Chapter 6
Basten
“Basten!” A honeyed voice snags my attention, and I whip my head toward the golden-haired girl sprinting across the grass. “Basten—I did it!”
She’s beaming, cheeks flushed in a fresh-faced smile that shows none of the sharp-edged rage she always seemed to wear under Rian’s control. Her gown is robin-blue velvet over a chemise with lace sleeves that fall to her wrists. Soft as a cloud.
Amused, I let myself smile, too. Not something I plan to do often, mind you, but her grins are so damn contagious. “What is it, little violet?”
Her hands twist excited knots in the hair at my nape. For a minute, with her bright face shining on me, I could almost forget that we’re at the brink of war.
She gushes, “I sprouted a rice seed with my fey. It wasn’t like before, during the Gloaming.
There was nothing scary about using my power this time.
I felt in control. Even at peace, I’d say.
Like I was working with the seed. Oh—” She glances down at the fallen bag of corn kernels, where a handful is spilling out of a split seam. “I’ll show you!”
She wiggles her perfect ass until I set her down.
She drops to her knees in the tall grass, scooping a handful of corn kernel seeds, then presses them into the soil, holding them there like trapped ants under her palm.
There’s a lightness to her movements. A raw vigor I’ve only seen in her when she rides Myst, wild and free.
At the same time, though, my godkiss picks up on something that gives me pause. Her enthusiasm is hot and fast—almost manic. Her pulse is rushed, even for a fae.
“Woudix told me that my body remembers how to do this. It’s just my mind that needs to catch up,” she rattles.
Her fey lines break out across the back of her hands, snaking up her wrists, where they disappear under her lace sleeves, only to blaze again with full force as they reach her neckline and spread to her temples.
Her attention is so riveted to the seeds that I don’t think she’s even noticed how her ears have grown points.
And, I’m not the only one watching.
Throughout the garden, a chorus of awe-filled gasps spreads as she slips into her otherworldly fae body.
Hedge-trimmers and kitchen girls stare. Courtesans and cooks stop in their tracks to watch.
That bastard, Woudix, is crouched down to stroke Hawk’s back, but he doesn’t fool me—his attention is on her, too.
I clock each onlooker, as protective over Sabine as a wolf with its mate. I can’t begrudge some gangly young soldiers their adoration. No matter how many times I’ve seen Sabine drop her human glamour, I lose my damn voice for a minute too.
She isn’t just beautiful—she’s mythic.
From the moment I saw Sabine Darrow, I thought of her as a goddess. Now, she simply reflects the way I always saw her. Utterly fucking divine.
But something’s wrong.
Her eyebrows draw together to form a thick line of worry. Her hand shakes. When I sink into a crouch next to her, resting one hand on her shoulder, her eyes are still feverish-bright, but there are deep hollows around them.
“You’re exhausted,” I say softly. “You need a break. You used up all your fey sprouting the rice.”
“No!” She turns sharply back toward the soil, knocking my palm off her shoulder in the process, but doesn’t seem to take notice. “I—I can do it again. I know I can.”
Her eyes glaze over the same way they did during the Gloaming.
“I want to show you what I can do—” she insists.
She closes her eyes, wrinkles deepening as she concentrates. And, it happens. A tiny, weak green shoot breaks through the loamy soil to curl around her cupped palm.
She lets out a small cry of satisfaction, but it’s immediately overshadowed by her flickering fey lines, which dim to a barely-there flutter.
She moans as she slumps forward, her hair cascading forward over her bowed head.
That’s all I fucking need to see.
“Yeah—you’re coming with me,” I mutter. “You need rest.”
Every protective instinct roars in me as I scoop her up in my arms, throwing her weak, too-light body over my shoulder. Damn, but she feels even lighter than the seed sack, like she might float away on the next breeze.
“Wait,” she protests, wriggling her pretty hips on my shoulder, but there’s no real fight in her. She used up every ounce of her energy on that tiny sprout. “Wait, I can do it. I promise.”
“Little violet, trust me, I’ve seen you do the impossible. I know you can sprout a damn seed. But right now, I need to take care of you.”
I scan the garden. A cluster of pit diggers toils near the entrance—I’d rather not have them see Sabine up close like this, vulnerable and in desperate need of sustenance.
I could carry her beneath the giant hemlock where the branches form a natural tent, but Woudix is only paces away.
And I don’t like that dark smirk on his lips, the way he’s rolling a plucked rice shoot between his fingers.
I pivot sharply the other way, swallowing a bite of jealousy, and spot a greenhouse nestled near the garden wall.
