Chapter Nineteen
I’m standing on the edge of a cliff.
The air is heavy and damp. Wind gusts around me strangely, sweeping up the fabric of my white robe until I’m surrounded by soft silk, a vortex of white. I fight with it, smoothing it down, but it picks up again and again as I look out over the edge.
Golden grain stretches as far as the eye can see. The wind sweeps over it and through it, cutting arcs and swirls into its neat rows, leaving intricate patterns in its wake.
A low rumble shakes the ground at my feet.
I step away from the edge, following a narrow path through high grass up a hillside. At the top sits a temple, its shining white stone stark against the dark clouds that loom behind it.
There’s something wrong with this place.
The wind is brutal the nearer I get to the temple. I’m holding my robes, looping as much of the fabric as I can beneath my arms and between my legs, but they won’t stay, no matter how much I fight them.
A raindrop hits the back of my hand. And then another.
I reach a staircase cut from grey stone, the center dipping, worn smooth by thousands of feet. I stumble on the uneven steps, my hair whipping my arms like a lash, and yet I know I must climb.
At the top, the air is still.
The temple has no door. I step through the entrance, the shadow of its archway feeling strangely cleansing, like walking through a waterfall. The vaulted room is empty, nothing but white stone columns and grey stone floor. No pews, no candles, no glass in the windows.
Lightning flashes somewhere outside, the windows on the left filling with light strangely, the flicker lingering a moment too long.
The ground rumbles once more.
When lightning strikes again, this time closer to the back of the temple, I see that I was wrong. There is something in this room, something concealed in shadow at the back where the altar should be.
I can’t see it. I haven’t known true darkness like this since I was a child.
It frightens me.
But I know where I must go, and my feet carry me there. My steps echo, the sound hollow, muffled. The air is stale and old, tinged with a faint scent of rot.
And yet the darkness calls.
I want to turn and run, but my body disagrees. It moves towards the shadow, drawn like a moth to flame: slowly, inevitably, fatefully spiraling towards death.
The darkness is near. I recoil from it, my pulse climbing, sweat dripping down my neck. I don’t want to know what’s hidden here. I don’t want to see it.
And yet I can’t turn away. My hand raises of its own accord. Trembling, I reach into the shadow—
And touch Ronan’s shoulder. My perspective lurches strangely as I realize I’m not on my feet. I’m lying down in Ronan’s bed, morning sunlight streaming through the window.
When I open my eyes, they meet Ronan’s. He’s lying beside me still in his robe with his head on his pillow. “Hello,” he says softly as I blink the sleep from my eyes. He reaches over and brushes the hair out of my face, and then he gently caresses my cheek.
“Were you watching me sleep?” I ask.
“Yes.” His eyes are the color of honey in the morning light, soft and deep. “I had trouble sleeping.”
My magic is weak after last night’s exertion, but even so, I can feel the grip his fear has on him.
“I’m here.” I touch his cheek, mirroring his movements. He sighs and kisses my fingertips.
“I felt you dreaming. You were frightened. I almost woke you, but I didn’t want to make it worse.”
“It was strange,” I say, still feeling the same feeling of wrongness from before. “I was in a temple of some kind. The fields looked like—”
“Avaris,” he says, his eyes widening. “The temple. Like a temple of Vayla only—”
“Wrong somehow. Yes.” I sit up on my elbows, fear gripping my heart. “You had the same dream?”
“I guess? I thought I dreamt of Avaris because of the map. The one in the library; I noticed yesterday that the city wasn’t marked as ruined. Did you see the city at all?”
“No. Just the temple. I’ve never been to a temple of Vayla in Avaris, though. I didn’t know they had one.”
Avaris had been a Nithyrian settlement before the last war. When Ronan’s father scoured the Machair Plains, it had been rendered uninhabitable. But the city was small. To my memory, it only had one temple where all the gods were honored, and it was in the town, not up on the hillside.
“That’s because that temple has been ruined for centuries. I visited once with my father. There’s nothing left there.”
A chill crawls up my spine. “But I didn’t know it was there at all. How could I have dreamt it? How could we have had the same dream?”
“I don’t know. But I have an idea how we might find out. If you’re not busy today.”
I have no plans today at all, having been disallowed from going on the mission to destroy the Nithyrian food supplies.
“You’re still angry with me,” says Ronan. Damn him and his magic.
“I’m not angry.”
