Chapter 20
Caelus
Fuck. Me.
What is it with me having to wear all the unfortunate things a body can egest?
My wicked woman bit her lips to refrain from laughing — likely more to do with my expression than with the actual emesis coating my favourite pair of boots.
Boots that were now destined to be burned.
In a monumental effort to distract myself from the warm slosh covering my feet, I toed the drunkard over to check that he was still breathing. Furies-damned bastard immediately began snoring. Loudly.
“He said he knew you,” I wondered aloud, hoping she could shed some light on the truth of that statement.
Nyssa ran a hand over her face, smearing the dark spatters of gore left behind from a battle that seemed so recent and yet so long ago. “Yes. Unfortunately, I think he was astute in that assessment.”
She peered closer at his haggard face, hers wrinkling in disgust. I couldn’t blame her — the man smelled awful. Like a fermented carcass doused in cheap wine. “And even more unfortunately, I think we need him to accompany us back to Aegis,” she finished with a wince.
A groan escaped me. “Well, since I’m the one already covered in foul waste, I guess I’ll do the chivalrous thing and escort the snoring ogre.”
Nyssa graced me with a mocking salute, as I threw Orland over my shoulders. She tugged me in for a quick kiss, flicking her fingers to the side, conjuring a shadow door with the impressive and thoughtless ease of breathing.
I couldn’t help the look that crossed my face, nor its accompanying surge of awe down our shared link; she was a thing of wonder. And I was — had always been, would always be — irrevocably in love with her.
“Marry me.”
She snorted, laying a palm on my armoured chest.
“I’m serious,” I murmured.
Her brows creased in the middle as she assessed the earnestness in my expression, matching it with the steady resolve I knew she felt through our soul bond. Then, a solitary dark brow lifted in disbelief as her striking green eyes landed on the load upon my shoulders.
“No.”
Pain skewered my heart — even worse than my mother’s dagger.
“Ask me again when the war is over and you’re not covered in someone else’s vomit.”
She thinks I’m joking! I sent, aghast, to Lykos.
What did you expect? It’s not the most romantic of gestures in a destitute tavern, while sporting an unconscious, inebriated bard on your back.
You’re saying it needs to be more romantic, I replied, the gears whirring in my mind.
You’re being selective in what you choose to listen to, Godling, he reproached. I’m saying this is not a moment for whim—
It’s not a whim—
What else is a whim, but something not pondered? Planned? Or even well articulated?
The wolf’s scolding stung a little, but it spurred me even more. You’re right. I need to plan this moment better. It needs to be perfect.
His sigh bounced around my skull, giving the oddest sensation of a tickle.
Realising I’d not yet responded to Nyssa’s request, I offered her what I hoped was an understanding smile as I stepped up to the shifting black gateway.
“You believe me to be impulsive and impetuous on this matter.”
She opened her pretty mouth to argue but I cut it off before she could do more than inhale.
“No, no, it’s fine. I can see why you’d think that, given the circumstances,” I said, jerking my head to indicate the foul-smelling cargo upon my shoulders.
“But know this: I have loved no other. I have given my last breath for no other. I have not faced the wrath of Fate itself and tethered my soul to any other…. And I would call no other my wife.”
With perhaps a little too much mirth and flair, I turned and strode through the portal before she could so much as fathom a response.