Chapter 10
CHAPTER TEN
Kole stopped me before my face fully collided with his chest. “Prim? What’s wrong?”
He practically growled the words, and the guards standing at the doors gave each other side-eyes.
I clutched Kole’s tunic, my fingers curling around it.
Scents of pine, the sea, and cedar encircled me, and I inhaled deeply.
“Nothing. I mean everything?” I laughed shrilly.
“I don’t know. I was just told that I can no longer work, and I’ll eventually be in an arranged marriage.
Oh, and in the meantime, someone is sending creatures after me, and I can no longer go anywhere without a warrior.
” I shook my head frantically, and my new reality hit me like a ton of bricks.
My life was over.
Everything I’d ever known in all of my seasons was gone.
I was a princess of Mistvale Kingdom. A dangerous enemy was after me, and this was my life now.
All of a sudden, I couldn’t breathe. “I need to get out of here,” I gasped.
Kole’s jaw snapped closed. “Follow me.” His hand drifted to my lower back, and his warm palm seared through my gown’s fabric.
Breaths shallow, I let him guide me away, but even with Kole’s help, it felt as if the walls were closing in.
A door loomed ahead, and then we were outside, in a large private courtyard somewhere within the palace. Soft moonlight bathed the grounds in silver.
Another shrill laugh escaped me. “You know your way around here too?” The hysterical sound bubbling out of my lips increased. “How is it that everyone but the king and queen’s own daughter knows this place? How is that possible?”
Kole didn’t reply, but a deep groove appeared between his eyes. He led me toward a stone bench, sheltered from the moonlight by a babbo tree. He lowered me to the seat as though I were an invalid, then sat beside me.
I perched there for a moment, breathing in the fresh air, but my body was as stiff as a board. Wind whistled through the tree branches above us, and nearby flowers perfumed the air.
“It’s warm here,” I stated.
“There are warded domes around all palace courtyards. It’s warm all season long regardless of the true temperature outside.”
His calm words and steady presence helped loosen my claw-like fingers gripping the bench, yet for some inexplicable reason, tears began to form in my eyes.
Hard, calloused hands abruptly took mine. Kole rubbed his thumbs along the backs of my hands, his brow heavy, his aura pulsing. “Prim, what happened?”
Tears swam in my eyes. “My life is over.”
His tone gentled. “It’s not over. It’s just . . . different.”
“Oh, and they hate me too. Both of them. I forgot to include that one.”
“Your sisters?”
I nodded, and a hot tear splashed onto my cheek.
A low growl left the warrior, but before he could speak, I blurted, “They want nothing to do with me. Koraline despises me, and given her scars that I’m responsible for, I can hardly blame her.
And Lillith is afraid of me. She tried to cover it up, but it’s so obvious she thinks I’m a monster.
And then there are my parents. They’re so different from Aunt Opalin and Uncle Roosep.
I mean, they’re the same. I get that since my magic recognizes them as the fae I’ve always known, but they’re different.
They’ve created some kind of potion, telling me I have to use it every single time I want to eat or drink something, because without it, I could be poisoned and turn into whatever my uncle was becoming.
And I have to get fitted for a gown tomorrow for a ball.
And not one ball, but two balls. Actual royal balls.
And then they said that they’ll start introducing me to potential matches, males I may one day marry, and as long as I choose someone suitable, they won’t fully arrange a marriage for me, but if I don’t, then an arranged marriage is likely coming.
” I gasped again since I’d been speaking so fast that I felt lightheaded.
Kole stiffened, but more tears blurred my eyes, and I pushed on.
“Never in my life have they ever said anything like that to me. Before, Opalin and Roosep would stop by, and we’d visit or play cards or go shopping.
It was all so easy. So pleasant. So normal.
But this—” I made a sweeping motion with my hand, waving at the soaring palace walls and beautiful garden glittering under a night sky.
“This isn’t who they are. Not to me at least, which means in some ways, they’re complete strangers. ”
I finally stopped, my chest heaving, but then I laughed bitterly. “And oh, I almost forgot. I killed somebody this morning. On top of everything else that happened today, I also took a life, but nobody seems to care about that.”
Kole’s throat bobbed in a swallow. I couldn’t help but wonder if taking lives bothered him.
He’d killed six shifter males without batting an eye during my hunt for the Stone, and he’d never said a word about it again.
