Chapter Twenty-Seven
Aren
Dietan motions frantically toward his bedroll at the other end of the space, his arms flailing and his face turning blue.
“What do you need?” I ask, just as panicked as he is.
“The knife…” he gurgles.
I immediately dive for the knife by his bedside. In one swift move, he slices the blade across his palm, blood rising in its wake, and instantly, air rushes back into his lungs. With a horrible, ragged gasp, his body convulses and he curls into himself.
But he’s breathing. The relief I feel is unlike anything I’ve ever felt before—so intense, I fall to my knees beside him again, unable to stand. He’s alive.
“Dietan…” I say gently, touching his shoulder.
He lifts his head and gives me a weak smile as he holds his fist clenched tight to his chest, blood seeping from between his closed fingers. He takes several labored breaths. “I’m all right. It’s all right.”
I pull him to my chest tightly, holding him as he continues to cough and wheeze. I have no doubt that if it had gone on a second longer, he’d be dead.
“It’s okay,” I whisper, quivering as I run a soothing hand through his hair.
He clings to me like I’m a life raft and he’s adrift at sea.
I can tell he’s forcing himself to remain calm as he leans his trembling body against mine.
I reach down to take his hand and notice he’s bleeding profusely from the fist clenched at his chest.
“Oh shit!” He allows me to pry his fingers open. The knife wound went deep. His hand is drenched in blood like a red glove.
I rip a long strip of ragged fabric off the hem of my dress.
“What are you doing?” he asks.
“I’m helping you, you dummy.”
“But your dress.”
“Forget my fucking dress!” I wrap the cloth tightly across his palm, the blood already soaking through the fabric. I keep going, winding it tighter and tighter.
“You don’t have to do that,” he says. It’s clear he didn’t expect me to come to his aid after our argument.
“I’ll fix it later,” I say. “It doesn’t matter.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to…”
I scowl at him, but there’s no heat behind it. He just looks back at me, ashamed. “I’m sorry,” he says again. “I’m a mess.”
Somehow, it takes all the wind out of my sails, and I sigh. It’s one of those dramatic, long-suffering sighs. His face twitches into a smile, and he looks away, covering his mouth with his other hand, holding in a laugh.
Ridiculous man.
I tie the fabric off tightly, cinching the knot in the middle of his palm. He hisses, taking in a breath between his teeth. “I have some dried Feverfew petals from Elspeth,” I say, tying off my makeshift bandage. “It’ll numb the pain and keep your wound from festering.”
He nods, his face drawn with pain. Then, all of a sudden, he presses his uninjured hand firmly against his mouth. He’s laughing.
I can’t believe it. “What the hell is so funny?”
He’s laughing so hard he’s crying. I watch him, unsure what to do as he’s overcome with hysteria. He’s probably in shock.
“You accused me of having feelings for you, and I almost died,” he chokes out. “You almost killed me.”
At least his color is back. I raise an eyebrow. “And?”
He wipes his tears with the back of his wrist. “This is exactly what I was trying to tell you. You’ll be the death of me.” He tries to stifle his laughs.
“All this because you can’t face your feelings. Just like a man,” I harrumph.
He bows his head in what looks like shame, then starts to chuckle again.
I frown at him. “It’s fine,” I continue. “We’ll…talk about it later. Just—sit there and let me get the medicine.”
Feeling more determined than scared, I leave his tent and return quickly as I can with my rucksack. As I pull out the tin of Feverfew petals, Dietan crawls to sit on his bedroll. He props his elbows on his knees and lowers his head in fatigue.
I kneel next to him, grinding the dried petals to powder between my fingers. “I’m warning you, this is going to sting. But you’re welcome in advance.”
Without asking, I take his wounded hand and unwrap my makeshift bandage. To my relief, the bleeding has mostly stopped. I sprinkle the ground petals onto the cut, and he doesn’t flinch, even though I know it stings like crazy.
I wrap the cut again, this time with the ever-clean gauze I purchased from the apothecary along with the herbs.
He flexes his fingers when I’m done, and I’m relieved he still has use of his hand. “Tingles,” he says.
“That’s good. It means it’s working.” I pull his hand back toward me and examine it closely as he flexes it.
Even now, I can’t help but admire the strength in his hand, how beautiful his fingers are—like every part of him—and I start to blush, thinking about how he had pressed himself against me, the heat between us…
“What’s the verdict?” he asks.
I snort as I tidy up and close my rucksack. “You’ll be right as rain soon. You’re lucky I thought to buy supplies. Helps to be prepared on the road.”