Inside, it’s hot and bright—but maybe that’s what Sabine needs to balance her silver blood. Potted ferns seem to turn our way as I push past them, as drawn to Sabine as every eye was in the courtyard. A showy orchid bursting with blooms bends forward to brush her cheek, but I swat it away.
“Thanks, but I’ve got her.”
Gods—talking to plants now, Basten?
With every minute, Sabine’s pulse grows more erratic, and in my urgency, I shove a stack of clay pots off a table to make room for her. They crash to the ground as I set Sabine’s ass on the table.
Her eyes are frenzied as they roll around in her head. I don’t think she even notices how the potted vines strain toward her with a preternatural life of their own.
She chatters, voice falling in and out from exhaustion, “Woudix said that it was time to move on from the research books…”
“That right?” I mutter, utterly uninterested in anything to do with Woudix, as I start to unroll my sleeve back over the scars that spell out her name on my wrist.
“Yes,” she gulps, “and he also said… He said—”
“Hey,” I cut her off gently, offering her my bare wrist. “You need me. Drink.”
Her eyes dart briefly to the throbbing vein beneath my wrist, her irises tightening for a second like a predator’s, but then her feverish excitement returns.
She grabs my shirt collar, pulling me close.
“Basten, it was like nothing I’ve ever felt. True connection. Like the seed and I were speaking a language no one else knows.”
“That’s great, sweetheart.” I know I might sound like a dismissive ass, but I do mean it. I’m proud as hell of her, but the thing is, I never felt a second of doubt that she could tap into her powers. “Now, drink.”
I wiggle my wrist temptingly, and it’s enough for her incisors to lengthen and gleam in the sunlight filtering through the greenhouse windows. She grabs my wrist lightly, distractedly.
But doesn’t bite.
She continues, “It was all just theory until Woudix put his hand over mine. When I felt his fey against my own, it awakened something.”
Immediately, my muscles pull tight as bowstrings.
Hold on. He touched her?
I flex, ready to slam my fist into whatever clay pot around here most resembles the God of Death’s face.
Through the glass windows, I’m very aware that we still have an audience. Gardeners, pit diggers, and, sure enough—the damn miracle man himself.
Staring straight at the greenhouse as if his blind eyes can somehow see every move we make.
It stokes the huntsman in me. But Sabine seems oblivious to my growing jealousy as she rattles on about the seed’s call to her and how Woudix made it all possible.
That God of Death and I? Yeah, we’re going to have words.
“Woudix says…he says that with the right guidance, I might soon sprout…entire fields!” she continues, energy fading fast.
“Mmmhhmm,” I mutter, wriggling my wrist.
Instead, she tightens her hold on my shirt collar until it digs into the back of my neck. “With Woudix’s help, I could…answer the refugees’ prayers, Basten. You wouldn’t have to…help them all on your own. I could fix everything.”
There’s such hope in her exhausted voice that it nearly breaks.
A tenderness catches me off guard, like a hand around my throat—gentle, not choking. The bowstrings in my chest loosen.
It’s a relief to hear her talking about using her powers for good.
Not that I ever truly doubted her…but ever since uncovering the old pictograms in Drahallen Hall’s foundation, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about Immortal Solene with that devious smirk, the wreckage of an entire city behind her.
I’m loyal to her—no fucking question.
Then again, what good is loyalty from a man like me? I was loyal to Rian, too. Look at how that turned out.
Gritting my teeth, I unsheathe the knife at my side and slit my wrist. A line of blood spills down my skin, dropping thickly onto my boot.
The smell of iron blasts through the greenhouse.
Her words vanish as the scent hits her like a drug.
She pounces on my arm, eyes shining like a night creature’s, lips latching hungrily over my wound.
She sucks, drinks, tastes. A groan rolls out of me.
It does something to me, giving her my blood.
Having her use me. Knowing I—only I—can do this for her.
“That’s it,” I groan between clenched teeth, grabbing the sloped wooden rafter overhead to steady myself. “Take it. Take what you need.”
The more her soft lips hunt and suck at my skin, the more her sweet torture drives me crazy.
Her pulse steadies, alive now not with jitters but with the heady drive of hunger. I can see the change in her eyes, her skin—her cheeks pinken and fill out, and I swear that her hair shines bright as sun-touched silk.
She breaks away roughly, touches her lips and looks at the blood on her fingers with both horror and fascination. Her fingers begin to tremble. “Basten. I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Hurt me,” I order gently.