43. Chapter Forty-Three Rhea
Chapter Forty-Three: Rhea
B y the time I finish with my shower, Immie has brought food to the room and confirmed with Flynn that Bella is thriving in the gardens, enjoying the attention of a few children. I sit on the edge of the perfectly made bed with crisp white linens, staring out the window at the people who look to be setting up for a celebration. Today is the Summer Solstice, I realize with a jolt. My finger drags along the gold bracelet that Alexi gave me so many years ago. I remember the night he gifted it to me in exquisite detail, a small smile pulling on my lips. But as I watch the townspeople outside of my window, my mind starts to wander. Edging in are my uncle’s words about how he wanted to spend my birthday this year, and I can’t help but squeeze my fists in response. He is so vile and foul, to expect that sort of relationship with me—from me.
I sit in silence, lost in my thoughts, until Flynn comes out from his shower a short while later. He’s changed his clothing—though they still resemble his guard uniform. The black-on-black ensemble might have made anyone else look morose or drained of color, but he manages to glow against the dark color of his short-sleeve tunic and form-fitting pants. My eyes are immediately drawn to his tan arms, the muscles there impeccably well-defined. Silence builds—like a stone wall going up brick by quiet brick as he sits down next to me.
“We need to talk,” he says at my side. His fingers trail lightly through my wet hair, just barely brushing against me. I turn and face him fully, our knees grazing. “I need to tell you something, and all I ask is that you believe me when I say that I haven’t lied about anything that I’ve said to you.” He reaches out his hand to hold mine, our fingers interlacing.
“Okay…” I hesitate, an imaginary fist tightening around my heart.
“My home and my family are in the Mage Kingdom.” His eyes stay locked on mine, his hold on my hand tight in anticipation of my reaction.
When my mind finally catches up, air rushes out of my lungs as I gape at him. My heart skips a beat as my thoughts start crashing into each other, a tangled web of confusion and questions—and hurt. I finally stammer, “You’re—you’re mage?”
He nods slowly as his eyes soften and he continues, “It’s why I was able to avoid the blood oath. I healed the wound with my magic before I said the binding words.”
The blood oath didn’t take. It’s what he had told me, and I suppose that wasn’t technically a lie. I remember the feeling of doubt that had risen within me at those words, but with everything that happened after, I had completely forgotten to bring it up to him again. I should have trusted my instincts and made it a priority to have him explain. I never thought he would lie, about anything, and that naivety was coming back to haunt me— Wait, he healed the wound?
“Your magic can heal too?” I ask incredulously. I had practically begged him to let me save him, to use my magic to stop his bleeding so that he would live. And he was hiding his ability to heal himself the whole time? Why would he lie about that? My stomach feels like it’s twisting in on itself with his revelation. Was he using me for something?
“I can use it to heal”—realizing how that sounds, his eyes widen—“every mage can, but I need to be able to concentrate fully for a few seconds in order to wield it. I was so focused on you and getting you away from there—away from him—that I was only able to start partially healing the wound.”
I think back on that moment, how my magic mended him and then some, more quickly than it had with Bella. Because he was already healing . I feel panic start to build within me, betrayal trying to curl its way around my mind. I pull my hand from his as my body starts shaking.
“What do you want to know, Rhea? Please ask me, and I’ll tell you anything—everything,” he begs, moving closer to me on the bed.
My thoughts tumble inside of me, but I don’t know where to begin. He’s been lying to me this whole time, and that realization hurts . It makes me question every word—every declaration he made in that tower. If lying about something so huge was so easy for him, were the smaller private moments between us easy to fake as well? I struggle to sift through everything I want to ask and instead just blurt out, “Why are you in the King’s Guard for the Mortal Kingdom if you are mage?”
“I did it for my family. That wasn’t a lie. They needed me to join, so I did.” His words are sincere, but I don’t know if he’s lying to me. Or I suppose, I don’t know if he is telling me the entire truth. He reaches his hand back out to reclaim one of my own, but I keep them fisted in my lap. He swallows roughly, dropping the outstretched hand to the bed. “What else?”
“Have you used magic around me?” And if he did, was it obvious? Did I completely miss the signs?
“Yes,” he replies with a small nod of his head. “The biggest thing I did was heal your back after the king hurt you.” My mind is so muddled by my racing thoughts that I have a hard time recalling the memory that he’s speaking of. “But more recently was when we went into the river. I protected the bags so the items inside wouldn’t get wet.”
My eyes widen. I hadn’t even questioned the items being dry later that night. I just— I didn’t think. I was so preoccupied with my own feelings and thoughts that I didn’t see what was right in front of me.
“And I also used it to help you when I pulled your unconscious body from the water. You were passed out for this, but I healed my arrow wound as well,” he adds on.
