24. A spark and a storm
A spark and a storm
T he rest of them stood around awkwardly after Isolde left.
“Who are the Laghains?” Leif asked curiously, breaking the silence.
Felix was seething. “Her fucking fiancé put a bounty on her head. That mother fucker.”
Gutting was too good for the little shit. He deserved a slow, drawn out death.
Garren looked sideways at him. “How did you know that?”
He rolled his eyes. “She told me, Garren.” After he saw a memory of the slimy bastard in her mind, that was. But that was none of Garren’s business.
Mia nodded. “Someone in that family did, yes. A substantial bounty, too.” She addressed Garren and Luella when she continued. “They tried to keep it covered up, of course, but I got my information directly from the Duskrend knight-captain.”
Felix’s head snapped back to face her. “Titus? Why would he tell you that?”
“Men tell me all kinds of things, Felix,” she said with a sly grin. “Titus loves to brag. Told me Alwin was practically frothing at the mouth to be sent after you. I assume he never found you? ”
“Oh, he sure did,” Felix replied darkly. “I’m going to check on Isolde.” He ignored Mia’s smug expression and strode off into the gloom.
The indistinct murmur of voices suggested Luella and Garren wasted no time in starting their own interrogation of Mia. He wished them all luck.
***
He found her with the horses, as he’d expected. She was leaning against Shadow’s neck, one hand tangled in the horse’s mane. When he got closer, he saw her shaking. She was crying. If he wasn’t so mad, he would try to comfort her, to be gentle. But he was really fucking mad.
“Isa,” he said, turning her around to him. “Stop. This is not worth your tears.”
The look on her face broke him into a thousand fractured pieces. It was so haunted, so heartbroken, that he didn’t think he could ever erase it from his memory.
His hands were on her shoulders, and he almost shook her, but managed a gentle squeeze. “All of them – the mages, your father sending you off alone, that worthless Laghain piece of shit – they’re nothing. All they deserve is your anger.”
“I can’t do this anymore,” she said, her voice breaking.
“Every time I think there is a glimmer of hope, I am reminded that I am heading towards my doom. And if I somehow don’t die at the Nexus, it seems the man I was supposed to marry wants me dead as well.
I don’t understand what I have done to deserve this. ”
Felix let out a slow breath, his anger receding in the face of her anguish. He reached out and gently wiped away the single tear rolling down her cheek.
“You have done nothing wrong. You’ve been nothing but brave, and strong, and perfect.”
Isolde surged forward, interrupting whatever he was going to say next. She flung her arms around his neck, and before he could register what was happening, her lips met his.
For a heartbeat, he was stunned by her enthusiasm.
Then he kissed her back, finally, finally, and she melted in his arms. She tasted like rain, like lightning, like everything that was right in the world.
Sparks danced against his skin, warm and heady.
Her fingers threaded through his hair when he deepened the kiss and pulled her body flush against his own.
When they parted, Isolde touched her forehead against his, searching his face. She smiled a watery smile at him. “I’ve wanted to do that for what feels like a very long time.”
“I hope it was up to expectations, in that case,” he said with a grin.
She narrowed her eyes. “Don’t you dare hide behind jokes now.”
“I thought you liked my jokes.”
She kissed him again.
If their first kiss had been a spark, this was a storm.
Isolde clutched at him, digging her nails into his neck, her magic enveloping them like a cloak.
Felix trailed kisses down her jaw, tracing the shimmering blue line there he had so often fantasized about.
She whined when his lips left hers, but gasped as he found the pulse point beneath her ear.
He wanted to touch her everywhere, all at once, inwardly cursing the existence of clothes and cloaks and other things that got in the way.
His hands roamed down her back, moulding her against him, and she let out a divine little sigh that would have made him lose his last remaining shred of sense – if it hadn’t been immediately followed by a sob.
He moved his hands out to the sides. “Isa. Isa, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t,” she said, drawing them back around herself. “Don’t apologise. I’m sorry. I’m a mess.” She leaned her head against his shoulder and sighed. “You’re the only good thing in all of this.”
He slowly exhaled and tried to ignore all the many complex emotions those words stirred in him. “That is grim news indeed,” he quipped instead.
Isolde let out a sad little huff of a laugh, but that was better than nothing. His arms tightened around her, and he kissed the top of her head.
She did not deserve any of this. She was far too good for this. The wild, unpredictable magic and now a bloody witch hunt and the complete unknown of her future – if she survived whatever awaited her at the Nexus. If they even made it there at all.
Fuck. I can’t lose her .
He was a stupid fucking idiot. Somewhere down the line, he had let her in. Had unknowingly opened the triple-locked box in his heart where he kept his feelings. Now there was no turning back.
She turned her head and looked up at him. He stared into her eyes and an overwhelming wave of sheer terror overcame him – a blind panic that ran across his skin like flames.
“Run away with me.”
Confusion flickered on her face. “Run away?”
“Yes! We take a horse and leave right now. We’ll go west, to the coast, board a ship or something,” he blurted out, almost frantic. “The world is a big place, Isa. You don’t need to continue hurtling towards danger for the benefit of others.”
She stepped backwards out of his embrace, wrapping her arms around herself. He wondered if she was suddenly cold, too.
“How can you suggest that? When you are always the first to run headlong into things?” She looked at him incredulously, shaking her head. “I can’t do that. I have to go to the Nexus.”
“Why? Surely you don’t believe this mage actually cares what happens to you? That whatever they are planning will help you?”
“It’s not about the mages. I have to go. There is something I must do there. Something important.” She looked away from him. “And my father is travelling north, too. Not everyone is against me.”
The words forced themselves out before he could do anything about it. “Isa. Your father told me to kill you if you can’t be ‘cured’.”
Why did you say that? You didn’t need to say that.
Everything fell silent, as if all the air had been sucked out of the world. The blood drained from Isolde’s face, and she took a staggering step backwards.
“I don’t believe you.”
She continued backing away from him. He followed, reaching out to her again, drowning in regret but unable to take any of it back now.
“He did. Before we left, on the dock. He told me there is no future for you if there is no cure. ”
Isolde stared at him, her expression raw and vulnerable. “He wouldn’t! You’re making this up to make me come with you! I can’t believe you would say something like that!” She whirled away from him in a flurry of sparks.
Felix started after her, reaching out to grab her arm. “Isa. I just want –”
I just want to keep you safe, because I don’t know what to do without you anymore.
She spun back around, her eyes glowing blue. Magic danced and leapt in erratic patterns. When he merely looked at her helplessly, her entire face hardened. “Go away, Felix, or I will make you.”
He held her gaze for a heartbeat longer, his hands shaking at his sides. Then he turned and left.