Chapter 69 Camilla
CAMILLA
Water swished in the small tub as I scrubbed the dirt from my arms. The bathroom was tiny, not that I was complaining.
This was the first time we’d been in a place we felt comfortable and safe in a long time.
Between the dirt and blood, the water had already turned a light brown.
My head still ached, but apparently, we’d both be fine.
We just needed a few days to rest. My magic didn’t even hum as I heard the door to the bedroom open and close, but my heart did.
Vincent had come back. We were sharing a room as the city of Sumaril was already near capacity.
Vincent had told me to take the bathroom first, and he’d get us food, but I wasn’t hungry.
My stomach was uneasy, both from the loss of the medallion and how much power I had used, but mostly because I’d never cared for someone so much that I would damn the world for them.
I knew anyone who hadn’t been through what we had these last few months probably saw it as irrational, but how could I explain to them what I felt for him?
We had survived together in a palace that was nothing more than a prison.
He cared for me as I did him. We were not two sides of the same coin, but the same side.
I hadn’t realized how alone I felt all those years until I met Vincent.
It was as if some part of him had awakened something in me.
He had been forced into doing horrible things because he was bound to a powerful being, and so had I.
He was an enemy of the realms, but he brought me more comfort and made me feel safer than a thousand soldiers.
And he loved me.
Someone had laid clothes out on the bed for us.
The room they had given us once belonged to a couple who had long since passed.
I didn’t ask too many questions, and the shadow assassins who led us to our room were not open to conversation.
They just told us to rest, and we would be summoned when their queen wished to talk. I was too tired to care or insist.
I raised my hands out of the water, small droplets running along my skin.
No scars marred my wrists where my hands had been severed.
My magic had healed me, but I could feel how drained I was.
I turned my palm up and tried to summon a ball of magic.
Emerald green light rose but fizzled like a candle being blown out.
Pushing myself out of the tub, I grabbed a small towel from the worn bars by the sink and dried myself off. I slipped into the baggy pants, rolling the waistband three times before they would stay up. The tank top left my midriff bare and pulled tight across my breasts.
I stood in front of the mirror and studied my reflection, raising my hand to slide my fingers lightly over the hollows of my cheeks and the dark circles beneath my eyes.
I hadn’t realized how much weight I had lost since we had escaped the palace.
Food wasn’t a big priority when you were trying to stay alive, but it was also the stress that was wearing me out.
Even now, every bump or knock made me startle, worried that Nismera had found us again.
I wondered if I’d ever feel safe anywhere again, but I truly doubted it.
With a soft sigh, I turned away and stepped out of the bathroom.
Vincent sat on the edge of the four-poster bed with his elbows braced on his knees and his hands clasped between his spread thighs.
Gray lounge pants and a heavy sweatshirt clung to him, stretched tight over his heavily muscled form.
Apparently, we had the opposite problem when it came to how our borrowed clothes fit.
Light spilled in from the window, casting a soothing blue over the simple room.
It wasn’t natural as the cavern system was deep underground, but they had found a way to simulate both moonlight and sunlight, keeping to the rhythm of night and day.
The aroma of the food he’d brought filled the small room, and I saw he had placed the tray on the dresser that flanked the door.
It and the bed were pretty much all this room had space for.
Vincent studied me, but his eyes weren’t filled with the heated hunger I usually saw in them. Instead, concern clouded his gaze. “How are you feeling? Still dizzy?”
“No, that wore off. Now I’m mostly just tired,” I said, curling a strand of damp hair behind my ear. “What about you?”
“Tired,” he said with a half-shrug.
“Did they say anything to you when you went to get food?” I asked, curious about our kidnappers.
Vincent only shook his head before glancing back down at his folded hands. An impenetrable wall seemed to erect itself between us. I hated it, but I was also too tired to find a way around it. I let out a breath and headed toward the food he’d brought.
“War is on the horizon,” Vincent said, making me stop mere inches from the dresser. “A lot of people are going to die, including us.”
