Chapter 34
Desmond doesn’t join us at the inn for lunch. Maybe he’s avoiding me after what happened at the bathhouse.
I’m so distracted that I eat the cabbage and goat stew without complaint. The goat is chewy, and the cabbage tastes a few days beyond its prime. The meal wouldn’t have bothered me at home, but after weeks of being spoiled by Nog’s cooking, my taste buds crave something richer.
Despite that, I can’t stop recalling the way Desmond’s clothes stuck to his body. The girth of his thighs, the bulging thickness of his upper arms. Such toned muscles don’t belong on a high fae’s willowy body. Being half-human must be why his shoulders are so broad and strong.
Min notices that I’m too preoccupied to finish my stale slice of bread. I hand it to Finnian, who bemoans that he’s hungry for a second bowl of the wretched stew. Then I excuse myself from them.
I need to start training. Anything to get my mind off that bath.
Heading outside, I spy a boulder in the distance, abnormally smooth. The ground is barren around it as though the whispering field grass fears it.
I fetch the fold-up bridge from the carriage. Then I levitate it behind me as I walk to the boulder. Once I reach it, I prepare for training by stretching as a soft mist curls around my ankles. It’s a little unfair that everyone else gets to rest today, but I’m thankful for this distraction.
What else would I do with my time, anyway? Wallow in my thoughts? I don’t hand-sew like Finnian, hunt field mice like Min, and I don’t read like Desmond. Besides, everyone is depending on me to get them across the chasm. I need to train.
Desmond approaches as I sit atop the boards to stretch my legs. “I didn’t think you’d join me,” I call out.
The mist swirls around him like a prince from a faerytale.
He’s dressed in all black except for two peridot pendant earrings that bring out the green in his hazel eyes.
His tunic’s low neckline reveals a sharp collarbone and the firm chest that I ran my hands over not so long ago. I draw in a tight breath.
“And leave you without your employer?” he asks, but the humor in his gaze is noticeably forced. That comment must’ve bothered him more than I thought.
“My friend,” I say, not meeting his eyes. “I was flustered earlier.”
For once, I’d give anything to know how he feels through our bond, but it’s irritatingly silent. “I’m glad to see you have enough energy to train,” Desmond finally says.
I shrug, then grasp my feet. “I don’t want to die in Olin’s tomb any more than the rest of you.” The glorious stretch of my muscles after hours of travel draws a sigh out of me. The hot bath and the monk’s healing magic definitely helped, too.
When I look up, Desmond is watching me, his lips slightly parted and eyes darkening. He quickly averts his gaze, clearing his throat. “You’ve worked hard. We’ll succeed.”
I smile at the compliment.
He extends his hand to me, and my pulse stutters. I remember all the times I didn’t take it. After we sparred, the hilltop at sunset, when he saved my life from the fomorian assassins.
All those times, I rejected him. Out of shame.
From a lack of trust. From the hurt that he doesn’t trust me.
Yet he looks at me, not with expectation, but the faintest glow of hope underneath the cracks in his mask.
It’s in his gentle smile that would shine if he’d lower his guard.
It’s in the way he holds his breath as he waits.
Most of all, it’s in his eyes, an uncharacteristic warmth that threatens to pull me in and bind me close.
If that wasn’t enough, there’s a thread of trepidation winding around me that I know is his own, an omen of disappointment if I dismiss him yet again.
I take his hand.
Desmond pulls me to my feet, but neither of us lets go. The warmth of his grip radiates into my fingers as we gaze at each other, waiting, but for what, I don’t know.
“Are you ready?” he asks me.
I nod, surprised that for once, I have no retort. “Should we start with the bridge or the boulder?”
“The boulder.” He lets go, and I already mourn the loss of his touch.
Desmond appraises the hulking rock, running a finger down its flawless surface. “This used to be a door to the Hollowlands, likely before the war. Now, it’s as inert as any other boulder.” At my apprehensive squint, he kicks it, just to demonstrate.
I kick it too, perhaps to show it some submission, and regret it as the hardness reverberates through my foot. “Shit!”
Desmond laughs. “Let’s start with your eyes closed.”
“Closed? At this point, shouldn’t I be looking at what I’m moving?”
“There’s no telling how much light we’ll have in the tomb.”
“That’s not reassuring.” I square my feet and concentrate on the boulder. “Maybe you should’ve hired someone who can create light.”
