Chapter 28
Mariah’s world tilted and cracked. The man slid from the back of an achingly familiar horse, feet hitting the ground with a thud that shuddered through the earth.
Crushing tanzanite eyes lifted to hers. A sob wracked her chest, a whimper of disbelief.
“Andrian?”
He’d made it. He’d gotten out.
He’d found her.
Her feet were moving across the frost-cracked grass. For the first time in so many weeks she felt something stir in her soul—not quite awake but rumbling with recognition.
Andrian held himself still, arms slack at his side, as Mariah raced across the clearing. Her lungs drew their first true breath when she collided into him.
Her arms wrapped around his torso, nails digging into the skin between his shoulder blades. Her face buried in his chest, inhaling lungful after lungful of that heartachingly perfect rain and sandalwood scent.
Home, home, home…
They stood like that for what could have been a second or an hour; Mariah never would’ve known. He was tense and unmoving in her arms, but she didn’t care. She didn’t let go.
“You’re here,” she whispered. “You’re here, you’re here, you’re here…”
Her words seemed to unlock something in him. He melted, relaxing like pliant heat in her embrace. His arms lifted from his side, wrapping around her.
With a near-silent sob of his own, Andrian clutched her head to him and buried his face into her neck. His hair tickled her cheek, his breath coasting across her skin.
“I’m here, nio,” he finally said, his voice hoarse—from disuse or exhaustion or emotion, Mariah couldn’t be sure.
Did it really matter?
She pulled back, just enough to see his face. His eyes met hers with a look written from the same desperate longing that had almost consumed her, that same subtle disbelief that this was real.
Even if it were nothing but a dream, it was perhaps the best one of Mariah’s life.
She searched the rich purple blue, reaching for a bond that didn’t answer her. But it didn’t matter; none of it mattered, not anymore, because he was here.
His grip on the back of her neck tightened. Shadowed fire flared in his eyes, and he pulled her forward, his lips meeting hers in a heart-stopping, soul-claiming, all-devouring kiss.
Mariah fell into that kiss with a bleak, wistful moan.
He tasted just as she remembered. All shadowed smoke and moonlit woods. The soft tang of spice melted through her when his tongue met hers, settling into a familiar form of combat.
One she’d missed all too much.
Mariah’s hands slid over his chest, crept up his neck, tangled in his hair. Traces of the haircut she’d given him still lingered; the shorter sides and back, the longer layers on top. It had grown, now brushing the back of his neck and framing his ears and tickling her forehead.
“Mariah,” Andrian groaned into her mouth, and she forgot all about the details of his haircut. Heat spiraled down through her.
She couldn’t get enough of him. She clung to him desperately, as if he were the only thing that kept her feet bound to the earth.
Maybe he was. What did she know?
“I knew you’d come,” Mariah murmured. “I always knew.”
He stiffened again.
His kiss grew less desperate, less claiming. More gentle and reluctant, as if slogging through a snowdrift. Andrian broke from her slowly, pulling back. Their chests heaved in tandem, color staining his cheeks that she knew also flushed her own.
When she met his gaze, his expression was…broken. Pained. Like the last thing he wanted to do was pull away from her, and yet he did it anyway.
With a heart wrenching hesitance, he stepped out of her embrace, dropping his grip on her neck, though his hand trailed down her arm to tangle with her fingers.
As if he was trying to get himself to let go, but his body refused to completely obey.
Mariah searched his gaze again. That’s when she saw it.
The haunted gloom. The absence of his usual fire. Even his shadows were muted, reaching tentative tendrils down his arms to brush like timid fingers against her skin.
Her stomach dropped, fear and fury and vengeance rising in its wake.
He’d been in Khento. Where they’d both spent most of the winter being tormented.
But that had only been at the hands of mortal men. What horrors had Kol, an ageless god, devised for Andrian during his second stay in that cursed castle, no matter how short it had been?
What unmentionable things had Andrian endured because Mariah hadn’t been strong enough to get him out? When she’d had to abandon him there?
He looked physically healthy, but what about the parts of him she couldn’t see?
Andrian’s thumb stroked idly over her palm, pulling her away from her thoughts. He probably didn’t even know he was doing it. That he was seeking a way to ground himself.
Judging by that empty, plagued look shrouding him, she wasn’t surprised.
Andrian swallowed, throat bobbing. “I told you to leave me. I told you not to come back for me. You weren’t supposed to find me.”
Mariah blinked. She took a small step forward, crowding closer into him, tilting up her chin. He didn’t step back, but his nostrils flared, brows furrowing.
“I did leave you, Andrian.” Her voice cracked. “I left you, and I didn’t come back. But you did—you found me.” A sad, small smile pulled at her lips. “Just like I always knew you would.”
She thought that would calm him. That he would feel some sort of reassurance—that she’d done as he asked but had never lost faith that he would make it back to her. That he would always find her.
Instead, his eyes widened. He took a small, stumbling step back. He finally released her hand; it fell loosely to her side.
Where she had expected to see overwhelming joy, she saw nothing but abject horror.
Confusion and fear dropped through her like bricks landing in her stomach. She lurched forward, almost tripping over her feet. “What—”
“By the fucking goddess! I can’t believe you found us!”
Mariah nearly jumped when Matheo called out across the clearing, the grass crunching under his boots as he approached. His greeting shook something out of Andrian, too, because that horror softened and fell away, replaced by a guarded coldness.
Just like that, all those walls slid right back into place.
Mariah’s heart twisted. Matheo clasped Andrian on the shoulder, giving him a once-over before pulling him in.
“You look like shit,” Matheo said with a chuckle, “but I’m glad you made it.”
“Always know how to give the best compliments, Matheo,” Andrian grumbled, and Mariah almost smiled at the familiar attitude lacing his words.
