Chapter 4 #2
His expression was still, almost blank, but his eyes had gone hard and calculating. Like he’d been watching me like a predator at that table and finally decided what to do with what he’d seen.
My fingers curled around the edge of my shawl.
“Are you really ill?” he sneered, his words twisted just enough to mock the concern they pretended to carry. “Or are you avoiding me?”
My throat tightened. “I just needed air.”
He stepped closer, and the waning sunlight caught in his golden hair, making him look almost harmless.
But the look on his face didn’t match the light.
“You left the table the moment I mentioned children,” he noted with quiet reflection. “Tell me why.”
A flare of panic raced across my skin. “I told you; I wasn’t feeling well.”
Thayden’s gaze slid over me, slow and assessing. “You’re not a child, Elariya. Don’t insult me with shitty excuses.”
My pulse kicked hard against my throat. “I’m not making excuses.”
He stopped a breath away, close enough that I could smell the faint spice of his cologne beneath his jacket. Close enough that I couldn’t pretend he wasn’t too close for comfort.
“You’ve been distant since you woke.” He kept his voice low. “And I’ve been patient.” The last word landed like a warning.
“Thayden, please give me my space. I really do just need air.” I turned to walk away from him, but he grabbed my arm.
His grip was firm enough to stop me cold. “I think we need to have a little talk.”
I sucked in a breath as he drew me closer, his hand sliding up my arm, his body crowding mine until my back brushed the hedge. The roses scratched at my skirts, thorns snagging fabric as he leaned in.
His mask slipped, all softness vanishing as if it had never existed. I realized I was about to meet the real Thayden.
“Talk about what?” My voice shook.
“We’re betrothed,” he murmured, lowering his head. “Affection shouldn’t trouble you.”
His mouth brushed my cheek before drifting toward my lips. I turned my head fast, breaking the contact before his lips could touch mine.
“No.” The word came out small, but it was enough.
Thayden froze, then his eyes darkened as they dropped to my face. “What did you say?” He gripped harder.
“I said no.” My pulse roared in my ears.
His fingers dug into my arm, pressure biting deeply enough to make me gasp. I tried to pull free, but he held fast, his thumb pressing into the tender flesh just above my elbow.
“Let me go. You’re hurting me.” The words came out sharp with panic.
For a moment, he only stared at me, something ugly flickering in his gaze. Not anger. Something darker.
Possession.
Then he leaned closer, his voice dropping to something only meant for me. “You’d better get used to me.” His fingers dug in harder. Not enough to break skin. Enough to remind me he could. It hurt. “Because I am your future.”
Pain flew up my arm, my pulse hammering wildly beneath his grip. “Stop it.”
“I’ll stop when I’m satisfied you’ve heard me. You’re very confused, Elariya.” His voice was dangerously calm. “That’s what this is. You’ve been sick. You’ve forgotten things. It makes you difficult to manage.”
“Difficult? Because I needed air?”
“Cut the fucking shit.”
The words landed like a slap.
“You have tested my patience for long enough.” He yanked me flush against his chest.
My heart slammed against my ribs.
“You belong to me now,” he said quietly. “By law. By contract. By every rule that matters in this kingdom. And I will not have you embarrassing me with this… resistance. You are going to be my wife whether you like it or not. Whether you love me or not.”
Tears burned behind my eyes, but I refused to let them fall. “You don’t get to decide what I feel.”
He threw me a wicked smile. “But that’s just the thing, my love. I do. You don’t get to decide anything,” he whispered. “Not anymore. Not if you want your magic-born family to stay alive. I’m the one with the power here. You’d do well to remember that.”
Blessed Mother. This…
This was why Emabelle was afraid.
His hand dropped from my arm as if I disgusted him.
I stumbled backward, nearly losing my footing as the sudden absence of his grip left me unsteady.
Chills raced through my body, blooming beneath my skin.
Then, as if nothing happened, Thayden straightened and smoothed his expression, the mask sliding back into place.
If anyone had been watching, they would have seen nothing more than a concerned betrothed giving his future wife space.
“Get yourself together,” he said coolly, then turned and headed back toward the house.
I stood there shaking, my arm throbbing where his fingers had been.
The garden looked the same. The house looked the same. But something vital in my life had shifted, and I could feel it in my bones.
I took a shaking step backward, as if the ground itself had shifted beneath me.
My legs barely remembered how to hold my weight as I turned and fled.
I didn’t look back at the house. I couldn’t. If I did, I might scream. Or do something that couldn’t be undone.
My skirts caught on low branches as I ran, breath tearing from my lungs as I crossed the garden’s edge and plunged into the forest, a place I was never meant to be.
The air changed instantly, becoming cooler, damp with moss and earth, carrying the quiet, ancient scent of things that had existed long before men like Thayden decided they owned the world.
My feet carried me without thought, deeper and deeper, until the sounds of the house faded behind me.
I stopped only when my strength failed.
An oak rose before me, massive and gnarled, its trunk thick enough that I couldn’t have wrapped my arms around it if I tried. I pressed myself against it, welcoming the rough bark beneath my palms.
It gave me something different to feel, other than the desolation ripping at my soul.
I slumped against the tree, my strength giving out as my breath shuddered from me in broken gasps. And then I broke.
A sob tore from my chest before I could stop it. Then another.
My shoulders shook as everything I’d been holding back spilled free—fear, confusion, and the sickening certainty that my life was no longer my own.
I clenched my teeth and pressed my face into my sleeve to smother the sound, but it broke free anyway.
What did it matter? The forest didn’t judge. It didn’t recoil at my breaking. It stood silent and vast, as if it had seen this kind of pain a thousand times before.
But then a hand settled on my shoulder.
Instinctively, I twisted at the touch and looked up. A platinum-haired young woman stood behind me, her pale hair a sheet of white against the green-dark forest.
For a heartbeat, the sight of her threw me off guard. I wondered if my grief had conjured her. Then her face softened into a pleasant smile, and her too-bright blue eyes gleamed in a way that felt almost unnatural.
She was real, but I knew just by looking at her that she wasn’t human.
I sensed it.
There was a flawlessness about her, and I picked up the same magical vibe I felt when I was around Grandmother.
With a soft smile, she placed a dainty hand to her heart and bowed her head.
“Na már iyah,” she said, her voice as gentle as a lullaby.
My lungs squeezed. I recognized her words. It was a customary greeting in Ivaliyahce, the language of the mages. In the common tongue it meant: I wish you well.
She gave my shoulder a reassuring squeeze, and I felt it, the magic humming through her touch.
I was right. She wasn’t human.
She was a mage.