My gods, the arrow. A little bit of guilt bleeds into my unease at the thought that I had forgotten he had also been hit with an arrow.
“Why? Why didn’t you tell me sooner? Why are you telling me now?” I ask as I study his expression, my frustration growing with each word.
“Fear,” he answers honestly, running the hand that had reached out for me through his hair and holding the strands there. “At first, I was afraid that you would tell the king. I didn’t know you or the truth of your relationship with him that well yet. You know how he feels about those from the Mage Kingdom.” And I did; it’s part of the reason why I never told him about my own magic. “Then I was afraid that telling you would mean that I’d lose you. That you’d be so angry with me for lying that you’d want me to leave.” He hangs his head, his hand dropping from his hair as he looks up at me. Even with his hair ruffled and his expression solemn, he is still the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen.
“And why are you telling me now ?” I ask again, appeased slightly by the sincerity in his words. “There were quiet moments on our trek here where you could have told me, Flynn.”
“Because I knew you were hurting and I didn’t want to add to that. You wouldn’t talk with me about what you were feeling, and I didn’t want to push it. I also wanted to give you the choice,” he confides. His voice is low, but his assumption that I have a choice only causes my emotions to heat again. “If you continue on with me, we will pass through the Spell and cross over into the Mage Kingdom. But if you would rather not, you can stay here. I trust this town and Immie to help keep you safe and settle into a new life.” My heart drops into my stomach at the thought. “And as much as it would kill me to leave you, I would honor your wishes. I want you to know that. When I said that you have total power over me, that includes if it leads to my own destruction. Whatever you want, I will do it.”
“What I want ?” I whisper, staring at him. All my emotions, ones brought on by his confessions and ones I’ve kept buried beneath the surface for too long, begin to rise until I feel like I’m going to burst. A hoarse laugh scrapes up my throat though there’s nothing funny about this moment. “You lied to me. You pretended to be somebody else, what, to lead me out of the Mortal Kingdom?”
My hands dive into my hair, and I find a kernel of calm in the storm swirling through my mind at the familiar way I grip the strands right at the root. Flynn tries to speak, but it’s like a buzzing in my ears.
“And now you want to pretend like I have a choice? What choice do I have? I can go nowhere else !” I shout as I stand from the bed, and that heavy pressure builds behind my eyes. I had never been anywhere but the tower. I wasn’t even sure I could survive on my own. I needed Flynn, I—
“Rhea, I’m sorry . I’m so fucking sorry,” he pleads, reaching for me but stopping short when I flinch away.
His hand drops down to his side, his defeat something that perhaps hurts me more than the actual lies. It makes me feel queasy, like I’m swinging back and forth on a vine unable to find purchase. A tear slips from my eye, Flynn tracking the movement as it falls down my cheek. And I see it then in his gaze, his realization that he caused that tear. That he’s the reason I’m hurting. His eyes flick back up to mine, and they shatter completely. Dejectedly, he walks to the door, placing his hand on the knob before turning back to look at me from over his shoulder.
“I’m sorry, Rhea. Truly. I wasn’t— I didn’t want to hurt you.” The door clicks shut quietly behind him, and maybe it’s foolish, but I wish he hadn’t left.
The look of devastation that completely filled the depths of his eyes was genuine. He wasn’t faking the way his fingers trembled on the doorknob. Yet I can’t help the way that I feel. So I lay on the bed, curling up on my side as I face the window. It reminds me of the many times I crawled into the comfort of my bed in my tower, but I never thought that these feelings of sadness and anger would trouble me again, let alone because of Flynn. I let the tears fall, my mind settling into complete numbness as cold darkness prods its way in. And I remember what it is to find relief in boxing everything up until nothing remains.
The bed dips at my side, the warmth of someone foreign caressing my arm and thigh. My stomach tightens, air squeezing from my lungs. Something is very wrong.
“Flynn?” I call out into the darkness. I try to pry my eyes open, but my lids won’t pull up. Panic rushes up my throat, a silent scream— No, a hand on my mouth muffling me.
A royal voice whispers in my ear, “You are mine , Rhea.”
My body tenses, and his hand squeezes. His lips graze my shoulder and then my neck, hot breath rustling the fine hairs at my temple.
“You’ve always been mine, not his.”
I choke on my fear, but it has nowhere to go. I can’t move, I can’t scream, I can’t—
“Rhea, wake up.” His soft voice and warm hand caress my cheek, and I relax into the way he makes me feel safe . My eyes open as I gulp in air, my vision slightly blurry but still able to see the outline of Flynn. Able to see his concerned expression—the tightness of his mouth mixed with the incredible sadness in his eyes. “Were you having a nightmare?”
