Chapter 11 Mance, Without Asset, Without Livid
Mance, Without Asset, Without Livid
Reltas shoves me into the room and I stumble backward, colliding with a settee.
“We should discuss this,” I say hastily. “As we are not yet wed, surely it’s not appropriate for us to . . . to—”
He raises an eyebrow, smirking. “To what?”
I scowl at him. “You know what,” I say through gritted teeth.
He laughs, shrugging out of his overcoat and tossing it onto a chair. “Relax,” he says, “I have as little interest in sharing a bed as you do. There are separate suites.”
With a flick of his wrist, he indicates two doors on either side of the room, one painted blue with green carvings like vines, and the other orange, with yellow carvings shaped like flowers. My creatures squirm under my skin, not sure if he’s being serious or still toying with me.
He’s fully turned away from me, though. He isn’t watching me the way he would if he were only trying to get a response. I finally decide he’s being sincere and release a breath in relief. “At least I have a week, then.”
I don’t realize that I spoke aloud until he scoffs, his vivid green eyes cutting over to me in cruel amusement. “Not interested means not interested,” he says bluntly. “I want you for political reasons, not for your body. You can go ahead and sleep alone until we die.”
I bristle at his tone. Not that I want to lay with him, of course. The idea of it makes my creatures restless and unsettled, pacing the length of my insides.
I just don’t believe that Reltas is telling the truth.
“The marriage isn’t binding until it’s . . . consummated,” I point out carefully.
He doesn’t seem concerned, doesn’t even look up. “As long as the vows are public, the union won’t be questioned. It’s not like anyone is going to come into our chambers to double-check that we followed through.”
Fastidiously, I weigh his tone, watch his movements. He doesn’t seem to be lying. And if he were tricking me, wouldn’t his words be kinder? The fact that he’s being so caustic is oddly reassuring. I sit down, deciding to accept the sentiment at face value. “Well . . . thank you,” I say.
He rolls his eyes. “It’s not a kindness. I just don’t want you.”
“I got that,” I reply testily. “Even so.”
He takes a cloak off a hook on the wall, less decorated than the overcoat he was wearing before, and wraps it around himself, making for the door.
“You’re leaving?” I ask.
“Do you care?” he shoots back. “It’s not like you’ll miss me.”
“I thought we were supposed to be discussing the wedding date.”
“Later,” he says. Then he slips into the hallway without looking back, leaving me alone in my—our—new chambers, the silence dusty and still.
I wrap my arms around my knees, taking in the room around me.
It truly does look like a couples’ suite, although it feels aggressively clean and suspiciously new. I realize he must have only moved into it recently, when his father passed. Perhaps he had it redecorated then.
I try the blue door, but it’s locked, so I enter the room behind the door painted yellow.
It’s been stripped, like Reltas took everything remotely meaningful out of it before he let me in. I can see outlines on the walls where pictures must have been. His mother’s, I assume. And I run my fingers along their edges, wondering what they used to contain.
It’s disorienting to be alone in this foreign place. I feel a bit like the walls, shucked of everything familiar. Incomplete. Exposed.
And I miss Silver already. I wish we didn’t leave things on such a hard note. I looked for him before I left to try to make up but couldn’t find him anywhere, and there was so little time.
I hope he doesn’t hate me.
Though, how could he not?
The very thought makes my chest feel heavy with creatures collapsing in dismay.
I hope I’ll be able to figure this out soon and get back to him.
Twisting the chain at my neck, I draw a small leather pouch out of the top of my dress, fiddling with the strings that bind it.
Inside, there is a collection of flowers. Squashed, bruised ones from the pile I found splayed in the hallway after our fight.
It doesn’t matter that they’re broken. They’re still beautiful to me. They’re still the colors of a sunrise.
I tuck the pouch away again and start to pace.
What I need is a plan. Because this cannot really be my future. I refuse to be bound to a man who despises me and then stuffed away in an undecorated room like a broom in a closet. That will not be my life.
The problem is that with Asset away on her hastily arranged mission, it’s difficult for me to formulate a plan on my own.
When I try, it’s like my mind won’t hold still long enough to think things through logically.
All I’m left with are wild impulses, powerful feelings, and a pretty mask to make it look like I still have it all together.
