9. Ayna
Ayna
By the time we make it out of the forest, it’s late morning, and when we stop for longer than to tend to our needs or water the horses by a stream and a few hours of rest here and there so they can recover, it’s another five days later. I stretch my arms above my head, grateful for the absence of the persistent nausea that has defined the carriage ride, and glance at Pouly, who’s engaged in a discussion with Andraya. My sensitive ears allow me to hear the entirety of the conversation about supplies, pending weather changes, and the need to lift fresh clothes for each of us so we don’t get detected through our smell two miles against the wind.
Tuning them out, I join Kaira, who’s staring out into the flat grasslands stretching in front of us.
“The Plithian Plains.” I don’t know what makes me say it aloud. Perhaps it’s the need to hear it so I believe we truly made it out of Erina’s palace.
Kaira nods, rubbing her side where her wound has been bandaged. Her bruises have developed various shades of purple, yellow, and green, depending on how far back the individual assault reached. “ Now we need to find the others.”
The fact that she speaks in her mind makes me wonder if she doesn’t want Pouly and Andraya to hear her, so I form my response in my head, too, projecting the thought at her. “ What do you think their plan is?” I gesture at the two rebels who saved us.
“ Whatever it is, it involves you on the throne of Tavras with an ugly crown on your head.” The smile on Kaira’s face is as much comfort as it is a mockery of her usually fierce nature. “ And before you ask, no, I ’ ve not suddenly grown soft just because someone stuck a knife between my ribs. I can still kick ass and laugh about it.”
“ As if there has ever been any doubt.” We share a sisterly look that allows me to appreciate we’re both alive, free, even if not in the way I’d hoped to be. “ We need to run again, don ’ t we?” I don’t believe I’d be able to if it came to it, so I pray to the Guardians that our saviors will support my wish to find Myron and the rest of my family.
Kaira shrugs, but the exhaustion in her eyes tells a story of everything but the nonchalance she tries so hard to keep up. “ Only if they don ’ t agree that involving your mate and the high fae of Askarea is a good idea. ”
When we briefly shared about Erina’s plan to conquer the fairy lands and how Ephegos seems to be pulling the strings, the genuine shock in both Pouly and Andraya’s eyes verified they’d been as clueless as the rest of the kingdom. This is worse than we’d thought. Who knows how long it will take to convince enough people of the truth to fight by our side? And the rebels? They might be loyal to my bloodline, but are they willing to stand with fairies? Creatures of their nightmares? And it’s not like we have magic at our disposal right now to fight our way out should they disagree and decide not to want to let us go.
Swallowing all doubts and concerns, I focus on the one thing that kept me going through all those terrible days in Erina’s palace. But I’m not the only one who had someone out there who kept her fighting, so I pull myself together and respond to Kaira’s thought, “ Don ’ t you have a fae brute you ’ d like to see again, too?”
A hint of pink tints Kaira’s cheeks, and she brushes her hair back in a surprisingly awkward gesture, giving her the look of a nervous girl rather than a tormented woman. I take that as a yes.
“ Well, then it ’ s time we find out if the rebels are with us or against.” Ignoring the assault of autumn smells floating on the steady breeze, I turn on my heels and head toward Andraya and Pouly, who’ve resorted to tending to the horses.
Much to my surprise, they don’t debate when I tell them I need to find Myron. Instead, they bow their heads like I’ve given an order instead of a request and pull out a map of northern Tavras, where travel routes are marked in interrupted lines .
Another hour and we’re back in the carriage, heading along the side roads where we don’t need to fear running into patrols or merchants.
“If we keep going at that speed, we’ll need to swap out the horses soon,” Andraya notes with a frown, her gaze on the proud animals grazing in the meadows we’re passing by.
“You mean steal them?” Kaira wants to know, a mischievous grin on her lips.
Andraya smirks, the facade of the lady shed entirely over the past days of traveling together, leaving behind a woman of practicalities and pragmatism. “Let’s say borrow . We’ll leave our own horses as a token until we can return what we take.”
Not that I believe we’d ever get the opportunity to return to the exact same farm to do so. Besides, I’d done my fair share of stealing as a pirate, so what are a few horses?
Eventually, we end up taking four horses from the last farm we pass by before nightfall and disappear into a small forest lining the side of the road.
I use the silence of twilight to trace the tattoo on my shoulder and think of Myron—where he is, if he’s all right, if Herinor managed to convince him not to run blindly back to Meer and get himself into trouble.
