Chapter 38
Lenna
What a damned evening that had been.
First plate served by killing the East Harming Bird with ancient crystal blades she was not meant to use. Second plate cooked by DIY-melting her wings to create the creepiest little syrup-juice that ever existed, and for dessert resuscitating the love of her life.
Was it extremely surprising her mind and body had given up right after? No. Was it extremely annoying? Very fucking much. Yet, she only realized what she had missed out when her golden eyes opened to Jake holding her, drinking her in with his silver stare as he grinned and chuckled.
“Here she is,” he said with a low chuckle. “My personal troublemaker.”
Lenna lifted her eyebrows as she rubbed her eyes and sat up on his lap.
“You look very alive,” she replied.
“My deepest apologies if that was not the intended consequence of your efforts. Please never make me drink anything as rotten as what you gave me. I almost wanted to remain dead when I tasted whatever the fuck that was.”
She elbowed him in the ribs, and she noticed every single rune she had drawn on him during the resuscitation curse was inked permanently on his skin in navy.
Lenna couldn’t decide whether not telling him exactly what he had drunk was the most generous act or the most secretive one, considering it was the corpse of a Cardinal itself that had brought him back to life. That, and a tiny bit of not-by-the-book magic.
“I can’t promise anything. Don’t die again, and nothing will happen. Simple as that.”
“For you, I’ll try not to, sweet fire.” He kissed her on her lips, so naturally, so effortlessly, so unexpectedly, that her nerves sent goosebumps to every single part of her body, her eyes widening beyond measure as she stilled as if she had been punched in the gut.
“Do you—can you—” she started.
“Love you?” he cocked an eyebrow, side smiling. “Or hate you?”
She couldn’t form her words, so she just nodded, eyes still wide. She was suddenly very aware of her messy, post-sleep-in-a-cuddle red hair, but was too shocked to sort it out.
“Both,” he said with a wink.
“Both?!” she shouted, indignation expanding in her chest. “What do you mean, both? Both my ass, as if—“
“No, I don’t hate your ass. Just my absolute love for that piece of art.”
Her jaw dropped for half a heartbeat before she snapped, “Oh, for Fifth’s damn sake.” She had missed him so much.
“I’ve held you for the past ten hours in my arms, unable to take my eyes or my mind from you, from your determination and passion, from your courage and lack of fear.
Of course I love you, Lenna. More than I ever knew was possible, more than I need air to breathe, more than anything in this world and any other. ”
“Every second I couldn’t love you will not be recovered,” he continued, “but I somehow now love you even more than before, because I know exactly what I could lose. I will never take you or your love for granted. I will protect you with everything I have, because all I want is a life with you, loving, kissing, making love, teasing. All I need is you.”
Tears couldn’t stop flooding her cheeks, her heart so exposed, so raw, it might as well have been outside her chest. The biggest fear she had held for months was finally cracking into pieces. Her man was back. Fully back.
Hers were painful tears for the past, joyful tears for the present, hopeful tears for the future.
His arms pressed her tighter against his strong body, and he let her cry until her tears dried out, whispering, “You’re safe,” “I’ve got you,” and “We’re together now and will always be,” now and then. Her heart felt steady and stable when she pulled back to look at him.
“I almost forgot,” she said. “The Queen’s piece of heart—where is it? You didn’t touch it with your hands, did you?”
“I took care of it. It’s destroyed, along with half of my House.”
“You’re joking.”
Jake shrugged. “I’m not. Half of my House is on the ground. Nothing some bricks and magic can’t fix, but we will need to decide if we want to rebuild it or leave it as it is. I always thought it was too big. It was my first time using the Fifth Power. I underestimated it.”
We.
We.
We want to rebuild.
She screamed, covering her wide grin with both hands.
He lifted his eyebrows, brushing his black hair backwards with his fingers, and Lenna wasn’t sure how aware he was of exactly how much her heart was jumping in a wild, happy dance. He said, “I almost forgot. Do you know what you did by killing the East Cardinal?”