I nod my head as I try to wake myself up further. The nightmare, while horrific, provides a clarity I wish I would have seen sooner. “You’re here,” I gasp in relief. His expression eases as his thumb continues brushing soothing strokes along my cheek. I sit up slowly and watch him freeze, unsure of what he should do—of what I will allow . And it breaks me because, while I hate that he lied by omission and can acknowledge that it hurts to learn that he did so, isn’t that what I did to him as well? Did I not hide a giant piece of myself out of fear?
When I said that you have total power over me, that includes if it leads to my own destruction. Whatever you want, I will do it, he had said. He had given me the truth when he didn’t have to and then given me the ability to make a choice. An option that I had been deprived of for my entire life thus far. Somehow, I knew that he had meant every word. That if I told him I wanted to stay here, he would leave me even if it broke him to do so.
So what do I want? The answer is simple, and yet it still hits me like a bag of stones. It overwhelms me the same as when I succumbed to the cold waters of the lake. I want him . In all forms and in all versions, and in whatever ways I can take him. Only and always him.
My eyes stay locked onto his, but this time, I reach out to him. He doesn’t hesitate as he slides his hand into mine, though he holds his breath like the moment might disappear otherwise. “I’m sorry,” I try to say steadily, but it comes out as nothing more than a harsh whisper.
“Sunshine, what did I tell you about apologizing? Never to me,” he rushes out, lifting my hand to his lips. The tender, tentative moment sinks beneath my skin as my eyes roam to take in the room. I notice it is lit with the glow of the sunset, golden light twinkling through the window. My mouth opens to speak again, but I can’t decide which words I need to let out first. Which feelings I’ll allow him to see. He must see the torment on my face because he continues, pleading, “Just talk to me. I promise whatever you’re thinking, whatever has you stuck in your head, I can take it. I want to take it, Rhea.”
Pressure builds behind my eyes, and I avoid bringing my gaze to his. Remember his truths, a small voice whispers, and I do. I can clearly picture the way he poured his heart out to me as he declared the way he felt in the moments after my failed attempt to escape. But, he hasn’t really seen all of my truths—how ugly they are — how ruined I am. I’m a walking mirage. On the outside, I appear to be one thing, but the closer people get—the closer he gets, the more he’ll see just how broken I am.
The way his eyes implore me, however, to let him in—to let him help me… What would that be like? To not have to carry this internal turmoil in the dark by myself anymore. To have someone continually by my side and not just for small pockets of time. I’ve been so caged in every aspect of my life, but this? This could be a step towards true freedom.
“I’m feeling scared,” I finally admit. “I’m scared that we won’t make it to your home, that you will get hurt— again —because of me. I’m scared that you’ll realize just how much of a mess I am. That you’ll see all of the ugly, broken pieces of me that I know I won’t ever be able to put back together again.” I whisper the words as I hold back the tears that line my eyes. “And I’m terrified that, even if I somehow managed to become whole , it still won’t be enough. That I won’t ever be enough for you—for what you deserve—and I’ll have to watch you walk away because of it.” My chest feels tight, my throat somehow hoarse. Speaking these things to him, they feel almost like a release, as if a bright light is shining into that inner obsidian.
He grasps my chin gently and turns my head to face him again.
“Rhea, I see every part of who you are. And the more time we spend together, the more moments when you offer another glimpse of yourself to me, it doesn’t make me want you any less,” he says softly, his heavy gaze cementing his words. “If you’re in pieces, then I want every fucking one of them. I want you—in any way you can give me. No scenario changes that.”
I shake my head, my lips trembling and eyelashes growing wet. Memories from the last three months together flash in my mind in rapid succession. Flynn was my guard, then my friend, and now—now he felt like my home. “I need you,” I breathe, feeling the force of that need bearing down on me. “Like nothing I’ve ever felt before. It’s an ache that stirs in the deepest parts of me and curls out until it’s soaked into my bones. It’s the way that the stars need the night and the moon needs the sun. It’s relentless and bottomless and like free-falling all at once.”
Flynn’s chest rises and falls in quick motions, his lips parting like he’s trying to inhale my words. He leans in, his hand coming to cup my cheek, but I am the one to close the distance, my mouth suddenly on his. He wastes no time sweeping his tongue inside in decadent strokes—the feel of it is a claiming that I eagerly return. My arms wrap around his neck as he pulls me onto his lap, my knees straddling his powerful thighs. His arms band around me, those large hands laying flat on my back as he squeezes me flush against him. I remember the feeling of wrapping my legs around him for our first kiss, and my thighs strain to clench together at the thought.
“Is this alright?” he asks, pulling back to look into my eyes.
“Yes,” I nod as I slide my fingers into the still-damp waves of his raven hair, gripping them gently.
