Chapter 12 #3
I ran for the stairs, my stomach twisting.
I needed to get out of there. Out of the fucking basement.
Away from him. Away from Auriel. Because if he spoke again, I was going to lose it.
I was going to fucking lose it. Already I couldn’t stand to hear him speak, to hear the way he sounded like Rhyan—but not.
I couldn’t stand to hear his tone, and his humor, and warmth.
Couldn’t stand to hear it all come together into this perfectly packaged, completely familiar voice—one that called out to my heart and my soul.
Identical in every way, except for one thing. Rhyan’s accent.
He was him. He was him. But not him. Not him. Not even Rhyan was himself now. He was gone. He was …
“I can’t breathe. I feel like I can’t breathe!” Bile was rising up my throat, and my chest was pounding painfully. I practically fell up the stairs as I ran, my hands grasping for the next step as my feet stumbled behind me.
The door at the top of the landing opened suddenly. Sean appeared, torchlight flickering behind him.
“Lyriana?” he asked, startled. But immediately he reached for me, helping me up the last few steps, and pulling me to my feet.
“Sean, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” I cried, my words rushing together. “Please. Please, I need to get out of here. I need—I need air. I need to—” I gasped, still finding breathing difficult.
“All right, it’s all right,” Sean said quickly. “It’s okay. I can get you some fresh air.” He wrapped his arm around my shoulder, leading me back to the kitchen.
I looked over my shoulder, back downstairs. Auriel had folded his arms across his chest at the base of the stairs. He looked away, but his aura reached for me. It was vibrating, bright and fiery with anger. But also, something that felt like it went beyond sadness.
“Sean, is she safe up there?” he asked, his words clipped.
Sean nodded. “For a little while, Auriel, yes. Ka Kormac is still out there. They’re searching homes in the neighborhood, but they came by here already a little while ago. I think we can risk a short visit for her upstairs with protection.”
I shook my head, still crying. “I’m sorry.”
I’d totally forgotten why I was in the basement to begin with.
The soturi were looking for me. And not just soturi from Bamaria—but every soturion in Ka Kormac.
Every wolf. And every servant of the newly anointed Emperor.
And they were coming here, interrogating Sean.
Shit. He’d already been punished for hiding me.
Sent to the pole by Turion Kevel. And I’d slept through it.
Fuck. It wasn’t enough that I’d failed Rhyan.
Now I was hurting Sean, the family he loved and trusted most.
I took a step back, suddenly barely able to face him.
To take in his curly hair, to hear his accent, to see his green eyes.
The subtle ways I could tell that they were related.
But beyond that, I could see the way he held his shoulder stiff and in pain.
And the haunted look in his eyes. I’d done that. I’d caused that.
“I should go,” I said, turning back. “You’ve done enough for me, Sean—risked so much already. I should just leave—”
“No, Lyriana,” Sean said, extending his hand to mine.
“Everything’s okay here. Branwyn can arrange a ward for you.
We have eyes on the streets—friends looking out for us.
Remember how we got here—going through all those homes?
Every single person whose home we entered is watching out for our best interest. If there’s a problem, we’ll have far more warning than we did the last time. ”
“But I’m putting you in danger,” I gasped, still struggling to breathe.
“That’s my job, Lyriana. I’m a soturion,” Sean said. “And I swore my oath to more than just Bamaria. I swore to Ka Batavia. I swore to your father. All of that extends to you. My oath still stands. Protecting you, Your Grace, is an honor I gladly accept.”
My eyes watered—for a whole new reason this time. No one had called me “Your Grace” in months. “I’m no longer an Heir to the Arkasva,” I said quietly. “Not here, nor anywhere. Not anymore. You don’t owe me anything.”
“Rhyan loved you.” He pressed his lips together, like he was trying not to cry. Then he nodded. “And you need my help. I have more reason than I need to offer my protection. Now, come with me.”
I stumbled into his arms, and sobbed against his armor, breaking down so utterly and completely, I thought my heart would shatter.
I hadn’t let Auriel be there for me. But suddenly, I couldn’t help myself.
Maybe it was seeing my father in my dream, or just the sheer weight of everything I was carrying.
But I gave in, letting Sean take some of the weight.