I nodded. The truth was like a stone tied to my feet, pulling me beneath the current. “I know. You can’t be upset with me for giving up that medallion.”
“The medallion?” Vincent looked at me as if I were crazy. “It is more than the medallion, Cami. Nismera has been planning a conquest for thousands of years. That medallion was merely a tool. She will use it now that she has it, but it’s not really her we need to worry about. Not truly.”
My brows furrowed as I looked at him, the food cooling on the dresser long forgotten. “I’d say she’s pretty much our greatest concern.”
“You think it stops with her? Look at all who have gathered around her, those who follow. If she succeeds with her conquest, the realms are fucked long after her bones turn to light.” Vincent stared at his hands, picking at the calluses on his palms. “Harsh ideals don’t die with the men who start them. ”
“Well, I cannot control the minds of men,” I said.
He said nothing. I’d assumed he would be mad at me for my decision. I had felt the tension between us since we’d been taken, but I was just glad we were both alive. What I hadn’t expected was that he would push me away as he was doing. I looked away and reached for the tray.
“You shouldn’t have given it up,” he said, barely above a whisper. “Not for me.”
I stopped, not even past the bedpost. “How can you say that to me?”
“Because you’re smarter than that. You were tied to Kaden and his nefarious plans for hundreds of years, just like I was. Nismera is worse. We both know what power does to beings like them, and you gave it away, tossed it as if it were nothing. We could have—”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Did you forget the blade at your throat? Or the other grave injuries? You’d be dead.”
“Then you should have let me die,” he snapped, and my breath caught in my throat. That’s why he was mad. “Let my worthless life at least mean something at the end.”
I couldn’t help the tears that pricked in my eyes.
I had thought those same words after Gabby died, after my greatest betrayal.
It was one reason I’d taken her body. I’d wanted Dianna to have the chance to say a final goodbye.
Some part of me had hoped that she would take her revenge, alleviating my guilt and leaving behind nothing but smothering embers, but it did not come.
“It’s not worthless,” I said. “Not to me.”
He scoffed and turned away from me, wiping a hand across his face.
My lips pressed into a thin line as I looked at him, and I took a step forward to stand between his thighs.
I reached out, cupping his face and making him look at me.
“I have no one, no family or friends, nothing in this cursed world because of my actions. Even with my powers, a part of me was scared to stand up for anyone. I decided that would not be me, not anymore, and so I chose to stand up for you. You’ve had no choice since the beginning, Vincent.
Nismera took that from you, and I refuse to let this world cast you as the villain you’re not.
Nothing about you is worthless to me, and I would hand over that fucking medallion a thousand times over to prove it. ”
He was quiet for a moment, and I was preparing to defend my actions further, but his eyes didn’t hold an ounce of anger, only understanding and sorrow.
He reached out and wound his arm around my waist, dragging me to him.
Heat coiled tight from his touch, but all he did was maneuver me to stand between his legs.
His hands lowered to the back of my thighs, and even though my magic was exhausted, something in me flared to life.
He looked up at me, holding me firmly in place, as if he feared that the words he was about to say would chase me away.
“I think I died on that mountain fighting Dianna. At least for a little while, and all I saw, all I thought about, was getting back to you. I don’t really know how mating bonds work.
I’ve only ever been enslaved to a goddess, but I think if I were allowed to have one, it would be you. ”
I blinked, dumbfounded by the raw confession spilling out of the man whom I’d once had to beg to be my friend.
“You’re it for me and have been for a while,” he went on.
“From the moment I saw you, I knew I was done, and you didn’t even look at me that night.
But I watched, following you like a phantom cloaked in shadows.
I think I have been following you my whole life, desperately waiting for you to turn around and see me. ”
I cupped his face, staring down into his depthless eyes. Oh gods, what this man did to me. My heart pounded, and it felt like I had forgotten how to breathe. Vincent held my gaze and threw himself wide open to me, letting me see everything as he continued.