Chapter 71
Chapter Seventy-One
It’s been five days since the attack.
Five days of digging out survivors from under the rubble—though by the fourth and fifth days, the number of dead far outnumbered the living pulled from beneath rock and steel.
Five days of planning alongside Tairna—missives sent to both palaces, endless coordination with the newly arrived Volcans.
Five days since I last saw Mayah—well, since she saw me. I’m embarrassed to admit how many times I’ve crept by the infirmary, searching for the faint pulse of her energy signature through the wall, reassuring myself that she was still there, still all right.
I was too much of a coward to go inside and face her—
—to say goodbye.
Because now it’s time.
Tormik and Faramir and my father are dead. She’ll win over the Arbinji people—I’m certain of it. And Tairna will help her sort things with Tundrayn. I need to leave. I know it in my bones.
And still my hand shakes when I open the door to my mother’s makeshift office. She sits behind a smaller desk. Someone retrieved her painting of Mother Valca from beneath the rubble—it rests against the wall, dented and dirty, but upright.
Purple shadows smudge my mother’s eyes, hair escaping her five-day-old braid. She offers me a tired smile.
It drops before it even has the chance to settle on her face.
“You’re leaving.” Not a question.
My answer is a deep sigh. The chair scrapes against the floor as I sit down across from her, cradling my head in my hands.
“Yes.”
“We’ve discussed this at length. If this is your decision, I won’t try to stop you. When will you leave?” Her voice is brittle and hopeless, and it claws at my heart. I lean back in the chair, tracking the silent tears streaming down her cheeks.
“Tomorrow morning.”
She nods, lips pressed into a thin line. “Take whatever supplies you need. I can send a few men with you to—”
“No. I’ll be fine on my own.” My voice catches. “Just … just promise me once more that you’ll do whatever it takes to protect Mayah. Love her like your own blood.”
Steely resolve carves itself into her expression. She sniffles softly, then wipes her tears with the backs of her hands. “I will do everything in my power to do right by the woman you love. I swear it, Vayru.”
“Thank you.” A hoarse, broken whisper. In the next heartbeat, Mother rises from her seat, stumbles around her desk, and wraps her arms around me.
“I love you, Vayru,” she whispers, tears wet against my neck. “I’ve loved you always. You are a good man. And it is the honor of my life to be your mother.”
Truth.
Mother eventually draws back and wipes away the tears from my cheeks that I hadn’t even realized had fallen. “Are you going to say goodbye?” I know she means to Mayah.
“No. It’ll be easier this way.”
My footsteps feel weighted with lead as I trudge through the crumbling remains of the camp toward my newly assigned room—one that I share with Mayah. She’s spent nearly every waking moment in the infirmary, so it’s been easy to avoid her.
The room is sparse—a too-small bed, a narrow dresser, and a lone armchair are the only pieces of furniture. A heavy sigh escapes me as I open the top drawer and begin folding the few articles of clothing I’ve managed to scrounge in the last few days.
Mayah’s betrothal ring burns in my pocket. I bury it inside a crumpled shirt, then stuff it into the satchel Mother gave me, the taste of ash and regret coating my tongue.
My resolve isn’t as strong as it was—but I need to do this. There’s still a burning, festering rage in my chest, a pit carved open by her betrayal—misguided as it was—and I fear she’ll end up burned because I can’t move on. She’ll—
My muscles tense, Mayah’s energy signature pulsing in the periphery of my senses. Fuck. She was supposed to be in the infirmary until well past morning.
Mayah barrels down the hallway, and two heartbeats later, the door crashes open. I can’t bring myself to look at her, so I keep staring at the satchel with my meager belongings.
“It’s true. You’re leaving.” Her voice is splintered with hurt.
I cast her a quick glance—beautiful face flushed, brows pulled tight, chest heaving—before turning back to the dresser.
“Yes.”
“Were you even going to say goodbye?”
