you on the other side, scratched and bloodied, I had to fight myself to not go mad with rage. That one of your own people would try to hurt you. Your uncle, the only one who’d never said a word against you, who should have been a man that protected you. I realized he’d been planning it for a while. Letting everyone else spout lies and rumors, calling you names, so that when the time came, he’d appear innocent.
“I sent you to Neris, and then I hid him in my boat until it grew dark. The islanders didn’t notice he was missing for a few hours. But you were missing, too. It could have easily been that something had happened to you , not Naheso. But none of them wondered. It was your name I heard from their mouths, claiming your guilt. They’d called for a search when I finally left, and I made it look like I was joining. But I rowed to the center of the channel, dumped him in, watched him fall away. And then I went to find you, determined to bring you back to Calder with me.”
My eyes drifted across the dark floor. “But I said no.”
“You said no.”
“And you” —I paused to clear my throat— “you respected that choice.”
“At first.”
I slanted my head to look at him. He ran a hand through the roots of his hair. “I went to Leihani and found Thaan, sent by the King to deal with me. He was standing on the docks, listening to the islanders screaming for your head, accusing you of murder. He’d drawn up your arrest and death certificate before I even landed. I promised his neck if he acted on it, went to order the captain to head for Neris Island—and the next thing I knew, I woke up surrounded by ocean, my name in ink on the very note I’d fought Thaan over. And you… you were gone.”
He drew his lower lip into his mouth, teeth scraping it as he pulled it back out. “That was when it sank in, I think. That I loved you. What other explanation could there have been, for the way I attacked them all. I went savage, Leihani. I went mad. I’d never known such fury. I loved you, and you were gone. I loved you. And you were dead. I destroyed half the boat. Punched at least four sailors. Knocked one of them out cold. Forced the captain to turn around. I needed to see you for myself.”
“I remember hearing a fight,” I said. “That’s why it took four days instead of three.”
Kye nodded. “Then it happened again. I woke up, another day passed. I thought it was the whiskey they’d given me to calm me down after the captain turned south. I thought I’d maybe drank more than I realized. But it happened a third morning, and I hadn’t drunk anything the night before.
“Then on the fourth, I woke in my bed in the tower, and knew something was wrong. I wracked my brain for my memories, and it felt like they were there. Like they’d been stuffed into a box and put on the highest shelf, just out of reach. I could see them, but I couldn’t see them. I went to find Hadrian. I knew he’d be worried about me, leaving right after he’d told me he was sick. Hadrian knows—” He hesitated, voice dropping even softer. “He knows how I fear inheriting the throne. He knows the King isn’t well in the head. And that wearing the crown is likely the cause. I went to apologize, and Hadrian congratulated me.”
My brows tightened in confusion. “For?”
“My engagement,” Kye breathed. “For finding something—someone—that would ground me at home. For the woman I’d brought back with me from the islands, with dark hair and obsidian eyes.”
The autumn breeze tapped softly against our window. I shifted again, uncomfortable. Those months in Calder. Kye’s outright disgust for my presence…
“But I hadn’t brought anyone back with me. I didn’t believe him at first. I thought it was a cruel joke. I was still trying to understand your death, were you really alive? In my tower, in the apartment across from mine? So, I set off to see and ran into Thaan.” He exhaled, the sound lonesome. Ashamed. “He congratulated me as well, then asked how we’d met on the island.”
His words settled slowly, tugging at my chest, eerie in my ears. “How we met?” I asked, gesturing between myself and Kye.
He nodded slowly. “He said you’d walked in his office that morning and asked for him. That you seemed worthy in looks, but that he’d expected a match from a higher station than some Leihaniian lord’s daughter. That the palace was already circling with rumors that you were using me to target Hadrian. He said he’d never heard your name before that day. And I thought… I thought you’d somehow taken his memories, too.
“I climbed the stairs of my tower and found Lady Selena leaving your apartment. Heard her voice as she walked out the door, saying goodbye to someone inside. She and I passed each other in the hallway… and my eyes landed on you. And my heart” —he pressed his palm to his chest— “my heart burst with relief. I could have wept at the sight of you. But my head… my head filled with caution. You looked at me with such contempt. With hatred in your eyes. You looked at me, and you weren’t the same girl from the islands. You weren’t timid and shy. You looked at me, and it was plain on your face. In every word you spoke. You wanted me dead.
“I struggled for weeks with the idea that my mother had told me I’d find a reason to live, and that I’d found you. I thought, maybe she’d meant to protect Hadrian from you.” I glanced sharply at Kye, unwittingly veering so close to the truth. But he didn’t seem to notice. “That maybe she’d gotten it wrong. Or maybe, it wasn’t her at all. Maybe it had been you, sneaking memories into my head as easily as you snuck them out.