She lifted her eyebrows. “Kill a Harming pain in the ass?”
“And?”
She bit her bottom lip, and his gaze stayed there. “And cause a panomquake, I guess? I was too busy trying to save you to pay attention to anything else.”
“And separated the East Petal from the rest of Thyria.”
She gasped loudly. “No, I fucking did not.”
He snorted, grinning. “Yes, you fucking did.”
Placing a hand on the back of her neck, Jake moured them to the edge of the East Petal.
Not to the East shore, where the Radel Sea expanded to the horizon, but to the West shore, where a mass of water separated them from the Core.
Bloody hell above. One thing was to hear it, but seeing it with her own eyes was much more than shocking. It was excitingly powerful.
“Are we floating in the middle of the Radel Sea? And the Jofryo River is…what, no longer a river in this area?”
He nodded.
She inhaled deeply. “But you’re alive, the Bird is dead, and there is only one piece left of the heart of the Queen to destroy.”
“Which is inside her very own chest,” he added.
She lifted her eyebrows. Of course, it was there. “So happy bloody days.”
“Happy bloody days indeed, my sweet fire.”
He kissed her, their lips savoring each other while their hands roamed each other’s bodies.
He kissed her once more, not with hunger but with a gentleness that stole the air from her lungs. It was a kiss of homecoming, of recognition, of everything they had lost and somehow found again. When he drew back, his silver eyes held her so tightly she felt her pulse steady under them.
“I almost lost you,” she whispered.
“And I almost stayed gone,” he admitted. His hand cupped her face, thumb brushing the trail of dried tears. “But you didn’t let me. You never let me. My stubborn woman.”
Her laugh broke into a sob, rough and small. “And here you are, so it was all worth it.”
“Yours,” he said, as if there had never been another answer. “I’m here, and I’m yours, Lenna. Through fire, through death, through whatever else this world throws at us. You’re the one. You’ve always been the one.”
Her chest cracked with the force of the unbearable simplicity. She pressed her forehead against his, eyes closed, letting the truth of him sink into her bones. His arms wrapped her close, and for the first time in months, maybe years, she allowed herself to believe in protection and unity.
Jake inhaled deeply, his chest expanding against her cheek, and they moved enough to look at each other.
He held his palm up, facing her, and when she felt the meaning of his gesture, her breath held, but not a cell in her body had any trace of doubt.
Trying her best not to jump with uncontained joy and kick the man in the face by accident, she kept her very excited ass still and placed her shaking fingers against his, their palms touching vertically.
“We,” she breathed, testing the word, tasting it, as she let her golden sparks travel to his thumb, circling it, injecting her magic into his skin in the shape of a golden-ink ring. “We will rebuild. We will fight. We will live. I’m only yours and will forever be.”
“We,” he echoed, sealing his acquired golden ring with a small, perpendicular navy line. Then his navy sparks traveled to her thumb and circled it in a finer line. “I’m only yours and will forever be.”
“You’re my man, Jake Coralt,” Lenna claimed, adding a small golden line across the navy ring to seal it permanently in an unbreakable oath.
“You’re my woman, Lenna Brachyan.”
Silence folded around them, not empty but vast, the kind of silence that carried oaths, that trespassed magic and centuries. There was no fear. Only certainty.
They sealed their love with a kiss that knew no boundaries, no limits, nothing but a forevermore.
“Can we still moure to the other Petals and the Core?” she asked quietly, because even in love, war did not pause.
Jake gave a crooked smile. “Good a time as any to test. Especially with everyone at Corentre’s safehouse no doubt busy preparing for a Queen we have to kill.”
Her laugh was short but real. She pressed her cheek against his chest, listening to the steady beat beneath. The sound anchored her, rooted her, reminded her they were alive, together, and ready.
Whatever storms awaited, they would meet them as one.