Chapter 22
22
A fter I bathed, I headed back to the tent I was to share with Rachelle.
As I slipped inside, Rachelle sat up, tenting her hands and watching me eagerly from where I sat atop my bedroll, combing my drying hair.
“Oh, don’t look so excited,” I said as I reached into my pack for a white shift dress that I had packed away in the saddlebags. As we advanced deeper into the trials, our wardrobe had expanded slightly—riding clothes, more sets of breeches and tunics, and this shift dress I had found in the saddlebags. “You were the one who warned me to stay away from him, remember?”
“The warning still stands,” Rachelle said as I slid off the day’s clothes, sliding into my shift dress that fell too thin on my body, the cold night air tickling my skin. “But it looks like you’re determined, and I can’t blame you.”
“I am,” I said, and hiked up my dress to strap the borrowed dagger I had taken from Tristen, sheath and all, during the day’s ride.
“Powerful wielders are known to be great in bed, so I can’t wait to hear all the details,” Rachelle crooned.
“Goodnight, Rachelle,” I said, and Rachelle winked at me just as I stuck my head outside the tent. I slipped into a pair of satin slippers that had also been impractically packed in my saddlebags.
The campsite was empty, the last embers of the campfires dying as night settled.
I had marked the tent that Tristen had picked. It was the furthest outside of the group, deepest into the woods. It was—thankfully—out of sight and earshot of most of the camp. I didn’t allow myself to think too deeply about what I was going to attempt—Callum’s confession had left me raw and vulnerable, but I tried to harden every soft part of my soul.
Remember, you’re doing this to give you and your friends an edge. You need Tristen’s power to see the answer to the riddle in the Oracle’s mind. This is just warfare—nothing else.
The reminder didn’t lessen my nervousness, and I felt sweat prickle on my palms.
I kept to the perimeter of the camp, noting every rustle in the forest. As I approached the lone tent situated halfway up the hill—better to see the other contestants or any threats coming, I supposed—I heard a low tune carried over the wind. Someone was whistling a song so wonderful and deep.
As I emerged into the small clearing, I spotted Tristen sitting on a tree stump, moonlight glinting off a blade he sharpened as he whistled the tune. The sound jostled something in my mind as I stepped closer.
His eyes ticked up to me just as I stepped into the clearing. He relaxed, sheathing the knife and looking up at me. He had changed from his riding gear into a white linen shirt that was unbuttoned, exposing the planes of his chiseled chest. His black hair glimmered underneath the stars, tousled and as unruly as ever.
“To what do I owe the honor?” he asked, and his gaze skated down my form, taking in the dress that bared my legs, my shoulders, barely a nightgown in its sheerness as it rippled in the breeze.
“I still have questions you never answered,” I said, and inclined my head to his tent. “Shall we?”
He raised an eyebrow, but in a fluid motion simply rose to his feet, holding open the tent flap for me. “Come in,” he said, and I did.
The inside of his tent felt warm and inviting—a few small candles flickered—and I realized the flickering was not a normal flame, but the mesmerizing blue-gold flame of his shadowfire.
“They won’t burn the tent down, if that’s what you’re thinking,” he said as he kicked off his shoes and sprawled onto the bedroll. His sleeping area was neatly set up, with blankets cushioning the floor and the warm blue Shadowfire casting him in an ethereal glow.
“Don’t think I’m that concerned about your well-being,” I said as I stepped out of my slippers and sat next to him on the bedroll, trying not to be overwhelmed by the closeness to him in such a small space.
“Right. You just have…” his eyes danced, “questions. Questions that couldn’t wait until morning.” He leaned into my space, a wicked grin on his face. “I wonder… does Callum know you’re here asking your… questions?”
I glared at him—then immediately softened my face. I was supposed to be seducing him, not angering him. I turned my expression sweet even as the words I uttered next made me sick. “Callum isn’t my keeper.”
“That’s right,” Tristen said. “No one could keep you if you didn’t choose it. You’re like a lick of flame. Deadly and beholden to no one.” He leaned in, trailing his fingertips up my bare arm. “I can’t wait to see when you finally let go and burn .”
My heart sped up. His presence had caught me off guard. He spoke of me as if he knew me. Not the scared girl trying to survive in these trials but… a version of me that was strong. Powerful.
Focus . I had to focus. I was powerful. And I’d be even more so with Tristen’s abilities going into the next trial—powerful enough to ensure everyone I cared for would live to see another day in this horrible fight to the death. I just needed to take what I needed from him. That’s all. My heart hammered in my chest.
I’m doing this for Rachelle. For Callum. For me.
Tristen pulled back slightly and cocked his head at me. “You’re nervous.”
I reddened. “I’m not. I’m just?—”
Tristen reached over and pulled me fully toward him, and I let out a surprised gasp at his casual strength. “Why are you nervous?”
He was so overwhelming. I just needed to let go. Just needed to get out of my head, and do what my body has been begging me to do. I closed my eyes, trying to regain my sense of balance. “I just need to ask?—”
“What do you really need, Saffron?” Tristen asked.