“I knew I was a fool. That I should have tried harder to make you disappear. Every time we spoke, you dripped with malice. Every time you spoke my name, it was like a bitter piece of fruit you spat out. When you and Hadrian walked together to the training yard, my blood boiled. I didn’t know which I was angrier over—that you were living in the castle with the intention of killing him. That you were there to get to him by using me . Or that he’d had an Aalto-damned moment alone with you without the hostility you saved just for me. And then, there was the fact that I was fucking jealous.”
“It was just a short walk,” I said, grateful the room was mostly dark to hide whatever expression I knew I failed to hide. “Hardly reason to be jealous.”
“It wasn’t just the walk. Every man in the City of Towers watched you when you passed, and some of the women, too. I used to count the heads that turned after you, stewing in my shoes. I could almost hear their thoughts as they undressed you in their mind, or I’d stumble on a conversation involving the fantasy of you in their bed.
“It was maddening, Leihani, what that did to me. That you were engaged to me. You were mine . And they couldn’t keep their eyes away. That I knew you’d enchanted me, done something to bewitch me. That I was endangering my brother by letting it happen. That I threatened men in the palace for committing the same crime I had: hoping you’d look my way. Or stop and flirt with me.
“When I entered a room in the palace, my eyes would search for you. At night, I’d sit and watch the neighboring tower, waiting for light to bounce off it from your window, so I knew you were in there. At parties, I’d follow you from a distance, telling myself I was making sure you didn’t run off and take part in some secret malicious scheme. But deep down, I knew it was because I couldn’t help myself. I needed to know you were alive. Safe. And not in some other bastard’s bed.”
In the dim light, Kye licked his bottom lip. “And then our engagement night came. I’d had a fight with the King that morning when he told me I was to leave for Winterlight. That we would be announcing it that evening. And I’d noticed a pattern. Whenever I attended an event, I’d wake the following morning, my memory of the evening wiped from my brain. So, I locked myself in my rooms all day, until the party was well underway and the grounds were clear. I snuck out with my bottle. I just wanted to watch the sunset from the shadows, toast my stupidity to myself, and go back to my room. But then you came.”
He groaned softly, rubbing his face with a rough hand. “And that dress, Leihani. That fucking dress. If I didn’t know what death felt like from the banks of Neris Island, I’d have thought you killed me in that dress. I told you to jump, but if you had, I would have jumped too. I saw the look in your eyes when you realized I was there. That I’d hurt you by not going to the announcement. It caught me off guard, the thought that I could hurt you. I knew that was why you stayed and taunted me. To hurt me back. Then you mentioned Hadrian, and it all went to shit. Was I worried about leaving Laurier Palace, leaving you with him? Yes. But was I also jealous that he got to stay, got to live under the same roof with you, and I didn’t? Fucking Aalto knew I was. And pissed off and irrational.
“I had to know. Who you really were. Why you were really there. Were you just fucking with my head? Was I a piece in your game? So, I convinced Hadrian to let me have the Soul Rings. They should have been his, being the first born. My mother left them to him. I went to his tower after you threw the knife in the water and confessed everything to him. That Thaan had told me on the ship you were dead. That I didn’t remember agreeing to marry you. That I was sure you were a witch. Or a spy from Rivea. Or possibly both.
“We went through the Leihani census together. Found you and traced your family line back fifty years. Fifty more. A hundred more. Found where the lordship had been added in to your lineage. I’d been to Leihani. Your father didn’t own an estate. He didn’t pay taxes to the crown. You’d been born into one of the poorest households on the island. You’d never even seen a fucking mirror. Why were you here, inseparable from Lady Selena, one of Thaan’s closest confidants? What was your connection to him?
“And then, Hadrian told me something odd. He said that six months before, in Arienne , before you and I had ever met, Thaan had approached him as he was studying a new painting in the art gallery. And sang.”
My brows tightened, my focus on his words sharpening.
“Thaan sang while Hadrian was facing away, and when Hadrian turned around, Thaan said, ‘Come with me.’ Hadrian asked, ‘Where?’ and Thaan seemed surprised. Flustered. Thaan is never flustered. He’s always so Aalto-damned bored and superior. It was strange enough I didn’t want Hadrian near him. I didn’t want you near him either, though that was difficult to demand as I was readying to leave the palace. Thaan tried to speak to me the day of our wedding, and I didn’t give him the chance.”
“I remember,” I murmured. The way he’d snatched my hand and hauled me away.