He shakes his head. “The fewer involved with this mission, the better. Now breathe. Close your eyes.”
The sun’s rays are a faint caress on my chilled skin. The landscape is harsh, free of the trees I’m used to that would shield us from this breeze. Strands that have slipped free of my braid whip against my face, and I tuck them behind my ear.
Desmond looms over my shoulder. “Do you need me to close them for you?” Before I retort, he lays his hand over my eyes.
I shift in surprise, my back bumping against his torso. “I can cover my own eyes.”
“Apparently not, or you would’ve done it already. Do you feel the weight of the boulder?”
The pulse-quickening tension I feel from his touch is like the feeling I get when I set foot into a barrow’s foyer. Anticipation. Exhilaration. All caused by the allure of danger.
“Give me a moment.” My lashes flutter against his fingers. I have to focus. My Gift reaches out and finds the boulder. I encircle it with magic, prodding it, testing it, then lift it. I count to three minutes and grit my teeth as I slowly descend it to the ground.
“Good,” he murmurs, so close to my ear that his breath tickles my skin. The praise makes me shudder. “But your body is tense. You can’t harness your Gift until you learn to trust it.”
My heart trips over its own pulse. Of course I’m tense. I’m only a shift away from my ass rubbing against his hips. “It’s not my Gift I don’t trust,” I blurt to banish the thought.
Even after we’ve fought together time and time again, I still hesitate to trust him. Feeling an unbidden attraction doesn’t change that. He’s hiding something. Actually, I’m pretty sure he’s hiding multiple things.
“Hmm.” Desmond’s thumb absently slides across my forehead, warm and rough in a way that feels too damned good for such a subtle touch. “Are you afraid of me, Cynthia?”
“No,” I gasp out. I swallow, processing a startling realization. “You’re afraid of me.”
He pulls away, and I blink at the sudden light. He meets my gaze with his cold, impenetrable mask. He wears it less often now, but he’s far from leaving it behind us.
“And why is that?” he sharply asks.
“I know next to nothing about you, Desmond. You like reading. You’d rather be a scholar than the High Court’s prince, but your duty to your people outweighs your own wishes.
Yet, I still don’t know what you want from Olin’s tomb.
I don’t know why everyone fears you. You resist telling me what your Gift is, and I haven’t asked anyone else out of courtesy.
Why withhold it if you’re not scared of trusting me? ”
He steps in front of me, still just as close. “You may not like what you learn.” His emotions batter me—hesitation, and there it is—fear.
I lift my head to meet his gaze. “Try me.”
A beat of silence passes. The wind whistles around us, crows cawing in the distance. I don’t break our locked gazes, unwilling to shatter the fragile spell between us.
“Three questions,” he whispers. “Ask whatever you want.”
“It goes both ways, doesn’t it? The vow.” My heart squeezes. I want him to answer truthfully so badly that my hope is painful. “That’s why I feel your emotions, and you feel mine.”
It would explain why the vow angered Auri when she learned of it. Why Desmond himself was surprised by how closely the bond linked us.
Slowly, as if it pains him, Desmond nods.
If I die. . . He will die, too.
All this time, I’ve known he’s hidden something about the vow. But why bind himself to me? Why take that risk? Then I remember what he said before. It protects you.
No one loyal to him would dare risk my life, not when it endangers his. Not Auri. Not other fae. It turns protecting me into a necessity.
“I knew Auri would guard you with her life if your death costs mine,” he says. “She may not show kindness easily, but she’s loyal and formidable. Nor would I risk letting my enemies harm you, even when your stubbornness grates on my nerves.”
“Why? I still don’t understand why you would care about my life,” I tell him, searching his gaze. Surely, he could find another person with my magic if something were to happen to me.
Except. . . I do understand.
He’s not a prince who sees people as pawns in a game.
He’s not cruel like other fae. He’s swayed by his emotions and a desire to care for others, even when he doesn’t know them.
He’s kind, a believer in peace even after all the horrors he’s witnessed.
It must take incredible courage to hold onto such kindness.
He tilts his head, the smallest smile pulling at his lips as if he can feel me realizing it. “And your third question?”
I shouldn’t have wasted my second question when I already knew the answer. I already know what my third will be. Not his Gift. No, he needs to tell me that of his own free will. He needs to prove he trusts me, and until then, I’ll let him keep his secrets.
I prepare myself for any slight flicker of emotion that will cross his face. “Rune told me to ask why you’re known as the ‘Prince of Death.’”
