15. Ayna
Ayna
We’re packed and ready by the end of the day, but Clio and Astorian don’t take us to Aceleau until the next morning. Herinor and Silas grab the bundles with the cooking utensils while Pouly and Andraya each pick up a bag of clothes. Clio and Tori take turns site-hopping us out of the cave, leaving Myron and me for last.
In the circle of rocks at the center of the cave, the fire has burned down, the scent of smoke fading as Myron stirs the air with his magic.
“We’ll be fine,” Myron whispers, pressing a kiss to my forehead.
My arms latch around his waist on instinct, the rush of his presence so new, yet familiar, and I rest my cheek against his shoulder. “I hate when people say that. It makes me anticipate the worst possible outcome.”
The chuckle rumbling through his chest is halfhearted. “What would be the worst possible outcome?”
Instead of the hundreds of horrifying scenarios involving him captured, tortured, mangled, or dead while I need to live on, I kiss the sliver of skin showing beneath the loosely tied collar of his shirt. The shiver running through his body eases my fear, turning it into something warmer, more docile. With a deep inhale, I allow his scent to fill my heightened senses and focus on the way my shoulder tingles under the feathers of the inked bird.
“We’ll be fine,” he repeats. “As long as we’re together.
I have no objections. All I want is him—day and night, alone for myself. I’m greedy and needy and entirely out of control when it comes to this male, but the look in his eyes when I enter a room and he finds me, the way he seems to light up and gravitate toward me, it’s enough to know he feels the same.
“As long as we’re together,” I echo.
Myron seals what sounded a lot like a promise with a fervent kiss, tongue colliding with mine in a dance I should have gotten used to by now yet can’t seem to ever get enough of. His hands roam my back, wandering up to curl into my hair, almost undoing my braid as he kisses me deeper. Heat pools in my core like it’s been waiting just for a touch of him to be released, and I lower my hands to his waist, ready to slide my fingers over the front of his pants where hard arousal strains against my stomach.
“Save it for later, younglings,” Tori calls from the cave mouth. “The King of Askarea awaits your presence at court.”
Myron groans his frustration while I untangle from him with more reluctance than a mere kiss warrants.
It’s never a mere kiss with him. It’s the universe and the stars that populate the night skies. It’s silk and velvet and hot, molten ore. It’s diamond and steel and anything and everything that could destroy me, yet never will, because his strength will only break my enemies.
Ignoring Myron’s growl of warning, Astorian saunters over, holding out both hands in invitation while his handsome face features a bored expression. “Ready?”
Smooth, glimmering rock is the first thing I see as we hit solid ground after being torn through the folds of the world. My stomach churns, and my head spins, making dots of light dance in my vision like little suns. At a sound of nausea escaping my throat, Astorian elegantly drops my hand and steps aside.
Myron is there in an instant, his arm around my waist, even when I seem to be more stable on my feet than him.
“I just need a moment to breathe,” I say to no one in particular.
Then, I don’t have any idea who else is witnessing my moment of weakness. Scents of flowers and foreign spices mingle with the familiar ones of Myron and Astorian. Footsteps echo in the distance, approaching faster than my ability to stand upright, and just when I think I need to expel my breakfast at Myron’s feet, Clio’s laugh joins Myron’s words of comfort and Astorian’s ones of mocking.
“Guardians, Ayna, one would think you’d have gotten used to all the magic features our lifestyle provides,” she chimes, voice unnaturally loud as it bounces between walls of too-colorful rock. “You look like you need a hug.” Unceremoniously, she pulls me into her arms and squeezes until my breath gets lodged in my throat, and I cough.
“Too much?” She lets go only to pull Myron into her arms next. “You look like you need one just as much.”
Myron’s half-growl, half-hiss of surprise draws a laugh from Astorian, who has sauntered to the tall doorway a few strides ahead from where he watches the Crow King’s struggle not to attack Clio out of instinct.
At least, I’m distracted from my nausea long enough to take in the enormous entrance hall of what has to be the Fairy Palace in Aceleau.
“Welcome to my home.” Releasing Myron, Clio joins Astorian with a few swaggering paces, her long, copper dress flowing around her legs like molten ore. It matches Astorian’s ability to liquefy rock, the image so vivid that, when he slides his hand around her waist, I wonder if he could solidify her into a statue of metal and stone at will. Not that he ever would. Nothing the male has done has ever made me believe he’d harm a shiny hair on her head.
As if reading my thoughts, he tilts his own head, fixing me with his auburn gaze. “Interesting idea, but not practically possible.” A smirk graces his features as he turns to Clio and kisses the question of what he’s talking about off her lips.
“Where are the others?” It takes me a moment to realize Myron and I are the only ones from our group of misfits in this room.
“They are in the throne room.” Astorian gestures toward the room behind him, and I glimpse a large space lined with glimmering walls and columns. Unlike at Erina’s court, this palace seems to be only sparsely populated. The absence of guards along the tall hallways tells me Recienne isn’t afraid of attackers or that prisoners might sneak out of his palace, and the lack of courtiers gives the place a refreshing aura of peace after so many weeks of being put on display whenever I wasn’t locked up in my room.
The air tastes of something floral I’ve never smelled, and the faint scent of magic lingers like the dew on a late summer morning. It’s a unique blend I would find delightful were my stomach not tight with worry over what’s awaiting us on the other side of the threshold.