Talk to whoever you want tonight. But not him, and not my brother.
Kye nodded vaguely. We listened to the sounds of night together. Wind and ocean whispering beyond our only window. An owl calling somewhere in the trees outside. The innkeeper and his wife, finishing the day’s chores down the hallway.
“Our wedding night…” I said, letting my voice trail. Asking a question, though what the question was, I wasn’t sure.
Kye huffed a small laugh. “Don’t think I haven’t thought of that night every day since.” My chin found the center of my palm, a ribbon of heat threading through my skin. It floated from him as well, the air sultry on my tongue. “If we hadn’t been wearing these,” he said, lifting his hand, “I don’t think anything could have stopped me from claiming you in my bed. Certainly not a little knife on your thigh.”
Breathless, I drew my feet onto the mattress, hugging my legs, that familiar primal animal rousing inside me.
“And the next morning,” he continued, clearing his throat, “when I found you sneaking seaweed into my tea. Using the corner of your dress, which might have been worth half of Leihani Island, to protect your hand from the fucking iron kettle. Leaving a stain of ash, never even realizing that most of the women in the palace would keel over at the sight. It was hard to not send it all to Perpetuum and just kiss you there. Every single thing you did charmed me. And I was so cruel in return.”
“I had my moments, Kye,” I whispered. “I was cruel to you as well.”
“Maybe,” he sighed. “But it didn’t keep me awake at night, regret slicing into my heart, when the cruelty came from you.”
I smoothed my fingers over the surface of my ring. “I did the same. I used to listen to your lungs through the walls at night. I liked the way they sounded. The way the sound of your breath soothed me. Then you were gone. And the tower felt empty.”
“Did it?” He didn’t try to hide the small smile in his voice.
I nodded. “Thaan came to tell me the family was headed to Cynthus Castle, but he didn’t know if you’d come. Winterlight had been attacked.”
“Ah Winterlight,” he said. I waited for more. He’d been injured in the attack, I knew that much. He’d received a letter from Hadrian while he was in the infirmary. But he’d never explained what had happened.
Of course, maybe I didn’t want to know. To imagine him fighting in a battle. Or wounded in a sick bed.
“What were you and Hadrian planning to do with me in the Corrum Wood?”
“What do you mean?”
I frowned. “Well, I assume you had some plan of action once you confirmed I was a witch or spy or whatever it was.”
Kye crossed his arms. I couldn’t see him very well, but I felt him, the thatched mattress whispering as he leaned away to look at me. “There was no plan. We’re a couple of idiots. He wanted to know if you were there to kill him. I wanted to know if you’d lied to me since the day we met. Then you… did whatever you did to help him breathe. You answered his question. But I wasn’t sure if you answered mine. That’s why I walked with you down to the beach.”
“And asked to start over,” I supplied, hesitation swirling within me again.
“And then kissed you,” he said, voice thick with apology.
Footsteps walked past our door, the brief silhouette of feet flashing through the light in the hallway. We listened to the sound of a door opening and closing, leaving us in silence.
“What are you thinking?” he asked.
I let out a soft breath. “I’m wondering when it changed for you. When you decided to trust me.”
His mouth cracked open, lashes flickering as he scanned the dark walls, choosing his words with care. “There is a point in a fight when you know you’re going to either win or lose. Sometimes you’re not sure at first. Sometimes you know right away. And when Kriska found us on the beach—” He stopped to gnaw his lip. “I realized it almost instantly. There were four of them. And one of me. But the way you fought…” He wrung a hand around the back of his neck. “You could have left me. I wanted you to leave me. But you stayed and fought like—like a rabid little animal, kicking and rolling in the surf. Clawing eyes. I’ve seen men run from greater odds before, but you didn’t run.
“It didn’t occur to you that we might lose. That we were losing. That your chances would be better if you left me. You stayed and fought. The next thing I knew, they were dragging me onto the ship. You were gone. I’d hoped you’d escaped. But they brought me to the cabin, and there you were, livid at the sight of them. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen yourself angry, Leihani. You’re—well, you’re terrifying. Like you could look at someone and liquify them on the spot. But Kriska pulled that garrote over my neck, and the way you cried stop .”
He paused to lean forward, forearms braced against his thighs, and gazed down at the floor. “I still hear you sometimes, screaming for him to stop. Your voice breaking on the word. As if it killed you to watch him kill me. It echoes in my ears. And then you said three words that sent terror into my heart. I’ll drink it.
“Koren Valeriany is deadly, depending on the dosage. And who knew how much the pirates would make you take. I watched you drink poison to keep me alive. That was when I knew I’d fucked up. I’d been played. I’d spent months thinking you were an enemy, and there you were, risking your safety for mine. The shame cut so deep; I could hardly look at you that first night on the ship. Could hardly speak to you. I kept thinking, she’s going to die. And I all but killed her.”