I opened my eyes, so struck by his dark gaze. The shimmering of his obsidian eyes felt alive and molten in the glowing flicker of his flames. My eyes coasted over his face. Down to his lips.
“You know what I think?” Tristen asked.
“What?” I said, suddenly breathless.
“I think you can’t stay away from me. You feel what I feel—something pulling us together.” I yelped as he pulled me closer, his mouth inches from my lips. “And you’re curious. Aren’t you?”
I tried to move backward, get some space to think , but I edged too far off the bedroll, my hand catching on my skirts as I tumbled back—and then Tristen was moving, lighting-fast. He caught my head before it hit the ground, pulling me back on the bed, his body atop mine.
My chest rose and fell against his, and I felt overheated by all of the places our bodies touched—and I knew we’d fit well together. On instinct, my right hand went to trace his chest, scraping across the bare skin above his tunic. Why was I hesitating? Why did it feel like I was on the edge of a cliff, about to dive off into something so deep and dark and vast?—
“ Sael ,” he breathed, his lips tracing my neck, feather light and questioning.
“Kiss me,” I breathed.
He hesitated, all of his flirtatious joking gone now. Why was he pausing? Was he thinking about how he was about to betray his wife in the same way I was worried about what this might do to Callum if he found out? I was tempting him, and by the way his breathing hitched and his eyes drank me in, I knew he was fighting the last shreds of his restraint. I would doom us both to hell for doing this, but I couldn’t back out now.
But why, despite all of my guilt, did a part of me long for him to cross this line with me?
“Please,” I begged.
In an instant, his lips were on mine as if my plea had cut through his willpower in one slice. It wasn’t a delicate kiss. It was a crashing union, and I was abuzz with the scent of him, with the thrum of his power as it vibrated through my body. I wove my fingers into his hair, pulling him into me. He obliged, his body molding to mine, not an inch of space separating us as his strong hands slid over my bare thighs, hitching the dress up.
As he claimed my mouth with his lips, I opened my magic to him. Just a little at first: drinking from his powers. Just a sip. But that sip filled my body with tingles, slamming me with warmth and pooling my body with fire— his shadowfire. His shadow wielding. His mindweavying.
More .
I opened my magic even further. As his power flooded into me, I arched my back, breaking the kiss as a gasp slid from my lips.
Tristen’s lips ghosted to my neck, his strong hands slipping up my bare torso underneath the dress, skating across the underside of my breasts, and I needed more—my body burning for him.
I reached for the hem of his tunic, pulling his shirt up and off him, needing to feel his bare skin on mine. As he tossed his shirt across the tent, I sucked in a breath at his strong body, rippling with muscle. He was built like a lithe warrior of the night, the planes of his chest wrapped with muscle. But what I saw there caused me to pause, to bank the fire raging inside me.
Across his chest, his torso, were vine-like scars. They were tinted blue-green, almost like a tattoo had left them. But I could still see where the thin chains had burned at him, where they had torn his flesh, the injuries reminiscent of a kind of chain that also had sharp barbs.
“Who did this to you?” I breathed, thinking about those days after the second trial he had been imprisoned for killing guards, supposedly. Was this…?
“These are old scars,” he said, taking my hand and kissing the back of it. Then, he looked up at me. “King West knew better than to leave a mark when he tortured me.”
I shivered, my lust abating. “So these were from a job?”
Tristen watched my expression as he spoke. “No. These are reminders of when I failed.”
“How?”
Tristen settled cross-legged next to me on the cot, pushing the dark hair out of his face. He took a breath, and then looked at me with those obsidian eyes. Those eyes that now looked so sad. So haunted. “These were from the night my parents were murdered in front of me.”
I gasped, my hand fluttering to my face. “When?”
“A long time ago. They aimed to kill me, too, but they didn’t finish the job.”
I shuddered, trying to imagine Tristen wrapped in magical chains and having to watch his parents’ lives end in front of him. “Is that why you became an assassin? For revenge?”
His eyes flashed. “Yes, and no. I became what I am today because it’s my duty to defend those who can’t defend themselves. The only way I could help Stormgard stave off Luminaria was by doing what no one else wanted to do. Pick up a blade and master a set of dark arts that would allow me to use my power for the people I care about.”
I tried to reconcile the man sitting shirtless beside me with the stories I’d been told. Of a ruthless assassin who killed children, who set villages on fire, who took me from my life in Riverleaf.
Tristen kidnapped you. He ruined your past life. He would do it again.
“So what does that make me?” I asked. “Wasn’t I defenseless when you stole me away?”
Tristen stilled. “I never did anything you didn’t want, Saffron.”
His words ran right through me. It sounded like the truth. Felt like it, even. But if he was telling the truth, that meant Callum was hiding something.
Callum. Rachelle.
I was here to help them. I was here to try and gain an edge in the next trial.
I reached over, caressing his chest with my fingertips. I felt him still under my touch as my fingertips trailed downward. When I met his gaze again, his dark eyes were ablaze.
