Chapter 30
Chapter Thirty
Sylvi
Ileaned against the healer’s wagon, the metal rim of my mug cool against my fingers as I sipped the tea Sascha had blended for my frayed nerves.
The taste was earthy and bittersweet, laced with something floral I couldn’t name.
It grounded me, even if it didn’t untangle the knot of dread tightening in my stomach.
You’d think after all my years in the guard, I’d have my shit together. But this envoy was different.
This wasn’t a border patrol. Or a training exercise.
This was a meeting with the Unseelie King.
And I had no idea what the fuck we were walking into.
I didn’t know if he was truly an enemy, what truths would be twisted, or what traps might be hiding behind false smiles and fine silks. Especially not after what Jack had revealed back at the lake.
Ravin had confirmed my fears when he returned from the ridge’s edge, brow furrowed. The Unseelie King had brought a small army. It didn’t make sense. Why request a royal escort if he was easily more heavily armed than we were.
I took another sip of tea and tried to still the tremble in my hands. Sascha sat nearby, finishing her own cup while checking the salves in her satchel. Ravin sat a few feet away on a mossy log with Astrid and Ingrid, chewing on a strip of dried meat.
In trying to remain discreet, we’d gone without fires at night, which meant stale bread, cold broth, and everything tasting like pine bark and salt. Still, it was better than drawing unwanted attention or starving.
Sascha sauntered over to Ravin to check on his leg. I’d heard her comment about his wound earlier, and how it seemed to be healing very nicely.
Maybe too nicely.
The thought made me reach to the spot right below my breast, where my wound no longer existed, not even a trace of it.
Sascha noticed my movements, her eyes flicking to my hand then to my face. “Everything okay, Captain?”
“Sylvi,” I murmured, correcting her gently with a smile.
A flicker of concern passed through her soft features as she gestured to the area beneath my breast. “You’re sure you’re fully healed?”
I nodded but didn’t meet her gaze. Gods, if she saw what I had seen in the mirror, she’d know something wasn’t right. “It’s fine.”
She didn’t press, but her brow pinched. “You’ve not been sleeping well.”
“I’ll rest when we get back to Isenheim in one piece.”
“I know you’re worried about another attack, but you made the right call naming Astrid your second.
And the prince’s shields have held strong every night.
” She reached up and tucked a stray lock of hair behind my ear.
Her touch was gentle, mothering. “Why not lie down inside the wagon for a little while? You don’t need to sleep, just… rest your eyes.”
I started to shake my head when a ripple of awareness ran down my spine.
Jack crested the slope, Draumskelmir’s reins in his hand, his strides long and languid, cloak billowing behind him, and for a moment I couldn’t look away.
I tried not to let my gaze linger. Didn’t want anyone seeing the storm that twisted inside me at just the sight of him. Didn’t want him to see it.
Sascha followed my gaze and rose smoothly, dusting off her skirts. “Just think about it,” she whispered before walking off to help Ingrid with repacking the medical kit.
Jack’s boots crunched over the frostbitten earth as he neared our gathered circle. He said something to Astrid. Ravin responded with a dry quip and a muttered curse that earned a quiet chuckle from Ingrid. But I didn’t hear a word of it.
My heartbeat thundered too loudly. My lungs too tight.
I couldn’t sit here, not with him close enough to touch, yet oceans away.
The ache inside me wasn’t anger anymore; it was grief. What I needed more than anything was to talk to my best friend the way I used to. To fall into step beside him and whisper my doubts, my fears, about this meeting. To let him pull the weight from my shoulders like he always had.
But he’d built that wall between us, brick by brick. And I didn’t know how to climb it anymore.
So, I stood, not bothering to excuse myself as I left the circle and slipped into the wagon. Not to sleep, but to breathe.
Inside, it was quiet and dark, and I settled on the wooden floor, leaning my back against the wall opposite the flap, drawing one knee to my chest. The wood creaked beneath my weight, the scent of herbs and dried mud clinging to the canvas.
Outside, murmurs fluttered.
Ravin’s voice was hushed, but not soft enough. “Are you really not going to talk to her?”
Silence.
“She needs you, even if she won’t say it.”
Another long pause.
I held my breath.
“You’re being a stubborn prick,” Ravin muttered. “Just suck it up and stop torturing the both of you.”
More fucking silence.
Then, the flap rustled, and Jack stood at the threshold, silhouetted by the dim afternoon light spilling in, soft and gray.
My heart lurched, but I turned my head slightly, fixing my gaze on anything but him.