He stands so very still, saying nothing.
“I get the feeling you’d avoid giving me a straight answer. So I’m going to ask something else. What are you afraid of?”
The question takes him aback, his eyes widening before they narrow. His voice lowers, the capricious curl of his lips reminding me of how quickly his moods shifted when we first met. He may be half-human, but he’s still half-fae.
“Why don’t I tell you what you’re afraid of?” he asks. “You’re driven by ambition to the precipice of recklessness. And do you know what ambition is driven by?”
“Do enlighten me,” I respond with a honeyed smile, “and then answer my question.” I won’t let him derail me.
A strand of grass flits into my hair. Desmond brushes it away, then trails his fingers down my braid before pulling away.
“The fear of nothingness,” he continues as if the stray caress hadn’t occurred.
“Of being nothing. Of accomplishing nothing. Of fading into obscurity with a lifetime of regrets.”
His words stab deep, a harsh truth so painful that my fists clench.
I take a half-step forward so I’m right in his face, glaring up at him.
I hate that he’s right. I hate how he knows I loathe Nettlerock because I don’t want to die there, never having felt the thrill of danger or the exhilaration of adventuring.
Every year, I’d rot with bitterness, feeling time slip through my fingers like sand.
Like dirt. Because that’s all life is in Nettlerock—dirt and seeds and tithes and empty cellar shelves.
“Nothingness,” I repeat. I want to smack him. I want to scream in his face that he’s wrong as shame and rage boil inside me. Yet it’s not judgment or pity I see in his gaze, but. . .
My rage subsides to shock. It’s yearning. It’s in the way his head tilts toward mine as his lips part. How his hazel eyes are half-lidded, pupils blown wide and black as the moonless sky.
My skin heats. The racing of my heart is as intoxicating as the thrill from raiding barrows. I feel like a bird in a cage, unable to move even if I wanted to. It’s not glamour holding me here. It’s something even more dangerous. An answering want.
He provoked me in an attempt to push me away, but I won’t let him. “Tell me what you’re afraid of,” I repeat. The marrow of my bones demands to know.
His head dips, too close to mine. So close that I’m swimming within the dappled gold and green forests of his eyes. “That asking you to join us was the most dangerous thing I’ve ever done. I don’t like things I can’t control, Cynthia.”
That almost pushes me to break away.
But then he says, “And I’m not in control of myself around you.”
His words shock me. My pulse skitters into a frenzy. “Don’t say such pretty things, not if you don’t mean them,” I warn him, staying so very still as he leans toward me. It’s as if he’s a predator, one that I want to be taken by.
“I can’t lie,” he reminds me, so close that I feel his breath against my lips. “We’re more similar than you think. Yet only one of us dares to escape our destiny.”
My lips part as my core heats, desperate for him to touch me. I hesitate, then reach out, threading my fingers through his curls. I gently tug until his nose brushes against mine.
His breath hitches.
I’ve never felt so weightless, like I’ll burst into a scatter of stars.
He grabs my hip, holding me steady.
I close my eyes, heady with anticipation. I brace to taste him, and—
Someone behind us clears their throat.
I jolt away as if caught doing something deplorable, but Desmond stands planted in place. He swerves, glaring at the intruder like he wants to cut them down where they stand. Then the anger softens.
It’s Auri, her brows furrowed in an appalled grimace. “I need to talk to you, Desmond. Don’t argue that Cyn isn’t done training. Surely she’s capable of practicing without you coddling her.” Then she stalks away toward Vekhara.
“Did you know she was there?” I ask Desmond.
“You’re out of questions,” he says, jaw clenched. “Keep practicing. We’re having a meal at the inn at sundown.” Then he leaves without a backward glance. His shoulders are hunched. He forces them down just as he reaches the low wall around the village.
I grip my dagger as if I could cut away the turbulence of emotions churning within me. Then I touch my thumb to my lips, remembering the lingering smell of peppermint tea. I close my eyes, shamefully savoring it.
I’m a fool. Evie would tell me that. Seb, my best friend who I haven’t thought of in weeks, wouldn’t hesitate to tell me that, either. Since when did these fae and the guild occupy all my thoughts? I’ll never see them again once we all have what we want from the tomb.
Yet. . . The more I get to know the guild, the closer I grow to Desmond—I’m beginning to wonder if the treasure is what I want after all.