“Come on in.” His voice carries in like midnight velvet on a phantom wind, and my hair stands on my neck.
This is the voice of centuries of enmity wrapped in deadly charm. The Fairy King.
Myron’s hand wraps around mine as if ready to pull me out of harm’s way should this be a trap, but he follows as Clio and Astorian lead the way into the sun-flooded space.
I don’t know what I expected, but not the simple stone throne on a dais at the far end of the room. Beams of light dance along the glimmering columns, multiplying into millions of stars. To the left, grand balcony doors stand wide open, allowing a view of the gardens beyond the palace. I have a faint memory of stepping into Erina’s throne room for the first time, the balcony there, and the summer gardens below the windows.
This, however, is different. Hedges frame walkways lined with spreads of wildflowers and vines. Gravel paths curve in seemingly random patterns toward a stone fountain at the center of the garden, and I could swear I see deer stalking near the edge of the park where it melts into wild brambles.
Someone nudges me forward, my feet reluctantly moving toward the dais while my eyes seem spellbound by the tamed wilderness beyond the balcony.
“Everything will be fine,” Myron whispers, the thumb of one hand brushing the bottom of my ribs while his other hand hangs casually by his side, within reach of his sword. The tension coiling through his body is infectious, commanding my limbs to ready themselves to fight or run or both. In my veins, my power rises, ready to be drawn upon if necessary. I battle it back into a low simmer. No matter how painful the history between Myron’s and Recienne’s people, we haven’t come here for old grudges or revenge. We are here for an alliance that could save all of Eherea.
Tearing my gaze away from the greenery, I force myself to take in the male on the throne—the male who caused Myron so much pain.
I don’t realize how much resentment I hold for the Fairy King until I meet his golden gaze when we stop a few feet from the dais and he pulls his full mouth into a quirked line .
“Welcome to Aceleau, Wolayna.” On his forehead, dark strands of hair shift like on a breeze, shimmering with colors reflected from the walls in all hues of the rainbow. For a brief moment, I wonder if my human eyes would have noticed; then I decide it doesn’t matter. I’m this half-Crow creature now, and I’ll take whatever my senses give me. “And Myron…”
Recienne pauses, leaning his chin into his hand, elbow braced on the armrest of his throne. His cream shirt wrinkles under his black velvet jacket, gold buttons shimmering like little suns. But it’s not the attire that makes him so spellbinding. It’s his eyes.
Solid gold set in a beautiful, tan face.
“Fairy King.” Myron is shaking as he forces his head to incline at the monarch who trapped him in a forest for centuries, and waves of hatred roll off of him like the waters of the Quiet Sea break against the Cliffs of Ansoli.
On his throne, King Recienne of Askarea seems to not have a care in the world. “You brought your bride.”
His eyes move back to me, sliding down my form like snakes over marble, and I could swear his smirk turns into one of delight.
Trying not to seethe at him, I take Myron’s hand, holding on, both to keep him from snapping and doing something he’ll regret and to keep myself from screaming my rage at the monarch who kept my mate from finding his freedom.
“ I hate him,” I chant in my head. “ I hate him. I hate him. I hate him.” Because I do.
It’s only then that I notice the others by the wall across from the balcony where Kaira is nodding her agreement while, in her head, she calls the Fairy King all sorts of names even I am reluctant to repeat, pirate and all.
“I bring my wife everywhere,” Myron growls, tension coiling even tighter if that’s possible. Why he doesn’t call me his mate in front of the Fairy King must remain a mystery. Perhaps he doesn’t want to give King Recienne more leverage than absolutely necessary. Their history surely suggests any kernel of power he hands the fairy male is a bad idea.
“Even to the battlefield?” Recienne’s question hangs in the air, sucking the calm out of even Astorian and Clio who, until now, have kept a serene confidence in this meeting.
On the side of the room, Royad and Silas have their hands on their blades, ready to draw them at the slightest misstep of the king on his carved throne, while Herinor’s fingers flash with a bright sort of power reminding me of what I failed to contain in the carriage.
Myron seems the only one capable of putting on an unreadable face, no matter how ready to kill he is. “ Is this a battlefield, Recienne?” Omitting his title might have rattled Erina or any other monarch in Eherea, but not the Fairy King who managed to contain a whole people in a forest. Recienne is dangerous and calculating. A master of pulling strings on his enemies. No matter how I’ve come to like Astorian and Clio, I don’t trust this male.
“ Neither do I,” Kaira agrees in her mind, showing me a flicker of fire as if wanting me to know she’s ready to burn him at any misstep, no matter how tiny.
Recienne’s chuckle is sunshine laced with darkness. “This, I’ve been told by my general and the sister who’s run off to rescue him, is not a gathering of enmity but one to forge unlikely bonds.”
I can’t figure out whether that’s real humor in his voice or a facade he’s spent centuries building. All I see is a beautiful deadliness inferior only to Myron’s. A shudder rakes along my spine as the Crow King adjusts his stance and his arm brushes my shoulder where the tattoo tingles with anticipation of an eruption of his power.
His voice rumbles through me as if he’s speaking from within me, our connection stronger than ever in the face of this potential explosion. “Unlikely indeed.”