“No, Mayah,” I sigh. Tairna must have told her. “I wasn’t.”
“How can you just go?” Her voice caves in on itself, arms wrapping around her middle. “You can’t just leave me here.”
I force myself to shrug. “You found your place. Your friends. You’ll be safe.” And happy.
“You’re a coward.” Her voice cracks, energy signature quivering. “You’re afraid.” I swallow hard, forcing myself to keep stuffing clothing into the satchel. “I know you love me, Zev.”
My hands still. I swallow past the tightness in my throat. I do. I do love you, Mayah. “That doesn’t mean I can be with you.”
A beat of painful silence, steeped in heartbreak. Both hers and mine.
Then—“I wielded blood for you!” she screams. Her energy signature thrums wildly, as though lunging for me in her rage. “How can you still think my heart belongs to anyone else?”
I don’t trust myself to answer. Just tie the satchel closed.
“We’re married.” A broken whisper.
“Right,” I sigh. It was selfish of me to hope I’d be able to leave with our vows intact—hold onto that only real piece of our marriage. “I’ll ask Tairna to annul it.”
Her breath escapes in harsh gasps, as though she can’t seem to inhale enough air. Guilt batters my heart, but this is for the best. She’ll move on. She’ll fall in love with someone else, someone who can love her completely. Trust her implicitly.
“Fine,” she snaps, her voice wavering. “Leave.” A deep, shuddering breath. “I-I hate you.”
Sharp, vicious pinpricks surge along my neck, ghosting down my spine.
My breath catches.
I don’t register crossing the room, grabbing her wrist.
“Say that again.”
She blinks, brows furrowed. “I hate you?”
No, not as a question. “Again.”
“I hate you.”
Phantom needles jab into my neck.
My heart stutters.
“I hate you so much”—steady prickles waterfall down my back—“I can’t stand—”
I kiss her.
My mouth crashes against hers so hard, her head knocks against the door. I weave my fingers through her hair, cradling the back of her head to protect it from the wood. My other arm wraps around her waist, pulling her flush against me as I kiss her.
My truthwielding works on her.
Skies, it works on her.
I draw back, leaving only a sliver of space between us. “Say it again,” I whisper, my lips skimming hers.
“I hate you.” Her voice is breathy and soft and sweet, but my neck prickles all the same.
She was telling the truth. She loves me.
She fucking loves me. The wormbark oil—Skies fuck.
Even then, she loved me. I stride toward the armchair, arm banded around my wife’s waist, tugging her into my lap as I sit down.
I kiss her again, so hard our teeth clack together, tongue tracing the seam of her lips until she parts them for me.
She tastes divine, and I’ve missed her so, so fucking much. Open-mouthed kisses trailed down her neck, the sweet scent of frost and winter rose driving me insane. When she moans, my blood heats.
“Zev?” she whispers, chest heaving. “Not that I mind, but I’m … confused.”
“Do you. Want. Me. To stop?” I ask between kisses pressed to her soft lips.
“No.” I scrape my teeth along her collarbone, and she looses a sweet whimper that has me straining against my trousers. My lips find hers in another deep kiss, this one slow and languid, my tongue teasing hers. “Then let me savor this, baby.”
And she does.
I kiss her until she’s writhing in my lap, until her lips are swollen, until her chin and cheeks are scraped pink from my stubble. My hands have taken permanent residence in her hair, angling her face so I can kiss down her neck and lick the dip between her collarbones.
I’d kiss her for another hundred years if she let me.
When she’s a mewling, whimpering mess in my lap, I draw back and tuck her closer against my chest, drinking in her beautiful, flushed face.
Those bright, blue eyes and high cheekbones, her faint smattering of freckles.
I want to count each one and memorize them, map out constellations that are mine and mine alone.
Her chin quivers, eyes welling with tears.
I brush a tender kiss to her cheek. “My sweet Mayah,” I murmur. “I’ve been keeping a secret of my own.”