“What if I want you?” I didn’t give him a chance to reply, leaning in to recapture his lips. In a moment, our flame sparked once more, and I felt my body responding to him.
I reached to the strap of my dress, starting to pull it down?—
—but Tristen’s hand shot out to grab mine, stopping me. I looked up at him in surprise as he pulled away to study me, but I still saw desire roiling in his gaze.
“Are you sure?” he asked. Tristen’s muscled chest rose and fell, his mussed hair and dark eyes burning into me, just as I was still burning with the taste of his magic.
“Yes,” I breathed.
His hands dipped under the ties of my dress, sliding the material to the floor as it gathered like moonlight at my feet.
He pulled me on top of him, and I straddled him on the cot as his hands pulled me to him and his lips moved against mine. Demanding. Claiming. I opened my magic wider, bringing in more of his shadowfire, drinking it in as I felt my body alight.
And then it happened.
I dropped into darkness like water tumbling over a steep drop.
Drip.
Drip.
D
r
i
p.
The ripple in my mind echoed, and suddenly I was seeing through my own eyes.
My past self’s eyes.
I was kneading bread inside a small bakery, the morning light coating my workspace like watercolor staining a page. Callum’s face appeared by the open window, his face so much less unburdened, just a bit younger than the Callum I knew him as. I couldn’t hear what he was saying, but he was teasing me, and I felt a warmth bloom in my chest.
Then, something stole his attention. He turned, backed away. Held out a hand for me to stay there. Stay inside!
But I couldn’t. Children were running. Running away from some threat.
I ran outside, Callum already turning to try to corral some of the villagers to go, pointing down the road.
There, walking down the dirt road to my village, swirling in shadows, was a god of destruction and fear. His shadows stretched high, higher—blocking out the sun as he made his approach.
Tristen Greywood. The Shadowfire Assassin. And his eyes promised endings and death.
His eyes locked on mine, and the memory slipped away—faster and faster and
f
a
s
t
e
r—
“Saffron?” Tristen asked, studying me with concern.
“I remember you,” I said with a gasp. But before I could fully digest what I’d seen, I turned my head, listening.
There was no sound coming from outside of our tent.
You should fear when all of the creatures in the forest fall quiet.
“Down!” Tristen said, pushing me off to the side, extinguishing all of the shadowfire in the tent just as a spear made from ice lanced through the tent, shredding it open in its wake. The faint cracking of wood—footsteps in the forest—sounded from outside the tent.
Tristen pulled me out of the tent, and we ran for the edge of the dark forest, a man’s laughter sounding from the treeline. I shivered in the cold as we turned.
Ajax and three of his crew emerged in the moonlight, steps away from Tristen’s ruined tent. Something was thrumming under my skin. A call to war. A call to fight .
Tristen stepped into their path, blocking their view of me.
As Ajax’s beady eyes glittered under the moonlight, I didn’t see any of the sneering bravado underneath his exterior.
“Ajax is… different,” I said to Tristen, trying to keep my voice down. “Do you see it?”
“I do,” Tristen whispered to me, keeping his eyes on Ajax as the hulking man took another step forward.
“We meet again,” Ajax said, but his voice was once again the monotone emptiness.
Tristen quirked his head. “You’re not like the last time we met.”
“Neither are you. And it will be your undoing,” Ajax said, and then a slow grin spread across his face. Off in some fundamental way, as if he was commanding the muscles in his face for the first time. “Kill him.”
The prisoners beside Tristen shot out at him, but Tristen wasted a moment to shove me further back, out of harm’s way.
When he turned back to the caster wielding ice, Tristen’s shadowfire grew at his palms…
…and then winked out.
I saw surprise flash across Tristen’s face, but he kept his composure as his magic disappeared. He rolled out of the way of another ice spear, stealing a sword from one of the nearest guards in a fluid move—before he spun and duck and sliced through some rather important tendons of one of the oaf-like prisoners who lumbered at him. The muscle in the man’s leg shot up like a rubber band, balling and making him go limp. The man screamed and then fell to his knees—but not before raising his cutlass and slashing a terrible gash in Tristen’s side on his way down.
Tristen hissed in pain, staggering just a step before whirling and blocking a downward strike from the ice wielder who had changed his spear into a razor-sharp frozen sword.
As the blood leaked from his body, I realized that… Tristen was losing. Ajax and one of his cronies remained, but he was badly injured.
I had done more than just replicate his power. I saw Tristen grasp for his power again and again—and by the way it simmered out, by the feeling of heat screaming in my veins, I knew?—
I hadn’t just borrowed Tristen’s power.
I had stolen it.
“Go! Run !” Tristen roared at me over his shoulder, blood sliding down his body from the slashes across his flesh—healing too slowly.
“Yes. Leave him to me,” Ajax said. But then he did something horrible. Ajax lifted his eye patch and winked at me with his ruined eye— a ruined eye that was now just a pit of swirling, inhuman darkness.
This wasn’t Ajax who had survived the second trial.
It was his double.