27. Leah #2
“Is that why you’ve been holding back during training?” he asks. “Because you’re afraid of repeating what happened that day?”
I can’t meet his eyes, staring at the floor instead, but I give a little nod.
“He was going to kill you, Leah. You did what you had to do.”
I grimace. “If I’d just given up that fucking piece of armor—”
“But you didn’t,” he says decisively. “You were defending what was yours, and he chose to take things too far. And when he did, you were strong enough to survive.”
I hate his comforting words and the way he says them—firm, but without any edge. If he was soft and gentle, it would make it easier to dismiss what he was saying as empty kindness. But this…this is getting through to me like nothing has before. Tears prick the back of my eyes.
“It wasn’t worth it,” I say.
He closes the distance between us, taking my chin in his fingers and drawing my face up so I’m forced to look at him.
“No, you don’t think you’re worth it. That’s the problem. You fight so hard—want to live on your own terms so badly—but when people push too hard, you back down. Because deep down, you’re afraid you don’t deserve the life you want.”
His thumb strokes my cheek lightly, studying my face for signs I disagree. The problem is he’s doing that thing when he sees me too clearly, and I can’t argue.
“But you do deserve it, Leah,” he murmurs. “You deserve everything. And I would give it to you if I could. But some things you have to take for yourself.”
“Is that what you do?” I ask, genuinely wanting to know the answer. Until now, I’ve only ever seen him fight for other people rather than himself.
He trails his fingers across my cheek and down my neck, sighing as a sadness rises up in his eyes.
“No, not always,” he says. “But I’m learning. It’s been a long road for me.” He pulls away from me, seeming to come to a decision. “Tell me, the day you killed that man, is that your worst memory?”
I nod. “Yes. The day my mother died is a close second, but I was young and don’t remember it so well.”
“And where does the night we met rank?” he asks wryly.
I smile, glad for a little levity. “Lower than you’d think.”
“Do you want to know my worst memory?” he asks, wandering around the room now, tracing a hand along the back of a chair by the fireplace. There’s a small table beside it with a book lying on top. The same one, I think, that I keep seeing Syrus with around the castle.
“Is it the day your kingdom nearly fell?” I ask.
He gives a small smile, pleased I’ve guessed right.
“Yes, although not just for the reasons you might expect.” Syrus braces his arms on the back of the chair, and I wait patiently, like I always do, for him to open up to me—to give me some real, private part of himself I can cling to even when he’s cold and distant and maddening.
“That day, the ephilium got wind of the fact that Ajax might make a pact with me,” Syrus says.
“Like I’ve told you before, the pale-bloods don’t think much of humans, but they can’t truly dismiss a group that outnumbers them so completely.
This rumor made them nervous, and they tried to get ahead of it.
A small contingent of them ambushed me and my closest soldiers at my home.
I survived, but only because one of my generals died protecting me—my younger sister, Sideria. ”
I hold in my shock and horror, swallowing it down to leave room for his story. Instead of grasping for empty words, I simply go to his side, laying a hand over his.
“Ajax arrived to help us,” he continues. “But some of the pale-bloods got away. Including the general who murdered Sid. I hunted him down later, of course—once I’d made my deal with Ajax and we were driving the ephilium back from the capital together.”
A thought occurs to me then. “Does your sister have anything to do with why the river—”
“Is called the Sideris?” he finishes. “Yes. They named it after her as a kind of memorial. Not that anyone remembers the reason now. I already knew when I asked you, I just wanted to hear you say it. I like hearing people say her name. It makes me feel like a part of her is still alive.” He nods at the book on the table.
“That’s a history book from Strata. It tells the story too.
It’s why I spend so much time reading it. ”
I wrap my arms around his waist, resting my head on his arm, and he lets me, leaning into my touch.
“I bet she was an incredible woman,” I murmur, because I know exactly how he feels. The worst thing after my mother’s death was the way no one would talk about her anymore. They all looked vaguely scandalized when I did—even my father.
“She was always a better fighter than me,” he smiles sadly.
“She could best any man in my army. And she was smart too, and so, so funny. Really, she should’ve been queen, but back then they still believed in nonsense like giving the throne to the firstborn.
So she gave her life for me, her brother and her king.
And I knew then that I had to do whatever was necessary to make her sacrifice worth it—to make my survival worth it.
