33. Chapter 30

Chapter 30

Love. What a strange emotion. I spent a thousand years believing that loyalty was the only thing I could count on. Now I know that loyalty is just a weaker form of love. My love saved Maeve’s life when she shattered. And Maeve’s love…

~Cole Cyrus, A History of Flames

Cole

Soon. It’s the only thing I’ve heard from Maeve for six weeks. It keeps me sane. It keeps me breathing and believing that she’s going to come back to me.

Her skin has grown tight over too thin of a body. She’ll eat and drink, but not enough. Her body’s fading regardless of how much I’ve tried to keep it alive. Her mind may be healing, but the body that lies beside me is terrifying.

I don’t doubt her, though. I can’t. She’ll come back to me before her body… before it’s too late.

I close the book and swing my feet over the edge of the bed. Another meeting today with Darian. It’s been a week since I’ve seen anyone other than the footmen who bring our food three times a day.

The clothes I’ve worn for the past week hang from a chair in my bedroom, and I reach for the pants. As I pick up a foot to slide it into the pants leg, I hear a cracking voice behind me. “That’s an awkward sight to wake up to.”

I whirl around, and I immediately regret it. My body’s slow from the lack of any kind of physical training. My foot catches on the pants leg, and I twist to catch myself, but it’s too late. I reach out for the chair, but then a shadow wraps around my waist, supporting me.

“The greatest warrior in Nyth almost got beat by a pair of pants,” the voice says. The “t” cracks again, and it’s only a whisper of the intended sound, yet it’s the most beautiful voice I could imagine.

I slide my leg into the pants and turn around, my eyes going to the Shadowed Cloak, and I wish I’d already put it on. “Maeve,” I say.

She chuckles as she slowly sits up with a groan. “I feel like I was hit by a full team of horses and the wagon they were pulling.” Each word sounds like it’s being dragged over sandpaper, and I immediately go to the bedside table to pour a cup of water from the pitcher for her.

“I’m sure you’re thirsty,” I say, handing her the pewter cup.

“Thank you,” she whispers, her voice seeming to fail as she takes the water and drinks it down. She looks up at me, her eyes wandering over my body, and she smiles. “I’ve missed you, Cole.”

“I never left your side.” There’s nothing else to say. “I knew you were going to wake up. I never doubted, not even once.”

She chuckles. “I doubted more than once. You made it sound like it would be easy, and it was anything but. Please tell me you have some food. I feel like I haven’t eaten in months.”

“It’s been six weeks since you… fell asleep.” The words come out of my mouth slowly. Carefully. I don’t know what she knows and what she doesn’t. Does she remember it wasn’t me that promised her to be here? Does she remember the thing that shattered her? “You’ve only eaten a little bit of porridge each day. I’m sure you’re ravenous.”

She looks at me with a sparkle in her eyes. “I’d say I’m ravenous, but we should probably eat first.”

I blink. That isn’t what I’d expected. “Let me ask our footman to get you some food.”

Without saying anything else, I walk into the sitting room and take a deep breath. She’s awake. She’s not dead. She’s not shattered. She’s awake and alive, and everything is going to be good again.

I still feel like a wave of shock is rolling through me, but I need to get Maeve some food. When I open the door, I tell the footman, “I need a tray of food that’s meant for three people. Get a little bit of everything. Some bread, meat, cheese, and fruit.”

He looks at me a little confused, but then he nods. I can’t remember his name, but he hasn’t shied away from us, even though most humans are terrified every time that I walk into a room with them here.

I close the door behind me as I walk back into the sitting room. I have to remind myself that nothing else matters beyond the fact that Maeve is awake and not broken. I’ll take things slowly with her. I won’t push her to talk. I won’t push her to remember things that hurt. I just want her to get her bearings before she has to come to any realizations about what happened.

When I walk into the bedroom, I’m shocked again. Maeve is standing in front of the full-length mirror, completely naked. “I’ve lost every bit of muscle, haven’t I?” she asks.

I can’t help but look at her. Her curves are gone, but it’s still her. It’s still the woman I fell in love with, and now she’s talking. Now she’s awake, and that’s the most beautiful sight I could imagine. “You haven’t eaten anything real in six weeks. Your body consumed your muscles to keep you from dying.”

She sighs as she stares at herself. “All that training. Months of it. All gone. I can’t fight now, can I?”

She turns to me and sees me staring at her, concern in my eyes, and shadows slide from her fingertips, a welcome sign. They crawl across the floor as she looks at me. I follow them as they climb my legs, staying on the outside of my pants. Then they cross my chest, wrapping around me and leaving my skin tingling.

“What are you doing?” I ask.

She ignores me, and the shadows become more solid. They swirl and glide over my chest, but then they slide under my pants’ waistband, so similar to how I would touch her body as the Shade. That part of me that has lain dormant for so long comes to life as I stare at her.

