Chapter 34
Ashley
She became the air inside my lungs,
my peace, my home, my art.
I follow Eira through the mess hall. Rows of pillars surround the long, dark wooden banquet tables.
They’re just like the one in the palace dining room.
Each table is set with flickering candles, though when I look closer, the flames aren’t made of fire but tiny glowing fairylike creatures, dancing to music I can’t hear.
The hall is alive with the clatter of dishes, conversation, and the smell of hearty food.
Territorial lines don’t seem to mean anything here; everyone is scattered among the tables.
Eira leads us to an empty one. Volker rise and bow every time we step past them.
I smile awkwardly and nod back once, twice, then way too many times, and decide it’s safer to look at the floor than risk breaking my neck from politeness.
“I’ll be back.” She disappears into the bustling queue and returns a little later with two plates and a hopeful smile.
I offer a small grin in return, reaching for my fork out of habit.
I appreciate her effort, I really do, but the noise in the hall is overwhelming.
Which is funny, because I used to be that girl at the club taking shots and dancing next to the DJ for six hours straight.
I miss her. Though, in hindsight, she was a bit of a mess.
I’m poking at my salad when something sharp yanks at me, like speaker feedback straight down my spine.
My magic loses its damn mind. It lashes against the wards holding it down, clawing along my ribs so sharply I nearly flinch.
I don’t even need to turn around. I know what that is.
Who that is. Captain Kaed. I almost forgot how tall he is.
How broad. How effortlessly commanding. He towers over everyone, swallowing the place up with a presence that can’t be explained.
His eyes find mine immediately, like I called him.
And I think something in me did. Soldiers straighten and salute, words of respect tumbling from their mouths as he walks in my direction, not paying them any notice.
I force my wide eyes back to my plate, prodding at the salad again but not really seeing it, hoping that moving it around might calm my nerves.
But a shiver races down my neck, the fine hairs on my body lifting as if every cell inside me is stretching toward him.
I’ve tried to imagine how this would feel.
How I’d react, seeing him again. I even planned to go looking for him more than once but chickened out each time, and now that it’s happening, now that he’s here, I’m a tangled wreck.
But, what’s new? I don’t think I’m afraid, but something’s still there.
Maybe he’s giving me space on purpose and I don’t blame him.
But I don’t want space. I constantly wonder where he is, what he’s thinking.
It’s like something bound us together, like no one else could ever really understand.
“Ashley.”
The gorgeous scent of fresh laundry, vanilla, and orange surrounds me.
The way he says my name in his deep, careful tone sinks right under my skin and sets my soul on edge.
His matted beard is long gone, replaced by a shadow of stubble on his chiseled jaw, emphasising the vertical marks tattooed onto his cheeks.
His once wild hair is shaved into a pristine buzzcut.
Those bright, captivating eyes, almost golden in this light, are so full of concern.
He’s so close I see the tiny flecks of sage dotted about them.
The pressed, black uniform that fits him so perfectly is completely at odds with the condition I remember him in.
When I dragged him across that floor. But even in my state of awe at the piece of art standing in front of me, his proximity makes my heart thump. Not entirely in a good way.
“I’m sorry I startled you. I only came to greet you. You need not fear me.”
“Anymore, you mean.” I half joke.
Conversations are replaced by hushed murmurs, and something like hurt flashes over him for barely a second.
Anyone else would miss it, but I know his face all too well.
Even if he looks like a stranger compared to the male who collected vials of my blood.
I regret my words instantly, but I’m not sure why.
It’s like his pain hooks straight into my chest, like it’s mine.
I’ve felt him, ever since that night on the beach, pulling me closer.
In the cells, I wanted to protect him and now that desire is almost suffocating.
As if protecting him and protecting myself are becoming one and the same.
“Anymore,” he swears. “Ever again. My hands will never cause you harm. They are yours and they will forever protect, defend and shield you. Even if it costs me my life.”
“How… dramatic,” I say, forcing the words out to push away the feeling of something I don’t really know how to process.
