Chapter Ninety-Eight Myla
I take in the way Aria’s skin gleams, her scent strong as I take another step towards her.
My eyes disobey any sort of logic as they travel of their own volition down the length of her curly hair to the very ends, where it brushes against her hips.
The slight shimmer of her scales changes color there, moving from the same garnet of her hair to something that resembles sunrise—golden and orange-hued.
“I’ve been told I’m a terrible spy,” she retorts, drawing my gaze back up. A stream of sunlight coming in from one of the cracks above splits the distance between us, making their hazel color glow.
“I find that unsurprising.”
She frowns as I hand her a new tunic, this one black.
I watch as she pinches the fabric between her finger and thumb, feeling the soft cotton as she steps back to slip it on, and I turn to give her privacy.
I had noticed that whenever I brought her one of Navin’s training tunics, she would tug at it, as if she didn’t like the way it felt against her skin.
I dismissed it as her not being used to wearing clothing until I accidentally grabbed one of my brother’s nicer tops that went beneath his formal uniform for events.
The fabric was of richer quality and a softer material, and not once had Aria fidgeted with its collar or sleeves as if she couldn’t wait to peel it off of her the moment we were done.
If she wasn’t messing with the top, she was more focused on our training.
The reasoning was sound, and that was enough for me to disregard any other thoughts for why I might give a shit about whether or not she was comfortable.
“I got here early so that I could get warm-ups out of the way,” she says, her steps quiet against the stone. That explains why her scent is fucking everywhere in this damn place. “I’m ready to get right to our lessons.”
“Then let’s start with the hand-to-hand combat. After, we’ll move to wielding your dagger.” She doesn’t bat an eye at the way I don’t acknowledge her arriving early, and though it doesn’t make sense, I find myself annoyed by that.
I’ve been on edge for what feels like weeks now, ever since guards were sent to scuttle around Khargis like an infestation of rats.
Shen’s been unable to give me anything new about the handful of males I had been watching, all of the information she’d usually glean at her bar snuffed out by the presence of silver armor and longswords.
According to Navin, more guards will be added each week that the Shadow isn’t caught, pressuring both the people in the poorest sections and the miserable guards who have nothing better to do than be cruel as they patrol the streets.
Shen’s hands had shook with anger as she recounted hearing of assaults by the added males, and though she wouldn’t say the words out loud, I could see the pleading in her eyes: Do something.
Of course, I wanted to apprehend each and every guard and bring them to the basement of my warehouse.
I could collect a handful of them at a time to hang from the rafters on metal hooks while I questioned them, torturing them with the edge of my blade.
But I haven’t made it this far by being impulsive, something Shen knows.
“Are you alright?” Aria asks from where she waits across from me, lowering her guard.
I lift a brow as I tug the sleeves of my black top up to my elbows, Aria tracking the movement.
“Put your arms back up,” I command, stretching my neck from side to side.
“And I’m fine.” I give her the time to fix her guard before sending my right fist in her direction, pleased when she blocks it with her forearm, her brows settling low over her eyes.
“That’s good,” she says.
“Is it?” I counter, delivering a quick combo of punches that force her to utilize both arms to block. But she’s clearly been practicing because her reaction time is the quickest it’s ever been.
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
The corners of my lips wiggle a fraction. “Don’t forget that you can attack me too.”
She smiles, sidestepping and forcing me to counter.
I had been intrigued when Aria came injured to our last meeting, and that curiosity had turned to outright fury when she tried to be covert about how she had gotten hurt.
But I had spent the past five years skinning the flesh from those who harmed others because they wanted to take what was never theirs to begin with.
And while I never interacted with the victims, Shen did.
I wanted her to be the good they saw, while I was the monster in the dark.
But she told me, sometimes, when we’d meet up for a briefing, what the victims had said.
What they felt. How, in some cases, they would downplay their abuse with an “at least it wasn’t worse” statement.
Aria swings her right fist towards me, and I lean back to dodge it, straightening just in time to catch her guard a little too high, punching the space beneath her ribs on her side.
She hisses out a breath, adjusting her guard as she keeps her feet moving.
Where fear once rattled her every time I so much as breathed in her direction, determination now blankets her soft features.
I had thought a lot about what she said and how I responded in the days since our last meeting.
Aria is a siren, a being I have hated since I learned about The War Of Five Kingdoms. But she is also a female subjected to the same cruelty of rulers, a victim to those who take what they want without asking.
Something had pulled at me from within, warning that if I did not show her that she had the ability to protect herself from whatever dangers might come her way, I would not be fulfilling the bargain between us.
In the same breath, however, something else whispered that it was more.
That the urge to care for her had nothing to do with whatever was magically binding us together.
But that voice was easy enough to silence, especially when I could distract myself with what my father was doing with the guards, the dragons, and the abduction of mages.
Fuck, things are really going to shit around me.
Aria and I continue our sparring until even my arms begin to burn and sweat drips down my back.
It works to relieve some of the unspent energy humming beneath my skin.
If I’m feeling this way, she must be completely fatigued, but she doesn’t complain.
Not once. Using my forearm, I swipe at my forehead and tuck my hair behind my ears to get it out of my face.
Aria’s eyes go straight to them, and I watch her reaction for signs of disgust. Or some other lingering prejudice against the fae that might have become ingrained by her queen.
I’m met with only open interest. She stares at them like one would look upon a full moon.
I’m reluctant to call it awe, yet that’s the only word that comes to me.
When she realizes I’ve caught her looking, she drops her gaze to the ground, her hands bracing her hips.
Even wearing the baggier tunic, the silhouette of her body is unmistakable beneath it, and a jolt of desire shocks me from where it pools low in my gut.
I grind my teeth together and palm the dagger at my thigh, content to ram it through my leg to stop whatever is happening to me. “Go grab your blade—”
“Actually,” she interrupts, her head snapping up so her eyes can meet mine, “I was wondering if we could revisit how we sparred last time.”
I tilt my head, releasing the hilt of my dagger. “What do you mean?”
Aria purses her lips, thinking her words over as she reaches up to play with a few strands of her curly hair.
I had been unable to stop myself from touching it as I bandaged her arm in our last meeting, an annoying curiosity overtaking me as I reached up to see if the strands were as soft as they looked.
It had been a lapse of judgement, a momentary and fleeting response to having her so close and unguarded.
“I froze last week. When you attacked me from behind. It’s because when she—when Lore—came at me, that’s how she did it.
And I froze then too, only able to eventually fend her off because I had the element of surprise.
” I work hard not to show a reaction, despite how tension rides my shoulders.
Aria offers a small smile in response, as if she can somehow tell what I’m feeling.
“I just want to make sure I can defend myself from anything. As much as I can with the limited lessons we have left.”
The reminder that we are on the tail end of our time together should give me a feeling of elation, but paired with the image of someone holding Aria against her will, all it does is sour my stomach.
Weeks are all we have left, and that isn’t enough time to teach Aria everything she needs to know to defend herself.
Fuck, it had taken me years of dedicated training before I could best Navin.
Then again, what are the odds that Aria is fighting a trained warrior?
Is Lore someone who has years of training over Aria?
But despite how the question attempts to slip free, I keep it locked behind my lips. It isn’t any of my business.
Stepping close enough to her to count the freckles on her cheeks, I say, “Show me how she restrained you.”
She spins until her back is to me, holding her arms out to the side.
When she feels me at her back, she tentatively reaches for my wrist, delicate fingers wrapping around it, and positions my arm around her torso.
“One arm was like this while this arm”—she reaches for my other limb, tugging that one so that it’s banded across her chest—“was like this. And we were—”