Chapter 39
F yn was in the dungeon; his shirt and boots were gone, leaving him in nothing but blood-stained pants. He was chained by his hands to the ceiling to make him stand, and both dried and fresh blood marked his skin like red paint splattered across a gray canvas.
She didn’t know how long he’d been left here to rot in this dungeon. Any other elf would have succumbed to it by now, but not Fyn. He had such strength in him.
She called the spell to open the door and rushed to him. “Fyn! Open your eyes.”
His head was cast down, and he wasn’t moving. How long had he been chained up here? It must have been after she left the dungeon yesterday.
The cut marks on his chest were made with a small blade, and the scars on his back were from a whip.
The wounds hadn’t healed, and making him keep his arms up reopened them.
They’d tortured him and thrown him in the dungeon after.
It was probably Falco who did it. She should have cut his skinny prick off when she had the chance.
“I’m here. I’ll heal you,” she whispered in his ear .
His head tilted slightly in her direction, and he mumbled something unintelligible.
Thank Freyr, he was still alive!
She unlocked the chains that bound him, and he collapsed onto the floor.
Sitting down beside him, she laid his head to rest on her lap as she started healing him with her magic, starting with the cuts on his chest. She hadn’t eaten anything for days, and her sleep was fitful, interrupted by nightmares and flashbacks.
Her body was exhausted, her soul was broken, but she poured everything she had left into her magic.
His cuts closed up, and the scars faded, even the blood dried from his skin. She marveled at his perfect chest, back to its even gray color, muscles defined and hard, and his skin soft and smooth.
Strangely, she didn’t feel tired. Magical energy flowed through her. She was expending a lot of it, but she didn’t feel drained as she usually did when healing.
It was … because of … love. She could feel her love pour through her healing magic that seemed a well without end.
“I’m here,” she spoke softly to him once she was finished healing his chest. Her hands moved the sweat-dampened hair from his face; he had a healthier look about him now. His eyes fluttered open and found hers. He slowly brought his hand up to cradle her face, and she placed her hand over his.
“Little … flower.”
“Don’t speak. Conserve your strength,” she said, and placed his hand back down. She started on healing his back. He winced slightly at her touch. Her hand had to touch his raw flesh to heal him, but he took it like a soldier and stayed still while she worked her magic.
Open wounds healed into scars, which then faded to cool gray skin. He stirred in her lap when she was almost finished. “You’re so beautiful,” he murmured.
She looked down to see him staring at her from her lap. A giggle escaped her. It was done more in relief that he was back to his old self rather than in mirth. “I told you flattery will get you nowhere.” That was said in mirth, though.
“No. I mean it.” His eyes narrowed in seriousness.
She got to the last scar on his back.
“From the moment I saw you in that temple, I was captivated.”
She almost snorted. “How ridiculous. You expect me to believe that? You went there to kill the high priestess. Why would you think that way about me?”
“Why do you think I spared your life?”
He was whole again. She’d healed him, but it was love that had brought him back.
“You were like the sunlight,” he continued, lying on her lap, still looking up at her. “Radiant, warm, like your healing touch just now.”
“You mean …” She had a flashback to Lindana’s death. He’d poisoned her and left her on the floor while he murdered the high priestess. Then, he just stood there and stared at her. She’d wondered why at the time, why he hadn’t killed her in the first place.
“I lived because you had a crush?” An unease spread in her belly.
Fyn’s eyes hardened momentarily. “And because of what the Light Elf said to me before he let me into the temple. He told me I could kill the guards because they didn’t matter, they came from poor families, but not to kill the other priestesses as he didn’t want ‘incidents with their families.’ I guess I… felt … Well, I understood you.”
“Nerilion Silvercoin said that?”
The discomfort welling up inside the pit of her stomach grew more. She was so close, though. Mistress Valeria said she worked with all elves, not just Dark Elves, but Light Elves too.
“I spared your life for the same reason you prayed for me.” She was interrupted from her thoughts by Fyn, still looking up at her.
“I would’ve died in that labyrinth. A less-than-honorable death for an assassin, but one I was long overdue.
The tree spirit promptly found me guilty and sentenced me to execution for my crimes.
It’s what you wanted, you said it yourself that you wanted me dead.
But you prayed for me and … a miracle happened … that’s the only way I can describe it.”
His eyes dazzled over hers, roaming her face, taking her in like she really was the sunlight shining down on him.
Blush reddened her cheeks. “I don’t know why I did that … I saw you were about to die, and I couldn’t let that happen, not again.”