I’ve wanted Maeve for nearly as long as I’ve known her. At first it was a physical attraction, no different from how I’d feel toward any other beautiful female. Then it changed. It became something more. It became stronger until that desire was for so much more than just her body. The bond we share only facilitated that need.

I step toward her, and she says, “Not this time, Cole. This time, you’re not the one in charge.”

Her shadows tighten, holding me in place, and even if I were to try to move toward her, I couldn’t. Then I feel her in my mind at the same time. She stands next to the obsidian tower that has more cracks than ever since the crystal that had once flowed over the base of that tower has stopped growing while she slept.

Maeve presses her fingertips against the tower, and my mind is flooded with memories. All the times that the Shade manipulated her body. The way he’d teased her. The way he’d pushed her until she begged for his touch. The way he’d even tried to convince her to give into accepting a “shadow crown”.

Then I hear her voice in my mind as the shadows wrap around my physical body. They tighten around my cock, gripping me so tightly that I try to pull away. Maeve’s shadows have complete control over me, the thin tendrils supporting and restraining me.

The images in my mind continue to play, but Maeve’s voice sounds over it all. “The Shade told me that when I left my mind, he would be all mine. Is that still true?”

Her words terrify me in the best way. That scent of fresh rain—her scent—is everywhere, calling to me in ways that it never has before. “Yes. He won’t hold back.”

Her nails brush against my cheek, but all I can see is her bound in a forest, begging for more than teasing. “Good,” she breathes, and it’s like her words have become shadows, whispering over me and binding me just as tightly.

“You’re the Shade, Cole Cyrus. I remember everything. Your vows. Your betrayals. Your lust. Your love. I remember everything, Cole, and I don’t want the Shade. I want you.”

The memories stop playing in my mind, and my vision clears, leaving her in front of me, a hunger in her eyes that I can’t remember ever seeing before. “I remember the way you gave everything you were to save the world. I remember you accepting the blame when you were nothing but a tool. I remember you protecting me from myself and saving me and being the one person who always bore the burden. Cole Cyrus, you have been exactly what I need.”

Her nails run from my cheek to my throat, and then to my chest, a thin white line left in their wake. “You accepted your punishment once for what I said was a mistake. You accepted my blame and anger. You bore the pain of being the one person I could hurt. I treated you just like your father did, and that will never happen again.”

She smiles as her fingers move down my arm to my hand. “Show me your flames, Prince,” she whispers as her fingers brush my wrist. I’m confused at what she’s doing, but I do as she says, flames flickering to life in my palms.

The familiar burn of the flames against my skin comes as easily as always, completely ignored from hundreds of years of training. Yes, there is pain, but it’s insignificant after the hundreds of thousands of burns I've had in the same place over all these years.

Maeve runs her fingers over the flames. I can see the blisters appearing on her hand, but she ignores them. “I will bear my pain without forcing it on you, Prince. You have carried enough for many lifetimes.” She lifts her hand and shows me the blisters, red and swollen, and I extinguish the flames as she puts her hand down. “I learned to embrace the pain, Cole. Just like you said. It’s nothing now. There’s only one pain I cannot bear.”

I rack my mind for what that could be, but I’m so caught off guard by her actions that I don’t know. I can’t begin to understand what all has changed about the woman I thought I understood completely. The silence lingers longer than I expect, and I realize she’s waiting for me to ask.

“What pain can’t you bear?” I ask. She smiles at me, and with her other hand, she runs her nails over my cheek again. “Losing you, Cole Cyrus. If I lose you, I’ll break, and there won’t be anyone who can bring me back.”

I blink. Me? There’s a knock at the door, and the shadows that have been roaming over my body, teasing me and making my mind fuzzy, move from me to her, clothing her in that beautiful midnight dress that doubles as armor. Except that this time, the dress isn’t covering very much.

It flows with every step, tempting me as her hips sway. “Our food is here, Cole.”

Who cares about food? She certainly didn’t seem to care a few moments ago, but what am I supposed to say?

She turns to look at me, a smirk on her face. “I told you I was hungry.”

Every sense in my body is on high alert, and when she opens the door, I can hear the gasp from the footman. Everyone knows who Maeve is, and they all know that she’s been sleeping for weeks. I’m sure that by the end of the day, everyone will have been informed that the Queen of the Fae has awoken.

The door closes behind Maeve, and she’s carrying a massive platter filled with meats and fruits and cheeses and even some fancy desserts. I’d thought that Maeve was just teasing me, but now that her eyes are on the food, I know I need to be patient because those eyes are ravenous. She hasn’t eaten in almost two months, and there’s no doubt in my mind that she’d murder someone if they got between her and that platter.