There’s a beat of silence, then the most beautiful smile I’ve ever seen in my life spreads across his face, lighting it up completely.
Deep dimples crease his cheeks, and my eyes are drawn to polished, white, elongated canines that nearly graze his full bottom lip.
God, he looks like sin. A low, rich chuckle escapes him and all I want to do is hear it again.
“May I?” He gestures to the empty seat across from me and I nod.
The room is starting to buzz with life again, though a few eyes still glance over to us now and then.
He flips the chair around and drops into it with a thud, resting his forearms on the table.
His biceps press against the fabric of the short sleeved top he wears, and that thing between us shakes with tension as my breath catches.
He’s still intimidating, but there’s something so alive, so tender about him.
The way he leans forward into the chair, relaxed, instead of sitting stiff and lifeless puts me at ease ever so slightly.
The hollow, bloodless look he once wore is gone, replaced by sun-kissed skin, faint smile lines, and tiny crinkles around his fiery eyes.
“You must eat.”
“I’m not hungry.” I place the fork down.
“Are you feeling okay?”
“Not really.” There’s no point pretending. I look like shit. I caught my reflection earlier today, and the dark circles under my eyes almost look like bruises blending in with the patches of dirt on my cheeks. He hesitates, his brow tightening. “What can I do to help?”
“Well, can you take me home?”
His face falls. “I cannot.”
“Then there’s nothing you can do. Unless—” His lips part and he leans forwards ever so slightly. “Unless you want to answer some questions. Like why everyone is calling you my betrothed? Where I’m from, that means we’re supposed to be married.”
He adjusts himself, then draws in a slow breath.
“It means the same here. We’re to be married.
Or bonded, as we call it. It begins with a kiss.
That’s what awakens our bond in me and opens some pathways between us.
To our magic. And a few other things.” A little heat spreads through my cheeks at the idea of kissing him, wondering if his canines would get in the way.
But it’s his voice that’s doing something to me.
It’s like melted sugar. “Then the ceremony awakens it fully on your side and seals it. It would be performed as part of The Creed. Have you not had a chance to read it yet?” He asks the last part carefully.
I shake my head. Avoiding my death prophecy like the plague has become a new hobby of mine.
It’s woven into tapestries, painted onto portraits.
Even engraved on the breakfast plates. I don’t want any kind of insight into my demise.
No reminder that once again, I’m not loved.
I’m a means to an end. I’m supposed to make this my home, to desire to set them free.
But it just feels like a waiting room for my own death.
“So right before you kill me for your freedom, I’ll be forced to kiss you. And marry you?”
I ignore the audacity of him to look hurt and the pulse of pain in my heart that could belong to either of us, since I’m literally going to be forced to die for some magical bullshit.
Hopefully, my screwed-up face speaks for me.
He opens his mouth and closes it again, as if pulling back a confession, before finally saying,
“I will not let you die, Ashley. Only if you are willing, we will find a way to complete the ritual without your death, or I won’t let it happen,” he says that last part extremely low, so that only I can hear it.
As if it’s something to be hidden. Something that would cause an uproar.
The idea that someone might choose me, my life, over their precious fucking curse.
The same curse they swear is unbearable, yet they’re all still standing here, breathing, living, carrying on just fine.
Meals prepared, beds made, doing what they love.
And this, this has to be whispered? How can caring whether I live or die be some kind of dirty little secret?
Fuck them and fuck their curse. We can all rot down here for all I care.
“You know, I don’t really trust anyone here to have my best interests at heart. How do you know you won’t be able to stop me from dying? It’s obvious no one knows what they’re doing. Nothing you did to me worked, did it?”
He winces, probably at the same memories. Our eyes fall to where my fingers trace the pink butterfly shaped scar on my wrist.
“Those experiments were the result of the foolishness of males who were trying to force the hand of Cinder Cliffs. It was clear they would never work. I will die before I let anything like that happen to you again.”
“Well then, Kaed, we’ll both be dead together, won’t we. Can we eat somewhere else?” I say to Eira, who I almost forgot was sitting there.
*