He didn’t speak.
And gods, the quiet between us crackled like a whip of lightning.
Jack sucked in a deep breath through his nose. “Sascha says you haven’t been sleeping well.”
I gently slid my gaze to him, though I didn’t meet his eyes. “Has anyone been sleeping well? The last four days have been brutal on all of us.”
“I’m worried about you.”
I leaned my head back. “Don’t be. I’m fine.”
“Syl…”
“Your Highness.”
He went to jump into the wagon, but I stared him down, stopping him. His eyes darkened, something like hurt swimming in their depths.
“I came in here to rest my eyes,” I said coolly. “Is there something else you wish to talk to me about, or are we ready to depart for the valley?”
There was a heavy pause between us, both of us measuring our words.
“This has been hard on me, too, Syl.”
I swallowed thickly, my gaze hardening. “While we’re still on this envoy, we should keep all communication between us strictly formal, My Prince. It’s best for the safety of the guard.”
His throat worked, and his chest heaved with one long, desperate inhale, that muscle in his jaw twitching tighter than usual. Dropping his chin, he said, “Let the guards know to ready the horses; we leave at once.” With that, he turned and walked away, a trail of frost glistening in his wake.
The moment he was gone, a shaky breath leaked from my lips as I tried to hold back a sob of angry, frustrated tears.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
I banged a fist against the wooden floor of the wagon.
Bastard. I missed him so godsdamn much my insides were crumbling.
I literally had to fight every instinct in my body from leaping across that wagon and diving into his arms. I needed his warmth, his scent.
I craved the safety of his chest and the sanctuary of his embrace.
I never imagined it would hurt this badly to miss someone who was an arm’s reach away.
Fucking Hel. Why did we have to mess everything up with that damn kiss? With the way I’d let him…
I couldn’t even finish that thought, or I’d run myself back into the Wildlands and beg those beasts to rip me to shreds.
For Skadi’s sake, I didn’t know how much longer I could go on like this before I wouldn’t be able to be around him at all.
“Captain,” Astrid called from outside the wagon, startling me. “Want me to start rallying the soldiers?”
I wiped at the wetness at the corners of my eyes. “Yes, please. Thank you, Lieutenant. I’ll be right out.”
“Take your time.”
When I emerged, Ravin was leaning against the wagon’s side, chewing what looked like his fifth piece of jerky. His gaze flicked up. “You know,” he said, “this is tearing him apart, too.”
“Whatever you think you know,” I muttered, walking past him, “respectfully, it’s none of your business.”
He followed. “It is when he’s my friend, too.”
I spun to face him. “Then why don’t you talk to him about it?”
“Because we both know how closed-off he can be.”
“I can’t do this right now, Rav. I need to get the envoy back on the pass and down the mountain.”
He caught my arm, not roughly, just enough to make me pause. “He’s got the weight of an entire realm on his shoulders, Syl. This alliance with King Maelthar… I don’t think I need to warn you that we’re stepping into dangerous territory. Jack needs you at his side, not just as his captain.”
I pulled my arm free. “Despite what’s happening between us, friend or captain, I would never put his safety or that of anyone in this company at any risk.”
“I never said you would. But at least cut him some slack, Syl. He’s only trying to do what he believes is best for his people.”
As if I didn’t fucking know that already. “Noted,” I said, exasperation bubbling out of me as I walked away before I could say anything else I would regret.
The descent into Thrymgard felt like sliding into the belly of some ancient beast. Snow thinned the farther we rode, replaced by dark earth and frost-glazed rock.
Pines loomed in close ranks around the pass, their blackened boughs rattling like bones in the wind.
Ahead, nestled like a viper between the folds of the valley, sprawled the unseelie camp.
At least a hundred tents, maybe more. All black as pitch, their pennants snapping in the wind, banners bearing the mark of the Unseelie Court. Ominous. Stark. And utterly beautiful in a terrible, commanding way.
Jack rode at the front of our formation, a creature carved from winter and shadow.
He had changed into his formal armor, his cloak billowing behind him, fur-lined and clasped with the sigil of his house. Even Draumskelmir moved like he knew the weight of this moment, hooves thundering down the path.
I flanked Jack’s left side, Astrid on his right, and the rest of the envoy followed behind. Two columns of mounted guard. Not a single banner raised. We hadn’t come here as conquerors.
But gods, it sure as Hel felt like we were riding into enemy territory.
“Breathe,” Jack murmured beside me, so low only I could hear. Even with the chasm carved between us, he could read my mood like a manuscript inked over his heart.