But killing Verin still weighed on my mind, even if she’d been evil. I’d never taken a life before.
“You’ve been through a lot, and understandably, you’re upset,” Kole finally said.
I laughed humorlessly. “You noticed I was upset, did you?”
His voice grew even more gentle. “Everything in the past day has been new and painful. Verin’s death doesn’t help that, and you wish things had never changed. That you could go back to your old life and undo all that’s happened.”
I turned toward him, feeling understood and seen for the first time since arriving here. “Yes.” I gripped him tighter, so thankful that somebody understood. “Yes, exactly.”
His thumbs roamed along the backs of my hands, and with each swipe of his fingers, a flare of pleasure traveled up my arms. “Do you think anything can be done to make some of this better?”
I scoffed. “Well, not forcing an arranged marriage on me would be one less thing to worry about.”
He stilled. “They’re truly already speaking of your marriage?”
“Yes. No. I don’t know.” I shrugged. “Koraline’s betrothed is to be officially announced at her upcoming ball in a few weeks, and they hinted that her suitors were selected by them, so I asked if I would also have to one day partake in an arranged marriage, and that’s when they brought up the whole suitable thing.
That as long as I chose someone suitable, they wouldn’t force an arranged marriage on me.
But what does that even mean, Kole?” I turned pleading eyes on him.
“Since when does being born into a noble lineage make someone suitable? Plenty of nobles are completely abhorrent fae, but apparently, one’s bloodline is all that matters. ”
Energy swam in his aura, rising with each second. I stared at him, looking for answers, but he shook his head. “I don’t know, but, Prim, you’re a princess, and . . .” His throat rolled in a stiff swallow, then he said, his tone slightly bitter, “Certain things are expected of you now.”
I snorted. “So you agree with them?”
“No.” His reply came readily. Harshly. “Not in the slightest.” He glanced away, and even though he was trying to lock his aura down, it still pounded toward me in waves.
“Why are you angry?” I asked quietly.
He glanced at me. In the moonlight, his dazzling Solis blue eyes looked so turbulent, as if lightning could crackle from them at any second.
He looked down, breaking eye contact, and took a deep breath. “Did they tell you that you’re not confined to the palace grounds anymore?”
“They did.” I waited for him to say more, to answer my question.
“Come with me.” He abruptly stood, his hands still holding mine, and when he peered down at me with the tree’s branches above him and his broad shoulders entirely blocking the moons, something in my chest once again stretched, sought, needed.
I shook that sensation off. “Where are we going?”
“Away from here.”
Kole mistphased us instantaneously. One second, the palace walls in the courtyard were closing in on me, and the next, sounds of waves crashing against the shore filled the air. Salty wind flowed around us, lifting my hair. And a million stars blazed in the night sky above us.
My jaw dropped, and I twirled around. “Where are we?”
“On the shores of the Nelive Sea, on the western coast of Mistvale.”
I pivoted more, facing inland, and in the distance, the Clawfur Mountains rose like dark beasts in the moonlight.
I stared at them, at their huge peaks tipped in snow.
Soon, those peaks would be fully covered in white powder once winter truly set in.
The Clawfur region was wild. Untamed. Those mountains were ruggedly beautiful, but they also held so many memories for me.
“I spent the first eight summers of my life living in those mountains. Well, I guess it wasn’t a full eight summers as I’d been led to believe, since I’d initially lived in the palace.”
Kole came up behind me, his presence like a looming shadow at my back. His hands settled gently on my hips, and he shifted me, turning me back to face the sea.
A cacophony of nerves fired through me at the feel of his strong fingers gripping me, and I reminded myself that I’d been a fool to trust him once and allow myself to develop an attraction to him.
But the reality was that everyone I’d trusted had lied to me, except for Ree.
And I still loved all of them. I still loved Gwen, Timith, and my parents.
I’d already forgiven them for their lies because I knew their intentions had been good.
Yet of all of the fae that I’d trusted, Kole was the only one who’d had no choice but to lie to me. He’d been ordered by his king and queen, and by the Imperial Council. And a part of me wondered, if given a choice, would he have ever lied to me at all?
The waves pounded along the shore, but even after Kole had redirected my attention back to the sea, his hands stayed, and despite trying as hard as I could not to be affected by his touch, I was.