Chapter 50
Ipressed my back to the door and stuffed my fist in my mouth to stop from screaming.
Beyond it, the deliberate scrape of whetstone against steel continued, the rhythmic rasp underscoring the thoughts circling through my mind. The greatest of them all lodged like a knife beneath my ribs.
I couldn’t trust Aedric.
The realization left me suspended in a sickening freefall, grasping for something—anything—to stop my descent. Every moment we'd shared replayed through my mind. What had been truth, and what had been deception?
The apothecarist in Solmire had been only the beginning.
He'd lied about my mother. About Dannis. About the slaughter of the Eidrae.
Even the scars marring his own body suddenly seemed suspect. He always hid them as much as he could, and when he'd first shown them to me, he'd framed them as proof of his unwavering devotion to his mate—wounds earned when my mother had savagely rejected him.
But what if that hadn't been the truth either? What if those scars weren't the marks of steadfast love at all? What if they were the evidence of her fighting him? Of her struggling against the male who’d hunted her people to extinction?
I wanted to vomit.
Every revelation laid another brick between us, a wall rising higher and higher. Could it ever be toppled? Could I ever climb it? And when all this was done, when Aedric's mind was finally his own again... would I even want to?
The infernal scrape, scrape of the whetstone went on and on, grating against my every nerve. Each stroke stripped away another illusion, another comforting lie I'd been wrapped in, honing the truth to an edge sharp enough to cut me open.
Rìan knew.
He knew the answers to every question tormenting me—I was certain of it. He'd been about to tell me more before I'd stopped him. Whatever terrible truths remained waited only a few paces away, beyond the thick wooden door separating us. All I had to do was ask.
But I wouldn't.
Those truths weren't Rìan's to tell—they belonged to Aedric. And after everything he'd taken from me, after every choice he'd made on my behalf, every lie he'd wrapped around me in the name of love, he owed me at least that much.
The truth—from his own lips.
I slid down the length of the door. I drew my knees to my chest, and rested my forehead against them.
Scrape.
Scrape.
Scrape.
I didn't know how long I remained there.
When the scraping stopped, the silence rang louder than the sound ever had.
A few moments later came the muted tread of footsteps, followed by the quiet click of a door somewhere deeper within the suite. Then the rush of running water.
I drew one trembling breath after another, trying not to think. Trying not to remember. Trying not to break.
This entire journey—the Gates of Othyr, the bargain I'd made with Rìan, every step we'd taken together—had been for Aedric.
To free his mind.
To break the bond.
And yet for the first time since that terrible night in Noctharis, I wondered what I was doing—and why the hell I was doing it.
The bronze-collared servant who knocked briskly at my door the next day carried a stunning ivory gown, courtesy of Thalassis, who’d apparently seen fit to provide us with appropriate attire for the evening's event.
She helped me bathe before using Tideland magic to draw the water from my hair, drying it in mere moments before sending the suspended droplets swirling down the drain with a practiced wave of her slender hand.
She dressed me, too, while I stood there staring into nothing, my heart so leaden I felt as though I might simply crumple beneath its weight.
Whether she failed to notice my silence or merely chose not to acknowledge it, I couldn't tell.
She busied herself fastening my dress before lining my eyes with kohl, never once asking if I was all right.
When she finally turned me to the mirror, I scarcely recognized the woman staring back at me.
Gone was the travel-ravaged female who'd crossed the salt flats, survived a raging fire, and been beaten by the Pelagan guards.
My skin, scrubbed clean of days' worth of dust and salt and blood, glowed with a healthy flush.
My hair had been pinned into a loose updo, threaded with fine silver strands beaded with polished sea glass that winked softly whenever I turned my head.
The gown was exquisite in its simplicity.
Creamy silk skimmed my body as though it had been poured over my skin, embracing my curves before plunging between my breasts almost to my navel.
The fabric swept over my shoulders in soft folds that gathered at the nape of my neck before giving way to a sheer back fastened with a single row of mother-of-pearl buttons that trailed down my spine.
The skirt brushed my ankles, the fabric shimmering with the soft lustre of an oyster shell.
I looked like a goddess—but a sad one.
Beyond the windows, the last of the daylight faded from the waters above, leaving Pelaga wrapped in the ocean's twilight, lit only by the bioluminescent glow of the sea. Somewhere within the palace, music drifted through the corridors, its sweeping melodies rising and falling like the tides.
