Chapter 65 #2
I held her gaze, letting my fury curl like flames through my veins, tasting the desire to strike her down.
But I didn’t. She would witness what my dragons had wrought, to feel it in every ruined street and toppled wall. A survivor cast into the ruins, prey for any lingering Velli.
Perhaps she would learn the terror I endured.
“Do not return.”
Moonlight poured through the bubbled panes, silver light pooling along the garden stones and turning the pond to glass. Cool air carried the scent of damp earth and crushed mint. My fingers trailed through the water, sending quiet ripples across the surface, fracturing my reflection into shards.
Footsteps sounded from the path behind me. Steady. Measured. He never hurried. Metal links of his mantle whispered against one another, a familiar rhythm that settled beneath my ribs.
His reflection joined mine. The ripples stilled as my hand went quiet. He watched me, face composed, something guarded behind his eyes. I wondered what task he’d just overseen, what hard decision he made alone.
He crouched beside me. His knees cracked, a low grunt escaping before he lowered himself fully. Long legs stretched out across the stone. From his palm, he offered a small blue flower. Four petals, dark as storm clouds, nearly black at the center.
A soft hum left me as I accepted it, the fragile stem broken and bent.
“It matches your eyes,” he said, voice low and even. “I found it wedged in a cleft of rock on the path from Sol.”
I turned the blossom between my fingers, brushing a thumb over its velvet surface. “You went to Sol tonight?”
“I was needed.”
“For what?”
His hand shifted against the stone. A dark stain marked his sleeve, nearly swallowed by the night.
“Three Velli were found.”
We had not spoken of it. Not the burning of Vellos. Not the decree that no Velli would remain within our borders. It unfolded without discussion, a silent accord.
He killed them all. No inquiry. No mercy. Vellos crossed its line. Those who did not flee over the Craggs would meet his blade.
“Thank you.” I tucked the flower above my ear, its cool petals brushing my temple. “It’s beautiful.”
His hand rose, palm warm against my cheek. Thumb traced the corner of my mouth as he studied me. Tension eased from his brow. “Yes,” he murmured. “You are.”
My smile faltered, and my gaze drifted to the pond once more. The surface lay smooth, luminous beneath the moon. Bright fish glided in its shallows, their fins trailing like silk banners through dark water.
Beautiful.
I was a mess. Bandages wrapped my throat. Stitches pulled along my back and thigh. I was a lattice of gauze and scars. The Dragon’s Heart should’ve been stronger. What were a few marks carved in the name of love?
Yet I had seen them. The torn flesh from Tallon’s belt. The dark line between my legs. Bruises shaped by hands that pinned me down. Each one a reminder of what I had endured.
He took my hand and lifted it to his mouth. His eyes met mine over my knuckles, shadowed with concern. After a breath, he lowered it and plucked a leaf, tossing it into the pond.
“Eldeiade provoked me,” he said quietly.
“She undermined me before my nobles. Mocked me, certain I wouldn’t retaliate.
Before she conceived Tallon, she summoned me during her fertile window.
She was–” His jaw tightened. “Lying with her poisoned me. It was so petty—her cruelty and endless taunts. It lodged beneath my skin like a thorn and festered. I became someone I despised. Rough. Careful not to injure her, yet wishing she would cry out. She never did. She reveled in it.”
The leaf spun in widening circles. He stared at it.
“I tried to deny her at times. Neglected my marital duties. She punished me for it. She came to me in the night—and Greaves couldn’t intervene.” Disgust curled his lip. “I am a warrior. I’m not weak. But there are ways a woman can overpower a man. Humble him. She did.”
My heart froze, blood freezing in my veins. His wife had raped him? My Kallias? With his face pinched and ear tips painted red, I dared not ask for details or clarification. He was embarrassed. Ashamed.
“I learned quickly to meet her on my own terms.” He turned to me with a tortured smile. “Some shames are easier to bear than others.”
He ground his teeth together, spirit laid bare in his eyes.
“You feel used, dirty. It can be painful to think about. Guilt presses in from all sides—every time it crosses your mind. You think it’s your fault because you chose a lesser evil, but evil is evil.
It still mars your soul, taints your outlook. ”
It did. I craved my trousers to cover my thighs, the scrape of wool a barrier against memory. I wore a high-necked tunic to hide the gashes on my collarbone, stiff linen brushing the tender skin. No, I didn’t want to see them, to have the mirror whisper all the reminders of what I’d done.