She sits down on a chair in the sitting room, putting the platter on the little table between the chairs, and glances up at me. “Are you hungry?” she asks.

I know the answer to this. “A little.” I pick up a piece of Dalen fruit and take a bite, enjoying the nuanced flavor, but mostly just watching Maeve as she devours the platter one piece of food at a time. This is the first time I’ve had a chance to really just watch her since she woke up.

She’s different. There’s a definite physical fragility to her. Her skin is tight against her bones, and all the muscle that she built through her life has been consumed during her seemingly endless sleep. Her movements are slower and far more decisive, probably because of her lack of energy. Her cheeks and eyes are sunken in. If all you saw was her body, you’d be terrified that she was on the brink of death. And she was. If she’d stayed asleep another two weeks, I don’t know if her body would have survived the starvation any longer.

But her eyes… They’re sharp. The emerald green she’s always had has changed. They’re not a different color, but there’s more light to them. They shine where they hadn’t before. She’s alive in a way that I can’t believe.

The shining Painted Crown on her forehead is brighter and golden tan where it was a muddy brown before. Something has changed inside her, and I don’t quite understand it. Maybe it’s because I don’t understand what happened in that never-ending sleep. Or maybe it’s just that this is how she would have been had every moment since she received the Painted Crown not been laced with tragedy.

I pick up a piece of dried sausage and take a bite. Other than the sound of us chewing, it’s silent, something that I’ve become very accustomed to, but looking at Maeve, I wonder what she’s used to. What was it like in her mind all this time? All alone. Surviving on just a promise from me… from the Shade.

I have so many questions, but what do I ask? Do I ask what she went through? Should I try to understand what she remembers? Or is it more important that I tell her what’s been happening outside her mental landscape?

She leans back and smiles. “I don’t think I’ve ever been that hungry before.” Her eyes are softer now that she’s eaten her fill. “My body’s falling apart, isn’t it?” she asks.

I shake my head. “It’s done exactly what you needed it to do. You survived. You’ll have plenty of time to rebuild it.”

She lifts a hand, and a crimson red crystal forms from nothing, slowly spinning above her fingertips, something I’ve never seen her do before. “There’s no time, Cole. You know that. How many villages have been destroyed while I’ve… healed ?”

That’s not a question I want to answer. “Too many to count.”

“And do we know if Gethin has retrieved any of the relics?” The look on her face tells me she expects my answer.

“We suspect he has the Burning Brand.” The silence after my words is a far cry from the relaxed feeling only a few moments ago when she was eating. This is solid; it’s a thing to get through instead of enjoy.

She sighs, the gemstone above her fingers shifting and changing as it spins. “He most likely has at least one other relic. Is he still looking?”

My eyes don’t stray from the gemstone as it changes from red to a deep blue to a bright yellow. “There was another reported attack on another kingdom’s village just two days ago.”

She stares ahead of her at the wall behind me and nods her head slowly. “They’re still looking for at least one. The memories from my childhood were too blurry to recall the names and effects of each relic.” She looks up. “Has Lee come back yet? Is Vesta here?”

I shake my head. “No, Lee’s still hunting. A few weeks ago, she heard of a ruin that Vesta might have gone to, and she went there. We haven’t heard from her since then.”

Maeve stares past me and shakes her head. “I don’t have the time to rebuild my body into what it was.” Her eyes move to meet my gaze. “I’m going to need you to push me, Cole. Harder than you ever have before.”

I cock my head. “Why?”

The look in her eyes is one of happiness, even though her voice is sighing. “Because, Prince Cole, we’re going to have to take the fight to Gethin. It’s time that we take Draenyth back, and we can’t do that until I’m stronger.”

I look her over again, and this time, instead of seeing what she’s lost, I see what she still has. Her muscles have atrophied an incredible amount, but she’s not past the point of coming back from this. It’s just going to take hard work and a lot of food.

“You need to eat more,” I say. “If you’re going to work harder than you have in the past, you’re going to need a lot more food.”

She gives me a beaming smile and says, “That’s one thing that I knew I could count on. Cole Cyrus will never turn down training or anything associated with it.” Then the smile fades into something darker as she raises a hand into the air. Shadows extend from her fingertips and crawl across the floor. They run over my body, and every touch of them against my skin teases me.

Then they tighten over my wrists, and I’m pulled into the air, suspended until stone climbs up my feet and calves, holding me in place. I’m caught just like I was in the ecstatic springs when Sia saved me from Maeve.

Except this time, I don’t want to get away. Her shadows cover every inch of my skin below my neck, and then they expand, shredding my clothes. They fall away, and I’m left suspended and naked in front of her.

“We can talk about training later,” she says, her eyes on my body. “Right now, I have a very different hunger.”

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