I sighed, unlatching the door and pulling it open. Rìan stood on the other side, his fist half-raised as though he'd been about to knock.
We both startled.
For a heartbeat, we simply stared at one another.
His eyes found mine, then caught on my hair before drifting helplessly down the length of my body. Just as quickly, they snapped back up, a muscle feathering in his jaw.
As always, he was dressed entirely in black, though tonight the filthy travelling clothes had been exchanged for finely tailored linen, buttoned neatly to his throat and cut to skim his broad shoulders and powerful chest. The dark stubble that had shadowed his jaw throughout our journey was gone, leaving the hard, clean lines of his face even more striking.
His dark hair, usually left to fall untidily across his forehead, had been combed neatly back, though the damp Pelagan air had coaxed soft curls free at his temples.
"Are you..." The words died before they fully formed. He cleared his throat, as though discarding whatever he'd really meant to ask. "Are you ready?"
He offered me his arm. I regarded it for a long moment before finally slipping my hand through the crook of his elbow.
We walked in silence through the opalescent passageways of the palace, the music growing louder with every step. Servants and courtiers passed with polite bows, their curious glances lingering just long enough to notice the unmistakable stiffness between us.
"You can't sulk all night," Rìan said at last, as the distant hum of voices became discernible beneath the music.
I turned my head sharply. "Sulk?" His infuriatingly flippant remark was enough to wrench me from the maelstrom of my own thoughts. I had, in fact, been sulking. Though, in my defense, my world had shattered.
He cast me a sidelong glance, his face as composed as ever. "You must behave as you always do with Aedric."
"Is that so."
"Yes. For the sake of appearances, there can be no doubt. No suspicion that things aren't as they seem."
I rolled my eyes. "Is that really necessary? I thought you were powerful."
"I can make them believe what isn't real." His voice remained maddeningly patient. "But Thalassis knows Aedric well. He'll notice if anything is amiss."
"That sounds like your problem, not mine. I barely know him."
"He'll find it strange if Aedric's mate suddenly shows him no affection whatsoever."
"Affection?" I hissed out of the corner of my mouth as another elegantly dressed couple passed us arm in arm. Rìan inclined his head politely to them without breaking stride. "You expect me to be affectionate?"
"I expect you to behave as you always do with your mate."
I considered that for a beat. "Does that mean I can strike you?"
His lips kicked upward, the barest hint of a smile, but he said nothing more until we neared the open doors of the hall, the bustle within spilling out into the corridor.
"Thalassis may seem laid-back, but he's observant," he murmured. "I'll already be holding too many minds at once. If I overlook something—something as simple as you scowling at me the way you are now—and he notices, it could unravel everything."
His gaze slid back to me, glowing faintly now.
"So fix your face, Eidra."
I peeled my lips back, baring my teeth in an aggressively cheerful grin.
"Better?"
"No."
Rolling my eyes, I let the grin melt into something altogether different. Softer. Warmer. I tilted my head and batted my lashes up at him.
"Let's get this charade over with then, shall we?" I asked sweetly.
He blinked. For the briefest moment, he actually looked stricken.
But he recovered quickly, taking a step toward the doorway.
"Wait."
I caught his arm and drew him a few paces to the side, out of sight of the guests gathering inside the hall.
I reached for the top button of his shirt. His hand flashed out at once, closing around my wrist.
"What are you doing?"
I brushed it aside with an impatient huff.
"Aedric would never have his shirt buttoned to his throat," I scoffed.
His hand fell reluctantly away.
I undid the first button. Then the second. Then another.
The black linen parted beneath my fingers, revealing the hard lines of his collarbones and the smooth planes of his chest. My pulse gave an unhelpful thud.
"There."
I freed one final button before absentmindedly smoothing the collar back into place. The gesture came so naturally I didn't think about it until my palms settled against the warmth of his chest.
I froze.
Slowly, I lifted my gaze. His face had gone utterly still, something unreadable passing behind his eyes.
Heat rushed to my face. Refusing to acknowledge it, I stepped neatly back to his side, slipped my hand through his arm once more, and fixed my attention resolutely on the dining hall.
"Now we're ready."
He answered with a low grunt, and together we stepped through the doors.