He tightened his arms around me, hugging me to him. His hand smoothed the back of my hair, like something my father used to do when I was a child. I sniffled, realizing he smelled like pine. Like Glemaria. Like Rhyan. It made me cry harder.
Sean waited a moment, letting me sob, then took my hand. “Let’s get you that air. Hmmm?”
I nodded weakly and let Sean lead me through his house, into a sitting room, and then up another flight of stairs to the second floor. He led me down a long hallway, dimly lit by candlelight, and knocked on a door. “Love? It’s me, and Lady Lyriana,” he said.
Branwyn opened the door at once. I realized that this was their bedroom. Their private space.
I stood back, immediately feeling like I was encroaching on someplace intimate. Someplace I didn’t belong.
“Come on in,” Branwyn urged, and reached for my arm, gently squeezing it. “Please.” Her eyes were soft, but as she looked back to Sean, they seemed to melt.
“She just needs some air,” Sean said, his accent thick. “Can you ward the balcony for her?”
“Of course.” Branwyn smiled again at me, inviting me inside, trying to make me feel welcome.
Then she crossed the room to a set of glass doors, and opened them onto a modestly sized balcony.
It was just large enough to hold two chairs and a round table between them.
Just enough for two people. For a couple.
I stood awkwardly inside the room as Branwyn moved swiftly around the balcony. Again and again she waved her stave about as she silently created the ward.
“She’s a very talented mage,” Sean said, watching her with obvious pride in his eyes. “Branwyn makes the most powerful wards of anyone I know. I promise, you won’t be seen or heard for miles.”
I nodded numbly, glancing around their bedroom while she finished. I didn’t mean to do it, but I started obsessing over all of the little details—the pieces that pulled the room together. That made it theirs.
Their bed was large and looked warm, full of thick green blankets—Glemarian green.
They were already pulled back, the sheets exposed, like it was ready for them to crawl into at the end of the day.
Together. Hanging on the wall above were a set of paintings.
One was of a silver gryphon. The other a golden seraphim.
They’d been magically infused, and the gryphon and seraphim’s wings fluttered softly, their eyes gazing into each other.
Loose scrolls, half-read, lay on night tables on either side of the bed.
Both held candles that were half-melted.
A few more scrolls remained tucked into leather cases, piled neatly behind them.
A cozy chair sat in the corner with a blanket draped across it.
One of Sean’s soturion cloaks had been tossed onto the arm-rest, and beside it was the dummy used for storing his armor.
Directly across from the bed was a dresser and mirror. Branwyn’s jewelry lay scattered over it, along with small bottles of perfume. Hanging from a half-open drawer was a black leather belt—the kind soturi wore while training.
There was an aura to the room—not something I normally felt—an intimacy that existed between them—as thick and tangible as the items within.
It was so clear from just seeing the room for even just a moment, how often, and how happily, Sean and Branwyn spent time here together.
It was nothing fancy, nothing like I was used to at Cresthaven.
But I could feel it. Feel how in love they were.
Their energy was attached to the room, existing on its own.
I’d had a sense of this once before, the way I’d felt Rhyan’s energy when I’d woken up in his old bedroom in Seathorne.
The way I’d known it was his room without having to be told.
I never would have imagined this—having lived most of my life in something far larger and fancier, but this was my dream bedroom. Simple. Intimate. Full of love.
I swallowed, turning back to the balcony. Away from the scene. Away from the bed of a Glemarian man happily married to a Bamarian woman.
A gryphon and a seraphim.
Auriel and Asherah.
Me and Rhyan.
Marry me.
I stifled back a cry, reaching for the scabbard at my hip.
For Rhyan’s gift. And suddenly, I found myself mentally trying to replace all of Sean and Branwyn’s things with mine and Rhyan’s.
Asherah’s chest plate would lay on the dresser beside my gold bangles, beside the seraphim wing cuff I always wore.
I imagined Rhyan’s beat up leathers on the dummy.
Tiny love notes he’d leave for me on the nightstand.
Extra bottles of suntree paste I could rub on any of his training injuries.
One painting above the bed instead of two—a gryphon and a seraphim together, a sun above and a moon below.
Our own sigil. The one of our kashonim. The one was that was uniquely ours.
I closed my eyes. We’d never have that now.
The sky outside was gloomy and gray, the sun in the process of setting.