“Is that why you couldn’t kill me when you had the chance, when we fell from the wyrm?”
Her heart sank, remembering the moment. Her blade at his throat, and her inability to go through with it. “I bet you thought I was weak. ”
“Quite the opposite. Weak kills indiscriminately, without mercy, without reason. What you did took strength, and I am eternally grateful you didn’t kill me. But now I have to ask, why didn’t you kill me?”
“I saw your face and I couldn’t do it.”
“Because I’m handsome?”
She chortled, jostling his shoulders. “No! I mean you are, but that’s not the reason.
But … seeing you put a face on a monster.
And I couldn’t kill you after you spared my life.
You could’ve pushed me off the wyrm, sending me to a terrible death, after my foolish decision to follow you down here. But you didn’t. I owed you that.”
She looked up to the ceiling briefly as if “here” meant the Evergloom and also where she ended up, in this house of assassins. When she looked back down at him, his eyes were trained on her so intently that it made her heart tighten.
“I never wanted to hurt you,” he said so earnestly, the tightening feeling in her chest intensified.
“You mean … we saved each other because of kindness?” The realization struck her like an arrow through the heart.
“A kindness for a kindness.”
To think this happened with the assassin who killed Lindana, her enemy. And it was his kindness toward her that started it.
“Our relationship began with kindness.” When she said this, tears fell from her eyes. A few struck his face.
He sat up. “Hey now, what’s wrong?” He cradled her to his chest while he stroked her hair. “What are these tears for? ”
She wanted to stay like this and not have to go on with what came next. Don’t remember the past. It hurt too much. Forget everything and just be here.
“I want to stay just like this forever. Let me stay here.”
“I wish we could, but the decor here is lacking … we will find a better place, and stay there for eternity, little flower.”
“Then, you mean …”
“Shh.” He held his finger to her mouth, and she nodded, not understanding exactly what he meant but understanding his feelings all the same.
He leaned in to kiss her. It was a sweet, chaste kiss on the lips, not a kiss of passion born from lust … but something else that created an ache of longing.
“Thank you,” he said, breaking from the kiss while holding the back of her head and looking into her eyes. “For healing me. You saved me.”
“I have to catch up to you,” she said as a smile formed on her face. “You’ve saved me so many times I can’t count them all.”
“Why are you here?” he then asked when they were both standing. “Did Kite find you at the safe house?”
“Never mind that,” she answered, trying her best to change the subject. “What’s done is done. Mistress Valeria sent me. She wants to have a word.”
His head lowered for a moment. “I see.” He then took in what she was wearing, the same black leathers as the other assassins. His voice turned dark. “What did they do to you?”
Her bottom lip crumbled. Don’t cry. Don’t …
A look of both shock and concern marked his face, and he leaned in to get a closer look at her. She turned around abruptly.
“Was it Falco?” Anger rippled through his voice.
She shook her head and turned around. The tears were successfully pushed down. “Don’t worry about him. I told him if he ever tried anything on me, I’d cut it off.”
A laugh escaped his throat, and he spoke from the corner of his mouth. “I’m still going to kill him.”
“His broken nose will never heal right,” she added. “You’ve done enough.”
A moment of silence passed. He eyed her more deeply. “What are you not telling me?”
“I can’t now. I will later, I promise.” She couldn’t say because the grief overwhelmed her still. “But I suspect you’ll find out soon. Let’s go see the mistress.”
Mistress Valeria waited for them in the sanctum. Aelrie was at Fyn’s side as both stood before her together.
The mistress gave them an icy smile. “I was going to ask what had taken you so long, but now I see.” Her gaze roamed to Fyn’s bare chest and its absence of cuts, not even scars. “She is talented, isn’t she, dear Shikra?” Her eyes had a hold on Fyn’s.
“You can take your leave, Sparrowhawk. Shikra and I have something to discuss.” Fyn’s head turned to Aelrie when Mistress Valeria called her “Sparrowhawk.” The suspicion he had was true. She saw the look on his face, the surprise, anguish, even .
Aelrie nodded and took her leave. She wanted to turn around to Fyn and tell him not to worry about her, but something prompted her to exit the sanctum and leave them to their conversation that she wasn’t supposed to be privy to.
Mistress Valeria’s manipulation magic worked with words, her commands, but also based upon her will.
She passed the corridor surrounding the sanctum, and the magic relented. The blood magic only worked while inside the sanctum, but she wasn’t close enough to hear their conversation.