Almost, if she didn’t also hear how empty they were.
“How’d you find us?” Matheo released Andrian and took a step away.
Andrian hesitated, then nodded at Kodie. The gelding stood only a few paces away, grazing idly. Mariah finally swung her attention to him, a pang of guilt firing through her.
It all washed away when her horse pricked his ears and lifted his head. With a quiet nicker, he walked forward, burrowing his head into her shoulder.
The tears finally came then.
They spilled out of her eyes and down her cheeks. She wrapped her arms around Kodie’s neck, stroking the golden fur and running a hand over the tangled black mass of his mane.
She glanced over her shoulder at Andrian and Matheo, finding them both watching her silently. “How?”
Kodie nickered again, nuzzling his soft whiskers into her palms.
“He must’ve been wandering in the woods outside Khento ever since we…
left.” Andrian’s voice caught at the end, as if unsure how to describe that ill-fated trip to Shawth’s castle.
“I found him—or he found me. With some help, I suppose.” Andrian’s gaze lifted to the sky, the hint of a scowl twisting his brow.
A flash of golden feathers. A high-pitched whistle. The branches of a nearby tree rustled as Cielle landed, shaking out her wings and clucking her beak with satisfaction.
Mariah smiled up at her, lifting an arm. The eagle took off again, swooping down over the meadow and settling on Mariah’s forearm. Cielle trilled as Mariah stroked her soft feathers.
A stare warmed the side of her face. Mariah glanced up, finding Andrian’s walls a little weakened. He grinned at her with something akin to awe, slowly shaking his head.
“Truthfully,” he murmured, “I should’ve known it was you.” The shadows around him had lifted, as if his true self tried to peek through.
Cielle trilled proudly again, nuzzling her head into Mariah’s hand. “This is Cielle,” Mariah said. “And she’s not the only one I want you to meet.”
“Stars.” Signe leaned back against a rock as she stared at the flickering fire. “I am so excited to finally be heading to Leuxrith.” She gave Mariah a quick, devilish smile. “I miss home.”
“I’m excited to see your home, Signe.” Mariah answered her smile with a grin, stretching her legs out in front of her. Andrian and Callamus sat across the fire, deep in a conversation of knowing nods and furrowed brows.
Introductions had been…interesting. Andrian had remembered Signe from that inn on the road to Khento—and the few other times before, in Verith—and given her his version of a warm greeting.
It had been entirely different when Mariah had introduced the God of the Night Sky.
Andrian had gone rigid, shadows flickering down his shoulders. He’d narrowed wary eyes on Callamus—mistrusting and fearful.
He may hide it all behind a protective wall, but Mariah knew better. She could see what it really was.
Andrian was terrified.
Only with her quiet reassurances had he reluctantly relaxed. When Callamus had asked Andrian to eat the dinner of freshly caught rabbit Matheo had procured from the woods with him so they could talk, Andrian had agreed.
Mariah didn’t know what they discussed, but she’d watched the tension slowly leave Andrian’s shoulders as it had gone on. She, Matheo, and Signe gave them space, lounging by the blazing fire, the smell of burning pine a comforting blanket.
The sun was long set, the stars and moons twinkling above.
Signe stood, stretching her arms high above her.
“That’s good. I have a feeling you’re going to love it.
” She glanced around the clearing, Callamus and Andrian falling silent to watch her.
“I think it’s time to get some rest. These three days have been nice, but I suppose we’ll be traveling by horse and foot from now on.
We’ll miss these nights when we’re back on the road. ”
Callamus nodded, rising. “Well said, Signe. I agree, we need rest.”
Signe beamed at her god, and Mariah again marveled at it. At the easy closeness of their relationship.
It made her wonder—and not for the first time—where Onita had gone so far astray.
Signe and Callamus retreated to their respective tents, leaving Matheo, Mariah, and Andrian in the clearing.
Andrian cleared his throat, standing first. His eyes darted between the tents, Mariah, and the tree line. His hair—still slightly damp from the quick foray he’d taken to the stream winding just inside the woods—glistened in the dying firelight.
“I’ll…I’ll take the first watch.”
Matheo snorted, pushing up from the grass. “Absolutely not.”
“Matheo—”
“Andrian,” Matheo interrupted. He pinned Andrian with a commanding stare, looking so much like his older brother. “You may have bathed, but you look exhausted. You heard Signe; we’re going by foot from here on. You need to rest or else your ass is getting left behind.”
The two men glared at each other, unblinking.
Mariah sighed and stood. “Matheo’s right, Andrian,” she said softly. His blue stare swung to her, softening as if on instinct. With a small hesitation, she raised her hand to him. “Let him take first watch. Come get some rest.”
They stared at each other across the fire, the light flickering between them and tension writing across his brow, and she had a fleeting surge of panic.
That he would say no. That whatever had happened to him back in Khento would keep him out of her tent, that everything they’d spent the past year building would crumble to the ground right here in this quiet, moonlit clearing.
“Please,” she begged. “I don’t care what happened. You’re mine, and you’re here. That’s all that matters.”
No matter how hard she tried to push those words down their bond, that bridge of magic between their souls stayed silent.
After what could’ve been a breathless eternity, Andrian’s hands loosened at his side. He strode slowly around the fire, stopping in front of her. He rested his palm in hers, and Mariah’s chest caved in at the searing warmth that ignited and spread through her at that small touch.
Without another word, he followed her into her tent. They settled onto the pallet and furs she’d arranged on the firm ground. As if it were as natural as breathing, he wrapped his arms around her, tucking her into the curve of his body, his breath quickly deepening and slowing.
It didn’t take long for her to follow him into sleep, sandalwood and rain all around her.
For the first time in weeks, her dreams were blessedly, beautifully silent.