“But then a woman sailed across the ocean.” He scoffed, lips curving with genuine mirth.
“I warned her, told her I was damaged goods. It would’ve been better for her to choose someone younger, not so battered by life.
A young man she could grow with, blossom beside.
But instead she chose a spent vine, embracing its thorns, ignoring the faded blooms.”
He pressed his lips together and patted my hand, thumb rough against my knuckles. “Don’t hide from me, Nienna. But I won’t press. Your pain is yours to hold or share.”
“What if I want you to ask?” My voice caught, thin as spun glass. What if he did? Could I tell him?
He frowned, tilting his head. “Then I will.” The words came measured, as if he tested the ground before stepping. He waited for refusal, for the shove that would send him back. When I didn’t move, he shifted closer, fingers grazing the lace at my throat.
My heart battered my ribs. Cold skittered over my skin, sharp pinpricks racing down my arms.
This was Kallias. Not a boy who recoiled from ruin. He had found Deimos between my legs and Egath at my back. He could assume my body had been paraded like prized livestock beneath greedy eyes.
I had nothing to fear.
Yet when he tugged the collar loose, my breath staggered in my chest.
“Tell me to stop.” His gaze shuttered. Pain and fury strained behind iron control.
My head shook, lips trembling. I would never offer this unasked. I would bury it the way he buried his own wounds, let it fester beneath bone and sinew, leaking noxious poison into everything it touched.
Determination tightened his jaw. He rose and settled behind me, heat at my spine. Steady hands loosened the laces of my dress. Fabric slipped over my shoulder, cool air sweeping across bare flesh.
His fingertips brushed the tender scab. He let the bandage fall into the grass. “Who was this?”
“Tallon first.”
My eyes squeezed shut against the humiliation. He would see the bruises, neat crescent moons stamped by flat teeth, skin darkened like a lover’s claim. The boy he once called son had carved that into me.
Tension radiated from him, sharp and contained, as if the garden itself held its breath. “Then?”
My arm crossed my chest as I turned away. “Egath.”
“Was he gentle?”
Horror locked my spine. Why would he ask that? Did he know? Would he measure my worth by the degree of cruelty? If Egath hadn’t been vicious, did that make my compliance worse?
“He would have been.” His breath warmed the back of my shoulder.
“He had to maintain control, or he would’ve broken skin and Tallon would have killed him.
He would’ve handled you like a frightened doe, coaxing obedience.
A contrast to Tallon’s cruel entitlement.
” Soft lips pressed against the wound, careful, solemn.
“In some ways, Egath’s attentions cut deeper than any other.” Tears burned behind my eyelids. My chest split open at his understanding. How could I have doubted him? He was Kallias.
He eased the dress lower, exposing the angry stripes along my back. Thick brocade bunched in his fists before he lifted it over my head. Cool air kissed my heated skin. I folded inward, arms crossing my breasts, trying to shield myself from the one man who saw me in my entirety.
His touch hovered at the edge of pain, close enough to sting. “And this?”
“Tallon.” My whisper barely carried. “Angry when I chose to persuade Deimos.”
“Deimos, the Velli King?”
I nodded. Unease prickled beneath my skin. He would hear what I did not say, that I’d been a willing participant.
“There’s more here than Tallon’s brutality.” His mouth traced my shoulders, slow, deliberate, guiding me forward so he could press a kiss to unmarred flesh. “You offered yourself to the enemy king.”
“I thought I could pit him against Tallon.” The confession left me on a thin exhale. Each brush of his lips was exquisite torment. Fear coiled tight in my belly, afraid he would find a raw seam and send fire through me, while another part stirred beneath his touch.
“Such lofty aims.” A breath of laughter ghosted over my scarred back. “Only a queen would imagine it. Only a warrior would attempt it.”
A tear slid down my cheek, warm against chilled skin. He forgave me. More than that, he gathered my shame into his own hands as if it belonged there. Relief tasted sweet as honeyed cakes. Each kiss, each word, returned another shard of my fractured heart.
Carefully, he rolled me onto the thick moss edging the pool. The earth smelled damp and green beneath my back. His fingers moved toward the lacing of my trousers.
My thighs snapped together. Pain flashed hot and bright. A hiss tore from my lungs as I arched from the ground, the tender flesh of my thigh protesting.
“Easy.”
His touch fled at once, palms hovering above my legs where they had wrapped around his waist. My vain attempt to block him had, instead, put him in a precarious position.
He waited. Hands off. Eyes fixed on mine.