“That’s why I asked you to come with me,” he points out.
“Yeah, so you’ve said. You just want me here because I’m useful, practical,” I say, trying to keep the disappointment from my voice.
“But you are useful and practical. Is that such a bad thing?” he asks.
I shrug. I’m so tired of being seen as nothing more than a convenience.
After a moment, his shoulders slump. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I didn’t mean to scare you.” He’s apologizing for the wrong thing, but I let it go.
“I wasn’t scared,” I lie. I was terrified. Seeing him so close to death shook me to my core, and I still feel faint. “What happened just now—when you couldn’t breathe. That was the Rings calling the Whisting, right?” I ask.
He sighs and drags his other hand down his face.
He looks as if he’s trying to smile, but he can’t quite meet my eyes.
“Yeah. Since I don’t know how to control the power inside me, I can’t risk being with anyone because I…
” He trails off as if choosing his next words carefully.
“You saw what happened on the bridge. That soldier is lucky he only broke a few bones. In the past…I’ve killed people.
Accidentally. I never mean to. But they died because of me. ”
I freeze, like an icy hand suddenly gripping my heart.
Died because of him?
I’m not naive. I’ve seen Dietan use his sword to protect me. He’s about to ride to war at his father’s side, and bards will sing of his bravery and strength. Of course, he’s probably killed people…he’s a prince who has been called to battle, but by using that power?
He’s hanging his head, picking at the gauze around his hand. He stops when he senses me watching him.
I recall my almost kidnapping in Evandale and the attack on the bridge, where I was saved by a sudden gust of wind. “Then what happened to you just now—when the Whisting attacked you—you’ve used it to do that to others?” I ask.
Dietan exhales. “It’s always been an accident, I swear. I can’t control when the Whisting rises or what it does…”
I can’t imagine him choking someone to death with magic. “But maybe…you killed them because…it was self-defense?” It had to be. He’s not a cold-blooded murderer. He’s no Boreas.
He shakes his head, and I can feel the blood draining from my face.
“No,” he says quickly. “They didn’t attack me.
Or at least Cedric—my best friend—he wasn’t doing it on purpose.
I accidentally killed him in the practice ring.
He’s the last person I ever sparred with.
” His lower lip trembles, and he works his jaw side to side before taking a deep, ragged breath.
“The other was the only woman I ever loved.”
“Oh,” I say softly. I feel a flicker of jealousy at his admission that he was once in love, but it’s quickly doused as I realize the magnitude of his confession.
He’s killed two people.
Two people, the ones closest to him, killed by his own hand due to the Whisting inside of him.
The truth is like a struck match in the darkness. It changes everything. He’s carried this secret for so long, it’s rotted him from the inside. It must be a relief to finally admit it to someone—to me.
“So, you can’t control your magic?” I ask.
He looks like he’s done talking about his feelings and seizes the topic gratefully.
“That’s right. I can’t summon it or bend it to my will like my father did.
It just…happens. If this King Osian can get the Rings out of me, then I can finally be at peace.
” Shadows catch in his deep-set eyes, lending his expression haunted, hollow weariness.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I know you’re a prince and I’m just a barmaid, but I understand.”
His eyes light with hope as he finally meets my gaze. “You do?”
“When my mother died, it was as if my family died with her. And she died…because of me.” I close my eyes and take a deep breath. “I caught the red fever after playing with some kids she told me to keep away from. She got it from me, and she died.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” Dietan says, shaking his head. “Red fever is highly contagious.”
“Everyone says that, but it doesn’t change what happened or how I feel about it.”
He reaches for my hand with his good one and squeezes. “I’m sorry.”
“Thank you.” I nod and squeeze back. “Tell me about them, your friend Cedric and your…” I hesitate. “Your lover.”
Dietan sighs. “Cedric… He was a good mate. He was the one who snuck in to see the Rings with me that night. I was the one who always got us in trouble, and he loyally followed my lead. Cedric was the best friend anyone could have.”
“As for her… Her name was Liesl. She was a lady of the court of Alarice. I’ve never told anyone how she died.”
“What happened?”
“We went to bed, and I woke up the next morning—and—she was lying next to me, but she wasn’t breathing.
The healers said she stopped breathing in the middle of the night.
‘How strange,’ they said. ‘A tragedy.’ Nobody suspected—not her family, not the Alarician court. But I knew. I knew what happened.”
“The Whisting,” I whisper.