For days, I haven’t felt anything from him, not even one small tingle. Perhaps that’s because I’ve been so focused on our escape and then on ridding my system of the magic-suppressing drug. Now that my mind is on him and only on him, I can feel him in the inked lines along my skin, can sense him like a presence hovering at the back of my mind .
“I’ll find you, Myron,” I promise, allowing the wind to sweep up my words and carry them into the crowns of the trees, above them, in hopes they’ll reach Myron. It’s a foolish thought, but it allows me to not grab a horse and ride off then and there. There are miles and miles and miles spreading in each direction, and he could be anywhere. The likelihood that we’ll find him is as tiny as the needles the evergreens around us refuse to shed.
We don’t spend the night resting but take turns driving the carriage to put as much space between us and Meer as we can. It’s only when the caw of a bird that doesn’t belong in the night sounds from the trees ahead that I allow myself a flicker of hope.
Only a flicker.
But it’s squandered by a thud of something heavy hitting the carriage roof, and all my senses go on high alert.
“Down,” Kaira hisses, already covering me with one arm as she draws the knife Pouly handed her the moment she could stand on her own feet. A rush of power that I’ve failed to summon for so many weeks comes to life inside of me, and for the first time since Ephegos recaptured me in the dungeon, my magic makes itself known.
Andraya hands me one of her daggers while aiming the one she keeps at the roof as if expecting a blade to slice through any moment.
For a heartbeat, silence rules, the tension palpable, and the carriage is too small for the power stirring in my veins. Up and up it rises until I have no room for it in my body, and it spills through my veins .
“Watch out!” My shout dies in a flash of bright silver as power breaks from my skin. Kaira ducks under the bench while Andraya presses into the corner, as far from me as the cabin would allow.
It hurts… Guardians does it hurt. Like fire and iron and ice all at once. Like death and rebirth and the moon squeezing through my blood vessels.
In the distance, I can make out voices. Screams perhaps. The carriage doors burst open, wood splintering under the force of my power, and, for a moment, I finally hear Kaira curse in all colors of Eherean violence.
Then darkness brushes up against me, soft and gentle in a swirl of feathers. For a breath, I wonder if I’m finally turning into a bird again; then his scent fills my nose, and an abyss of emotions swallows me up.
“Stand back,” someone shouts in the background. I know the voice, but I don’t care what they want or why they’re here. All I care about is the weight of Myron’s arms falling around my shoulders, pulling me up against his chest, the uncontrollable need to eradicate every last tiny space between us. The touch of his lips against my forehead as he cradles me to him.
“I found you,” he whispers, and the sound of his voice tunes out the entire universe. “I found you.”
His breath is cool against my skin, his grasp on me firm—or maybe it’s me clinging to him in relief and desperation.
“Don’t let go.” Tears suffocate my words, but Myron understands anyway.
“Never.” On my neck, his fingers tangle with my hair, securing my face more tightly to him. “Never again. ”
In this moment, the world might have come to an end, and I wouldn’t have cared. As long as he was here.
“Breathe, Ayna.” Another kiss to my forehead and another, until I believe this is real and I’m not fantasizing about the day we’ll be reunited. “Calm your magic, or it will destroy both of us.”
It’s only then that I notice the strain in his tone, the anguish that has nothing to do with our separation.
Myron loosens his grasp just enough for me to take in the torn expression on his beautiful face, the angry red blotches marring his skin around where my fingers lie against his chest, and it hits me like a cannonball.
I’m hurting him. Somehow, my magic is attacking without my permission, harming the male I’d die to see unharmed.
He doesn’t shy away from my touch though, his expression soft despite his obvious pain. “It’s all right, Ayna. It’s all right. Take a slow breath.” He inhales, holding the breath before he releases it. “Exhale. You’re safe, Ayna. I’m here. We’re together.”
I can’t even begin to understand what’s happening when, like a lullaby, his voice strokes my magic to sleep, and slowly, the marks my hands burnt into his skin disappear, leaving nothing but smooth skin behind.
“Myron.” It’s nothing more than a breath, for I have nothing left when the outburst of my power has drained all my reserves. But it’s enough to summon Myron’s mouth to mine in a hard, desperate kiss that speaks of the fear and terror of the past weeks, of when I believed I’d lost him in the dungeon, the moment Herinor picked him up and carried him away to safety—and left me behind .
We both live or we both die. I won ’ t leave without you. I’d been prepared to escape the dungeon with him or die at his side, but I’d not been ready to see him ripped away from me all over again. And I’m not now.
Never again will I allow for anything to separate us.
As I swear that to myself, the angry power in my veins fades, and all that’s left is Myron’s taste on my tongue and the feel of his body against mine as we kneel in the wreckage that once was the carriage.