I would save my kingdom, whatever it cost.”
He shifts his arm, lifting it over my head to wrap it around my back and draw me closer. He rests his chin against the top of my head, and I can feel the vibration of his voice as he murmurs his next words.
“The problem was, I thought I could earn something back, could fix that hole in my soul, by being the best leader possible. But three hundred years later, I still don’t feel any more worthy than I did the day she died for me.”
I lift my head, pulling back to look at him. “You mustn’t think like that,” I say. “Of course you are.”
He raises his eyebrows. “Pot, meet kettle. Or are you going to tell me that wearing that ring isn’t some kind of penance?”
“What do you mean?” I ask. He takes hold of my hand and lifts it up so the wedding band catches the light.
“I couldn’t work it out for a long time, why you still had it on,” he says.
“You didn’t love your husband, so it’s not loyalty to him.
It’s a kind of punishment, isn’t it? You’re trying to remind yourself of the price you paid for…
something. I don’t know exactly what. But it’s like that sun I have hanging in the ballroom, isn’t it?
It’s a reminder of a sacrifice, because you hope on some level it will make you feel better about yourself, about your past.”
I roll my eyes, tugging my hand away. “I’m not sure I like being analyzed like this.”
He presses his lips together, like he’s trying not to laugh. “Always so spiky,” he says, sounding deeply fond in a way that makes me melt a little.
“So you’re saying you’ve reached some kind of absolution?” I ask, skeptical. “You’re not struggling to feel worthy anymore?”
He looks like he’s debating saying something, then goes for it. “I guess that recently I’m starting to realize there are some things I might be willing to prioritize above my duty. Some things I want to choose for myself, regardless of what it means for my people.”
The look he gives me makes my mouth go dry.
“I do care about Infernum, you know,” I say, wanting to reassure him. “It’s not like—”
I’m silenced by him kissing me, and I don’t mind at all.
I’ve been aching for more since we sat in his office yesterday and he made my pulse jump just by blowing on my wrist. Then he started to slowly unravel me with his tongue and his hands, and all I could imagine was that tongue and those hands in other places—right up until he walked away.
Yet here we are again, and I can’t find it in me to be mad at him. Not when I plan to take as much of him as I can before he decides this is a bad idea.
There’s a needy edge to both of us tonight, perhaps precisely because we cut things short yesterday.
He tangles his fingers in my hair, urging my mouth open with firm, insistent lips, and I respond hungrily, teasing his lower lip between my teeth, drawing a low, rough sound from his throat that nearly makes my knees give out.
Eventually, we have to break for air, but we stay close to each other, foreheads touching, and a thrill goes through me as I notice the way his eyes are glued to my lips.
“What is this thing between us?” I ask, panting. “Sometimes when you’re close, I feel like I can’t breathe without being aware of you. Without wanting you.”
“The binding spell—” he starts to say.
“No,” I give the front of his shirt an annoyed tug. “Don’t pretend that’s all it is. Maybe that’s what lit the match, but it’s more than that now.”
“I know it’s more than that for me,” he says, his eyes burning with an intensity that makes me lightheaded. “I just wasn’t sure—”
“Shut up,” I say, but it’s soft—chiding. “Shut up before I get mad at you for suggesting I don’t know myself. That I’d let some stupid piece of magic tell me what I want. Don’t make me hear you say that. Because I need to kiss you again too badly to be angry with you right now.”
It’s the truth. I don’t want to list all the ways he’s disarmed me in these last three months.
How I’ve been touched by the tenderness and loyalty he has for his people, despite everything they’ve cost him.
How, even though I once thought he was costing me everything, I’ve started feeling freer in Malice than I have for the last six years in Strata.
And still, while giving me things that make my soul sing, he’s pushed and challenged me, taught me to be smarter and stronger.
Plus, none of that even touches on what he does to me when he fixes me with those dark, red eyes and takes me in his arms.
His lips meet mine again, his hands dropping to my waist, tugging me closer.
I slide my own hands across his bare chest, fingers lingering on each spot where a rune has been carved into his skin.
I want him to know I love this about him, that these scars are beautiful to me.
And when I’m done with his chest, I slide my hand over his shoulders, standing on tiptoes to stroke across the marks there too.