Chapter 41 Stay Alive
SOUNDTRACK: Under My Skin by Ash to Eden
~ brEN ~
The skin on the back of my neck prickled as Donavyn took my hand, the bond glowing, pouring heat—and the cold chill of dread. Neither of us spoke as we traversed the rolling estate, back to the castle.
How could I leave him?
What choice did I have?
‘If we meet anyone in the halls, all they need know is that we’re dealing with tension in the dragons—an uneasiness with the feral herd.’
‘Yes.’
He didn’t mention that each step took us one closer to that yawning chasm of separation, but his grip on my hand tightened.
My heart raced.
The castle corridors hummed with bodies the closer we drew to the ballroom—servants rushing to and from the kitchens. Small flocks of noblewomen clucking and pecking their way to the powder rooms. The dull chuckles of handsome lords on their way to smoke, or find women who weren’t so noble.
So many bodies. So many lives. And seemingly not one of them aware of the death sentences already decided.
When one unknown Lord passed us, his eyes dragging from Donavyn’s face and down to where our hands entwined, the hair on my arms stood up.
Did they truly not know? Or had we been the ignorant, over-trusting minds in a plague of impending doom this whole time?
‘Relax, Bren,’ Donavyn whispered in my head. ‘As far as they know, nothing has changed.’
I nodded once, quickly, but tightened my fingers until my knuckles ground painfully between his.
When we passed the main corridor, though outside of view, the music, tittering laughter, and jolly sounds of rich, powerful people enjoying the festival wafted to us over the footsteps of the hurrying servants.
Then we turned a corner, and within moments we were alone again.
Alone.
Being alone with Donavyn was usually the thing I looked forward to most of all.
The word held a hollow ache now.
Donavyn turned his head and met my eyes. I wasn’t sure if I’d inadvertently shared the thoughts, or if he simply felt my grief. But his gaze locked on mine, bright, warm, and longing. And then I could breathe.
“Donavyn—” My voice cracked and I felt him flinch.
‘Wait. Until we get to the room. Please.’ He looked over his shoulder, made certain we were alone in the hallway, then began to jog, pulling me with him.
When we made it to our rooms, he took care, urging me inside with a hand to my back as he stayed in the doorway, leaning out to ensure no one had followed, then softly closing the door and locking it, before pulling the wooden chair from the writing desk and propping it under the handle.
Then he turned to face me, and our eyes locked.
I’d stopped just a few feet into the room.
I should have rushed to pack. Should have been mentally preparing the essentials list that had been drummed into me by Gil and Voski during those too-short training days.
Should have checked my blades and strapped as many to my body as I could conceal.
Should have been reaching for Akhane in my mind and making certain she was prepared.
But that moment hung in the air like a tear about to fall—the gut-wrenching promise of what was to come, yet still not upon us.
‘I have to pack,’ I blurted in the link.
He nodded, but didn’t move. Neither did I.
‘Bren… you know that I don’t want you gone? This isn’t an attempt to remove you from the mission.’
‘I know.’ I swallowed hard, though we hadn’t spoken out loud. ‘And you know, I don’t want to go, but I can do this.’
He nodded slowly, but one vein in his forehead rose, and those lines of worry and stress appeared.
Then he moved, slipping impossibly quickly across the space between us and taking my face in his hands, his eyes burning pinpoints of light that pierced skin and bone and threatened to lay open my heart as he searched my gaze.
I gripped his waist, the quivering tension in him turning his sides marble under my hands as he leaned in, until his breath fluttered across my lips and his pupils expanded to turn his eyes nearly black.
“I fear losing you more than I fear losing my own life.”
I might have choked on tears at the ragged, desperate words. But I knew. “I feel the same way,” I breathed. “Donavyn how—”
He shook his head quickly, sensing my descending panic. “The Creator makes a way. Every time. I have wished for you. I have ached for you. I’ve been given you. Now… now I will do everything in my power to overcome this bastard—I will send him to his grave, Bren. And then I’ll come for you.”
I gave a shaky laugh and clawed my hands into his hair, holding him still so he couldn’t look away. “You won’t have to. I’m coming back. I’m burying that traitor in his own lies, then I’m coming for you.”
His lips twitched, the hint of a smile, there then gone.