“Sylvie.”
He’s right. Of course he’s right; I can’t lie to him about how I feel. “I don’t want to be pushed to the side.”
“I’m not pushing you to the side. I’m not doubting you, and I don’t think you’re incapable.
But you have to see what a disaster it would be if you were captured by Adria.
If the plan failed or was a trap set by Seth, and Adria took you captive.
We’d be right back where we were two days ago, only worse because you’d be with Adria. ”
“But what if Vesper gets captured? Or Octavia?”
Ronan flips onto his back, sighing as he puts his hands behind his head.
“Then I’ll try to get them back, of course, like I’ll try to get back as many prisoners of war as I can.
But it’s not the same. You’re not the same.
” He looks at me defiantly. “I won’t apologize for that.
I care deeply for my people, but not the way I care for you. ”
I feel him dig in his heels. He’s certain that he’s right about this.
And maybe he is, but I want him to understand my perspective.
“I appreciate you protecting me, but I’m worried that your fear for me might turn into control.
I’ve spent so much of my life being told what to do, what I’m allowed to do, and what I’m not allowed to do.
Being here has given me a chance to decide that for myself, and I’m scared that you’re going to take it away from me because you’re too afraid to lose me. ”
He blinks, opening his mouth to speak and closing it again.
I feel the sting of my words in his feelings.
“You think I’d try to control you? Sylvie, I wouldn’t dream of it.
I thought you agreed with me that it wasn’t a good idea for you to go.
” He reaches for my hand. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you were trying to tell me what you needed.
I thought that if it mattered to you, you would have put up more of a fight. I’ll listen next time, I promise.”
“It’s alright.” I kiss the back of his hand.
“You were right this time. But you can’t always be right.
” I ignore the way his lips twitch into something like a smirk.
He definitely thinks he’s always right. “As long as you’re willing to listen to me, to let me tell you what I want and need, that’s all I ask. ”
“I can’t promise that I won’t be overprotective. Or that I won’t be terrified every time you put yourself in danger for my sake. But if I ever make you feel like you don’t have a choice again, slap me.”
“Why do I have a feeling that you might like that a little too much?” I say, my voice softening into a purr.
“Gods, you’re going to be the death of me, darling,” he mutters. “That look you’re giving me. That’s my ruin. If you ever feel like you need to take control back from me, look at me like that, and I’ll literally eat my own crown if you ask me to.”
“I’ll tell you what I want right now,” I whisper.
“Gods, please do.”
I sit up and grab hold of my legs. “I want to be useful. Tell me what you need help with. And not in this bed. Honestly, I think I need a day to recover.”
“You’re not alone in that,” he says, gingerly adjusting himself. I’m pretty sure I nearly broke his cock last night. “Alright. I do have a mission for you, but it’s going to be dangerous, and I’d understand, given your history, if you don’t want to do it.”
“Go on.”
“I let the alchemists back into the Guild last week. I didn’t have much of a choice—we won’t make it long in this war without their elixirs.
But I’m not leaving them on their own this time.
They’re under guard, but I intend to go and see for myself today that they’re doing exactly what I asked and nothing more. ”
“And you want me to what? Spy?”
“I seem to remember you having a gift for getting around in the shadows unseen. I want to be sure there’s nothing they’re hiding from me. But I understand if you’d rather not go back there, after what happened the last time.”
When Zara kidnapped me and held me in a cellar so she could drain my blood to use against Ronan. “But that wasn’t even in the Guild proper. And Zara is dead.” At Ronan’s hand. “Did she really tell you we were shadowbound?”
Ronan nods. “She said it had something to do with how our magic affected each other.”
“Like last night.” I stroke my chin, thinking. “Maybe she wasn’t the only one in the Guild who knew about it.”
“My thoughts exactly.”
I’m not afraid of the alchemists. They weren’t exactly fearsome fighters from what Quinn told me, and even Zara hadn’t truly wanted to hurt anyone; she’d just felt cornered once Ronan began getting close to her scheme to end his rule.
And if there’s a chance they have an answer for what’s going on with our magic, it’s worth finding out.
Because something about last night has left me feeling unsettled.
Maybe it was just the lack of control, or maybe it was the strange, shared dream we had, but it feels like something has changed.
Our magic has always seemed connected; I’ve felt the pull of his on me since we met, and although he hasn’t questioned it as much as I have, I know he feels the same.