Chapter 14
Leita rose before dawn, slipping out of the warm, comforting arms of her azai. Her instincts screamed at her not to do it, her heart pleaded with her not to go, but her resolve was set.
On silent feet, she found the clothes that’d been tossed aside so passionately the night before.
Her wings twitched, wanting to hum at the memories of what they’d done.
She didn’t dare look at Attalus’s sleeping form, his face slack with ease and dreams. If she did, that resolve of hers, wholly unpopular with the rest of her, might give in, too.
She packed her things by rote. There was little to take, really. Just a handful of items she kept in her pack. The rest—including all she’d bought in Hallevale—would remain here with Attalus. She knew it was little consolation and offered only small comforts, but it was all she could do for now.
Leita just couldn’t risk bringing him to Fallorian. Not yet. There were far too many unknowns.
Dragons flying overhead was one thing—but one in the palace? She didn’t know if her people’s patience could suffer it.
She didn’t want to bring danger upon them from the dragons. And she didn’t want to endanger Attalus either, subjecting him to the same suspicion and displeasure she faced in Fallorian.
No, best she go ahead. Smooth out what she could.
She could tell Charis and the elders that she’d made some progress, at least. And that there was a bastion of old traditions in Hallevale and likely other hinterland towns. Leita was determined to find a way to bring them together, to show the fae of Fallorian that it could be done.
Leita would bring Attalus back to a healing city, not a viper’s pit.
With her boots on and her pack shouldered, there was but one thing left to do.
Raising her hand to the gray sky, Leita wove an enchantment entirely of her own magic.
Above the treetops, she set a glamoured dome across the nearby land, so that anything looking from above would only see the ground.
In this she could offer Attalus a modicum of safety.
She just had to believe that he would stay put as she asked.
Glamour in place, Leita had nothing left to do but leave. Even so, her feet wouldn’t move.
She stood there so long, dawn began to threaten.
Thalia watched her in silence, neither encouraging nor reprimanding. Leita could have used a nudge, but she understood this was her decision. She had to bear the initiative and the consequences.
Drawing in a long breath, she turned on her heel and marched back into the cave.
Carefully, she knelt beside the mess of blankets, drawing one up over Attalus’s arms where she herself had lain not long ago.
Leita leaned over him to kiss his scaled cheek, savoring his warmth and scent for one last moment.
Her body buzzed with the contact, and she swayed forward, nearly falling back into his arms.
Not yet. She had to make things right.
One last kiss, then she strode from the cave, and with a running start, leapt onto Thalia’s back.
Before the mare turned west, she asked, Are you sure, Lala?
It has to be this way, she told Thalia, and herself.
There was a female in the blankets beside him when Attalus woke, but he knew it wasn’t his mate. Instead, Slinky yawned wide, her black eyes narrow with sleep as they both struggled to muster the will to rise.
What was the point? Attalus had to wonder. Leita was already long gone.
His sigh ruffled Slinky’s fur as he surveyed their lonely camp. Leita had left him all the provisions procured from town, so he wouldn’t go hungry immediately. Fresh firewood had been stacked on the far wall, the new cauldron suspended from a spit over the cold fire.
She’d thought of everything, it seemed, in preparation to leave him.
The dejection sat hard in his chest, his inner fires and bitterness giving him heartburn.
Finally, he sat up in the blankets, casting his listless gaze about the cave. There wasn’t anything that needed doing, really. Nothing to entice him from the small comfort of his nest.
So Attalus slumped back down.
At least the blankets still held a trace of her scent.
If he closed his eyes, he could still taste her on his tongue. Yet, he used that same tongue to curse her.
“She really did it, Slinky. She left.”
The marten stretched, contorting herself into impossible shapes before clambering up his side to sit on his chest.
Attalus carefully scratched her chin with the tip of a claw.
“You won’t leave me, will you, friend?”
In response, Slinky nudged his hand, turned in a circle, and laid herself down in a perfect, furry O. He laid his hand over her, grateful one woman at least wouldn’t hurt him.
Eyes sliding closed, Attalus decided life might look a little rosier after a nap.
He was tired, perhaps from the night before, perhaps from sleeping on hard ground. His body ached, but not as fiercely as his hearts.
If he truly was going to have to wait out his mulish mate, perhaps the best thing to do would be to sleep through as much of it as he could.