“Then we are agreed… this isn’t goodbye,” he rasped, then he descended on me, his kiss a slow, searing drag that lit up my skin like the night flowers we’d watched over the maze—tiny explosions that trailed down my spine, like cold comets plummeting to earth.
I heard his breath hitch and I froze, clinging to him as he hunched over me, clinging, his body trembling.
“I love you,” he whispered.
“I love you, too.”
He cupped my face and pulled me in again, inhaling deeply, his breath shuddering. The sound raised the small hairs all over my body. I grabbed for him, panic overwhelming me as the reality of what was about to happen came home.
Last time. Last touch. Last taste…
Donavyn wrapped those steel arms around me, murmuring my name with a tormented gasp, walking me backwards, both of us stumbling, clinging, desperate, touching, unbuttoning, unbuckling, pushing everything away but each other, until my bare back came up against the wall, and I pulled his iron warmth to me.
Tighter. Harder. He couldn’t get close enough because I knew it would be mere moments until we couldn’t touch at all.
The thought sent a shivering jolt through my core and I whimpered.
Donavyn, sensing my fear, pinned me hard against the wall, his body pressed to mine from hip to kiss, hands clawed into my hair, holding me there. I clung, clawing down his back, gasping, fingers shaking, body trembling under his touch, begging him not to let me go as every inch of my skin pebbled.
He trapped me against the wall with his weight until I couldn’t move—and I wanted nothing more. Held him closer. Harder.
He tilted his head to take the kiss deeper, sucking in as his tongue traced mine, his fingers tangling in my hair, his hips rolling, pressing himself, sliding against me—and I wanted him so badly, so desperately, I arched and hissed when he passed over me, denying me.
Fingers tightening in my hair, he pulled my head back so I could drink in the sight of his stubbled jaw, slack, fire blazing in his eyes—but flickering with deep shadows.
In the bond I felt his rush of want and need, overwhelmed with tremulous fear.
Still keeping me pinned so I couldn’t even rock, he held me there, sipping at my lips, but his eyes open and locked on mine.
He slid one hand down my thigh, hiking it high and pressing even harder against me. When my head fell into his hands, a deep, guttural rumble started in his chest.
‘I am yours, Bren. Always. To my soul.’
‘Don’t let him take you from me, Donavyn. Don’t you dare let him take you.’
‘He can’t.’
‘But—’
Without warning, his whole palm cupping under my thigh, he tugged my leg higher and took me, cursing when my mouth fell open and my breath stopped.
Tingling, glorious pleasure exploded where we joined, and spiraled out through every vein and muscle, to my limbs, leaving me breathless and shaking, urging him on, gasping.
But I couldn’t move. I was held. Covered. Helpless. Hungry. Full.
Neither of us blinked, and to hold his bonfire sent the flames in me roaring higher, higher with every roll of his hips, and grasp of his trembling hands.
That gaze was the sun, pouring love and light and hope through me—the bond singing with it, yet shrieking in dissonant chorus.
Last time. Last touch. Last taste…
It couldn’t be. We couldn’t let it be!
“Donavyn—”
He took my mouth again, deeply, but so tenderly, inhaling sharply.
I was overcome. The flood of sensation—his heat, his body, his touch, his love. And the bond, that quivering golden cord that tied his heart to mine and sang of his desperate, aggressive need to protect.
I whimpered again, suffocated by the conflicting weight of fear, and bounty of love. My eyes closed and I stopped fighting, letting those fingers in my hair cradle instead, holding me into his kiss.
And just when he’d stolen the last ounce of my breath, he drew back, only far enough to let his lips trail on mine as he spoke, so we breathed each other’s breath.
“I will remove the bastard that hurt you,” he whispered like a benediction. “I will come for you, and we’ll win—or flee—together. Do you hear me, Bren? He will not win.”
“I know. But—”
“I’ll make you safe. I’m going to marry you and raise our children, tell any man who meets you that you are my wife, my mate, my One. This isn’t over, Bren.”
With every statement, he took me, stronger, deeper, and that thrilling sparkle of joy and love pressed me higher, harder against him.
I began to shake, not with fear, but increasing need.
My breath coming in short gulps. I couldn’t move away from the wall, or closer to him, though I wanted more.