I don’t, though.
What am I going to do?
Something flashes by my window and I stiffen.
There are many shadows in the forest, of course. Many things moving in the brush. But my rooms are on the third story, so I didn’t expect any movement up here. And it almost looked like . . . a face.
I approach the window cautiously, peering out into the night. Wondering which of my animals might defend me best from a threat, given that the predators are gone. A large bird? A . . . raccoon?
At first, I see nothing but the outlines of trees and the deepening gloom.
Then the face appears again, right in front of me, and a frantic pair of amber eyes locks on mine.
My mouth falls open. “Silver?!”
Without waiting a moment, he wrenches open the window and pushes his way in, landing on all fours like a cat. “Where is he?” he asks, voice dark.
My mind is struggling to catch up. “Who—Reltas? I don’t know; he went somewhere.”
“Good. Let’s barricade the door before he gets back. Does this armoire move?”
I start to respond before realizing that I don’t actually know. I don’t know whether the armoire is movable, I don’t know how Silver got to the Forest Realm, and I certainly don’t know how he managed to find and access my window. I really only know one thing.
I am so glad to see him.
“Silver—”
He braces against the armoire with one shoulder, only to discover that it is, in fact, bolted to the floor. “Okay, the bed maybe? Or I could just take you through the window with me. We could run.”
“Silver—”
“No,” he says, wheeling on me. “Don’t try to talk me out of it. I’m not letting him force you into bed with him, Mance. It’s not happening. I don’t care if it affects inter-realm relations or whatever; there are some lines you shouldn’t have to cross. It’s not right. He can’t—”
I cut him off by throwing my arms around him and pressing my lips to his.
Silver takes a second to catch up to the situation, but when he does, he responds with a fierceness that startles me, burying his hands in my hair and kissing me like he may never get the chance again.
Something flickers in the back of my mind, trying to remind me that this may not be the best of times for this, but the warning is fuzzy, and it flits away before I can fully examine it.
My voice of reason isn’t in right now. So I return his fervor eagerly, leaning in so far that he falls backward onto the bed and I end up on top of him, our lips never parting.
In this place of dangerous, unfamiliar things, his hands on my body feel like home.
They feel like warmth and safety, and I curl into him, craving more.
Soaking in the feeling of his fingers digging into my hips, his chest beneath my palms, his tongue brushing mine.
“I’m so happy you’re here,” I gasp, in one short break for air.
Before I know what’s happening, he flips me, pinning me to the bed, his eyes blazing. “Really?” he bites out. “Then why didn’t you tell me to come with you in the first place?”
I blink up at him, my mind irritated to have to compose an answer to his question when all I want to do is touch and taste and feel.
But when I arch up and try to claim his lips again, he stops me with a hand on my collarbone. “Why, Mance?” he asks again.
I sigh, falling back onto the bed and trying to clear my brain enough to think it through.
Because why didn’t I? I want him here, after all. Clearly.
It just didn’t occur to me. I’m not used to having the option. In the past when I’ve asked people to show up, it only led to disappointment.
“I . . .” I swallow, trying to be honest. “I should have. I’m sorry. I don’t really know . . . how.”
Silver’s eyes are still molten, but they soften a little. He cups my face, his touch gentle. “I know you’ve been burned in the past,” he says. “But I’m not your history, Mance. When have I ever let you down?”
“Well, there was that one time.”
He rolls his eyes. “I mean since then.”
I smile. “Never.”
“Exactly. And I’m not going to let you down now. I’m here, and I’m ready to build a barricade or stage a kidnapping. I even contemplated burning down the whole palace if that’s something you’d be interested in. There’s plenty of flammable stuff around.”
He gestures vaguely at the forest, and I laugh. “I appreciate that, but it doesn’t sound like it will be necessary. We’ll be sharing quarters, but not beds. He has his own. Somewhere thataway.” I point toward the door.
Silver follows my finger with his eyes, then blows out a long breath and sags on top of me, making our bodies press even closer together.
I feel heat rise to my cheeks, and when he raises his head he sees it.
And he smirks. His eyes re-caramelize, but there’s a spark of playfulness in them.
“So you’re saying your bed has . . . a vacancy? ”