“I thought you were angry with me for getting us captured,” I said.
Kye huffed a breathless laugh. “No. I don’t think I’ve ever actually been angry with you. I’ve only ever been angry with myself.”
I looked down at my wedding ring, still in the center of my palm. Heavy. Delicate. I rolled it around in my hand, watching the faint light catch it in a shine from certain angles.
“My mother’s dowry contained a variety of objects imbued with alchemy and ancient magic, most of them jewelry,” Kye said quietly, watching me. “She gave one to each of us before she died. And then threw the rest down a well so that the King couldn’t take any more. Mine—" he turned his hand over, and I realized the sapphire ring his mother had given him sat over one knuckle. “Mine was infused with moondust.”
He slid it from his hand and held it out for me. I paused, hesitant, then slowly took it, slipping it onto my own finger. Weighted and warm from his skin, it drooped from my hand.
Suddenly my opposite hand struck out, snatching something from the air. Hard, smooth, round. His pocket watch. My mouth parted as I realized he’d thrown it at me. And even without seeing it coming, I’d caught it.
“They say Aalto watches the present. Caecus hoards the past. And Theia safeguards the future. Moondust is in the silver band, making it a Premonition Ring,” he said, nodding to the sapphire on my hand. “Wear it, and your instincts sharpen. Your body knows things before they happen.”
“How do you have these?” I asked, then realized the answer as I handed the timepiece back to him, its gears softly clicking away. “The pirates attacked Veles and Reija after we left the market in Vranna.”
His jaw tightened. “I assume they’re both dead.”
Guilt flared in the back of my throat. “This is how you knew I was watching you train with the Royal Guard,” I murmured, twisting his ring on my hand. The memory of his eyes meeting mine through the glass just before Aren struck him with the hilt of his sword flashed in my head. “How you knew an arrow would be shot in my direction just before it happened.”
Kye nodded. “I should have known they were there, at Cynthus Castle. Kriska and his pirates. I should have felt them approaching us. But I’d taken all my rings off so I wouldn’t lose them in the tide. Kept my wedding ring on, knowing…knowing I would try to break into your thoughts one more time. I shouldn’t have taken this one off. It’s my fault they captured us. It’s my fault they chained you to the cabin wall. Forced you to drug yourself into sleep. Made you think you might die.” He closed his eyes and swallowed again, a track of moisture escaping his lashes to streak down to his chin. “It’s my fault Burian put his hands on you when you couldn’t protect yourself from him. It’s my fault that ships scare you. It’s my fault. And it’s killed me every day since, knowing I let it happen.”
“Kye,” I whispered. “It’s not.”
“And then, I promised myself I wouldn’t let it leave my finger ever again. But we needed money. You didn’t want to sail to Calder. And I thought, it’s my fault you couldn’t board a ship. So, I sold it to buy us two horses. And they caught up to us again—and I couldn’t sense it before it happened.
“And I can’t explain the terror I felt when I realized Kriska took you from me. Pure, fucking engulfing terror. I tried to follow, but Demyan and Burian blocked my way. Kolibri was tangled in ropes on the ground, and you had vanished. I couldn’t even go after you, I was forced to fight them. I'm trained to fight multiple men at a time. Three can be a challenge, but give me a sword and I can hold my own with only two. And they realized it. They ran to their horses, hidden in the bushes behind our camp. And suddenly I was alone, with no idea where you were.
I tracked them for hours. They took the long way to Kriska, weaving back and forth, trying to lose me, I’m sure. Aren—Aren is a better tracker. He would have found you sooner than I did. I kept praying to Aalto I’d hear them, or that I’d hear you, and then I did. And you were screaming.”
Kye paused, eyes flicking up to meet mine, thick with shining silver. I shifted my weight, coaxing the rawness in the back of my throat.
“You were lifeless, hanging from that tree,” he whispered, tearing his gaze from mine to lean forward, sinking his face into his hands. “I thought you were dead. And I knew two things. One, I’d kill them. Sword, knife, bare fucking hands. It didn’t matter how. It didn’t matter what happened to me. I’d rip them to shreds, one inch of skin at a time.
“And two, I knew that if you’d left me… if you’d left this world and gone to Perpetuum… I knew I’d fight tooth and fist and fucking nail to drag you back. Gateways be damned. Guardians of the Sky be damned. The Sea of Stars be damned. Sun and moon and Darkness be damned. I told you I’d come for you. And I meant it.”