He swallows roughly, holding my gaze as he takes a deep breath, and moves in close again. “I need you too, but more than that, I crave you. You feed my soul in a way nothing else ever has before. You’ve altered my very being by the way you’ve carved yourself into my heart,” he murmurs against my lips. His words are like kindling to a flame, and I want nothing more than to be consumed by them.
When he deepens our kiss, I find that I’m desperate to taste every bit of him, to know his body better than I know my own. His responding groan rumbles down his chest and travels directly to my core. He kisses down my jaw and neck while his tongue dips out to taste each inch of me like there’s nothing sweeter. My hips roll in response, the seam on the thin fabric of my pants creating an incredible friction at the apex of my thighs. The sensation of the heat of his mouth, as his teeth tug lightly on my earlobe, causes shivers to roll down my arching back as I gasp. I didn’t understand what it was to be so undone by desire until I kissed Flynn.
I moan his name, holding his head to me as he grazes his teeth down my neck to where it meets my shoulder. His touch creates an insatiable longing—a brightly lit inferno—that causes something reckless to rise within me. I don’t know what I’m doing, but I let my base desire control my movements as I abruptly push him down on the bed. His eyes grow wide for a moment before my lips meet his again. The strands of my hair fall to either side of our faces, cocooning us in our own honey-colored world where it’s just him and me and this all-consuming force. It’s a madness that I’d happily lose myself to for eternity. From this position, the bulge of his erection rubs right at my center, and gods help me, I may die from it. His hands rest on my hips, and I can feel his restraint beginning to waiver as he guides them back and forth, that grip tightening just a little more.
“Rhea, I—”
My mouth stops his words as my tongue follows the movements of my body, and I can’t help but smile at the way his breath stutters in response. He then emits what can only be described as a growl of pleasure, the noise so carnal that it causes me to whimper in response. Stars above, is it normal to feel this way? To be so undone by simply melding your body to someone like this? To want their scent branded into your lungs and their taste to be a permanent pleasure on your lips?
Flynn slowly slides an arm up and around my waist. The world tilts, and suddenly I’m underneath him, his hips sinking into the middle of my widened legs.
“You like being in control?” he taunts me from above with a provocative smirk.
“Do… you like that?” I ask, vulnerability somewhat cooling me down as I stare into his darkened eyes.
They soften for just a moment before he leans down and presses a sweet kiss to my mouth. “I like anything you do,” he breathes against my lips as he slowly drags his hand down my side. I can hear the pounding of my heart in my ears, my skin tingling under his touch. My breath catches at the feel of him—of how hard and ready he is for me— and I can feel how wet I am for him as my body conforms to his above me, my hands roaming his back. “But I especially like that .”
He braces his weight on one forearm by my head as he kisses me again, somehow deeper and harder than before. His other hand finds purchase on my hip, pinning me in place with a tenderness that lets me know I can move at any time. I don’t want to stop him though. No, I need more. I want all of him—with nothing between us. And I’ll give him whatever he wants, whatever he’ll take of me—it’s all his. I’m his, and maybe that’s why I let the words slip out.
“Explore me,” I whisper, recalling how he said he’d do that very thing once we were safe. And that’s all I have ever felt with Flynn—safe. From the very first interaction, he has always made me feel at ease. I trust him with every part of me, including my body. His hips sink further into me, his cock straining against his trousers as he lines up perfectly with where I need more of that sweet friction.
“You have no idea how badly I want to,” he rasps. His rough voice is a pleasurable scrape along my body as his teeth gently pull on my lower lip. My fingers skim up his sides, nails dragging along his skin as I lift his shirt higher and higher. “You can tell me ‘no,’ and I will stop at any time, you know that right?”
“Don’t stop.” My voice is unrecognizable to my own ears, and when his hips roll in response, I descend further into our chaos—everything else becoming a distant fragment outside my reality.
My magic starts humming inside of me, warmth and white light pushing on the confines of my body as I moan at every new sensation. For once, the only thing I feel is desire; it devours me from within, setting every nerve ending alight with need. My hips lift, and I rock against him until I’m left panting. The hand on my hip travels slowly underneath my shirt, his fingers moving closer to my breast as his mouth continues to devour mine. He kisses me thoroughly, soundly, in a way that makes me feel powerful.
All I know is this pleasure and the intoxicating grip it has on my senses. My hands roam down his back and lower, until they are dipping under the waistband of his pants. The muscles of his backside flex as he grinds into me, and just that sensation has tension beginning to coil at the base of my spine, my toes curling into the bed.
“You’re so fucking perfect,” he murmurs as his lips start traveling down my jaw and neck again. When the tip of his thumb grazes under my bralette, I gasp and arch my back, wanting to give him more. And wanting to take everything in return.
But the moment is interrupted by three knocks on the door.