So, I opened my knees and clawed at him, pulling him to me, begging in tiny gasps, the ache within growing, even as it was appeased.
‘Donavyn…’
Tears pinched out from under my eyelids as he groaned and rolled against me, our bodies rippling together, his lips tasting mine, then hovering again.
When he slid one hand behind to cup my neck, and the other under my knee, when our bodies began to sing in harmony, and the shaking threatened to become violent, he whispered my name and my eyes flew open to find him staring down at me, his dark gaze reddened and intent.
“I have you, I’ll always have you.” Those simple words that he’d offered so many times, landed heavily in my heart, galvanizing the safety and strength he fed my soul.
I arched against him and he took me again—the horizon of pleasure surging closer with every thrust. “Come for me, beautiful—break apart. I’m here. I’ll hold you, I’ll always hold you.”
“But… Donavyn!”
His breath shuddered and his brow furrowed as he begged me in increasingly ragged pleas, to let go.
But if I did, we’d be done. I knew what this was. I knew what it meant. And it would end. It would end with goodbye—
‘No!’ he growled in my head.
With that desperate declaration, he buried both hands in my hair, pulling my head back and filling me again, and the sight of him, eyes burning with dark flames, the tendons on his neck standing proud, his shoulders rolling with tense muscle, and my name on his lips—it ended me.
My jaw dropped on a wordless cry that was meant to be him. He gave a shuddering groan as he watched me bow and jerk, my nails digging divots in his back as I held on, gasping, and he came, meeting me at that peak, both of us holding on as if we might be torn apart.
We would be torn apart.
And so, we clung even harder as we slumped.
I had a moment of fresh panic when he dropped his chin and I thought he would pull away. But he only gathered me up and held me to him as he carried me, stumbling, to the couch and sat, leaning back, while I wrapped arms around his neck, buried my face under his jaw, and straddled his lap.
‘Donavyn.’
‘I’m here.’
Then he lifted his chin and gently tugged my head back by my hair as he met my eyes with his own reddened gaze. His throat bobbed, and when he spoke, his voice was torn as if he’d been shouting. “Stay alive.”
I gave a sob that was half-laugh, half-weep. “I will. But you have to—”
“I’m yours, Bren…” he rasped, his eyes shining and intense. My body, still thrumming with my release, my pulse picked back up. “Yours. Utterly. Only yours. Make certain you come back to me.”
I didn’t have words to meet the look in his eyes, so I took his face in my hands and kissed him.
We held each other tightly for a long minute then, reluctantly, slowly, finally separated.
He followed me into the bathing room and, despite my protests, helped me wash, then dry, then took my hand and led me back to the bedchamber.
Nothing felt real as I donned a clean pair of leathers, and three sheathed blades.
As I threw other fresh leathers into a bag, I caught sight of the vials Terra had given me.
I couldn’t see how they would be important to a flight home, but I left them in the bag, then after a moment, shoved one of the vials into the pocket of my leathers, just in case.
When I was packed, I turned to Donavyn, to find him standing over me, also redressed in clean leathers, his face taut.
And then it was time.
Holy shit. I wasn’t ready for this.
He stepped up to my toes and took both my hands, standing over me, his bloodshot eyes searching mine.
“I won’t give up,” he said hoarsely. “I believe in you. I know you’ll do this.
I know you’ll make the right judgments when the time comes.
But… I vow to you, Bren. I won’t give up.
If God delivers Ruin into my hands, I will kill him.
No matter what… I’m coming back for you. ”
My throat ached with tears I swallowed back convulsively. I put both hands to his face and pulled him down, kissed him deeply, then stepped back. “I have to go, or I won’t.”
He nodded, but his eyes never left my face.
I kissed him one, final time. “I love you,” I breathed, then turned and practically ran to the door, because the urge to stay there with him, to take him and remain was so strong, if I didn’t run, I’d give in.
My vision blurred as I hurriedly pulled the door away, unlocked the door, and stepped into the hallway, pulling it closed behind me. Then froze.
I was leaving.
The words were a death knell in my chest. The bond shrieked. I let go of the ornate handle and took one step back.
Donavyn was on the other side of that door. Did he stare at it, as I did? Would he—
The lock clicked and I flinched, even though I knew it was right.
‘I love you.’
‘I love you more.’
I turned and fled.