Chapter 63
LYRAE
The next morning, I found Rooke outside my rooms on the hallway floor—long legs stretched out in front of him, head tipped back against the wall, cloak tangled around him like he’d been there long enough to become part of the stone. Hooded eyes watched me as I closed my door behind me.
Yes, I’d been pissed last night.
Pissed because, much like Rooke… I was really, really bad at this sort of thing.
Feelings and love and interpreting yearning, swoony looks were like some indecipherable, cryptic code, where the meanings could be anything from I love you forever to—I want to stab you in the heart.
Give me a bloodthirsty army charging across a battlefield any day. At least I knew what they wanted.
My head on a stake. That, I could work with.
The corridor was quiet this early, empty of anyone but us, so I crossed the hall and slid down the wall beside him, my stomach tightening with worry.
He looked…bad.
Deathly pale beneath the stark lines of his face, shadows bruised into circles under his eyes.
In the last two days he’d been bled to death, donned a legendary Crown to resurrect the magic of his ancestors—which had very nearly killed him, according to what he’d told Anaria—liquefied his enemies, then flown me here to face judgment.
Where the only thing he’d done was secure my future, while trading away his own.
I curled my hands in my lap, because all I wanted to do was smooth that rogue black curl off his cheek, press my fingers to his temples, and let him close his eyes as I rubbed some of those shadows away.
He needed real sleep. Time off from…princing.
I sniffed. A bath.
None of which he’d get, because Zephryn was going to storm down this hallway at any moment to escort him south, where he’d…use the Triune to resurrect a barren realm, which just might kill him.
My blood went cold.
Rooke’s wide shoulders were squared, but he was rattled, like he’d been shaken apart and hadn’t yet settled back into place. When his gaze found mine, his eyes weren’t gilded with gold or dancing with arrogant amusement.
They were flat. Hollow. Empty.
“Have you been out here all night?” I asked, fiddling with the hem of my shirt. My clothing was silky and white and flowing—unlike anything he’d ever seen me in—and my hair was loose, hanging over one shoulder, still damp from last night.
Had I known he was still here, I would have dressed in full armor, right down to my gauntlets…
But I hadn’t expected to see Rooke today.
Or ever.
“Yes,” he said quietly. “You look…different like this. Nice. Softer.”
“I dress different here. When I’m off duty.
People here are used to it.” I dropped my gaze to my clasped hands, because I couldn’t stand to see that desolation in his eyes anymore.
“Had I known you were still here, I would have made a different wardrobe choice, but I figured you’d already gone back. ”
Fuck. That was a really long explanation when he hadn’t even asked for one.
So bad at this sort of stuff.
“What are you still doing here?” I asked softly.
His throat bobbed. “Waiting for you.”
“Well, here I am,” I muttered, sounding far more combative than I’d meant to, but the future felt so…impossible right now. Especially after how incredibly possible life had felt last night, walking through the city streets, holding his hand.
Like we could have ruled the world together.
“I made a mistake last night, Lyrae.” His voice cracked on my name, and he blinked once—slow, like his eyes were burning. “A series of them, actually. I made assumptions when I shouldn’t have, and I couldn’t just leave without…without explaining why.”
He looked away, chest heaving.
“I’ve been alone most of my life,” he murmured. “The kind of alone where you learn to only look out for yourself. Where you use all your energy to erect the thickest, strongest shield around yourself for when the enemies come through the front gates to bleed you dry.”
My fingers curled tighter around the silky fabric, an awful tightness squeezing my ribs.
“When I’m by myself,” he continued, “I don’t have to think about what to say. How my words land. Whether or not I might hurt someone by what I say.” He swallowed. “But that’s exactly what I did to you, and for that, I am sorry.”
His gaze dipped to my clasped hands. “You showed me this city with such love in your heart, with such a sense of yearning, I believed you would never want to leave,” he admitted. “And I lacked the courage to ask you to come with me…and risk the pity in your eyes when you turned me down.”
The confession hit harder than any apology, and my aching heart shattered into a million pieces, scattered on the floor around us.
“Better,” Kaden went on, “I decided to ensure you kept everything you had fought so hard for. Your title, your position in court, the city you rebuilt—without forcing you to choose. Safer for me, because if I broke my own heart, I thought it might hurt less.” He lifted his eyes to mine, sorrow shining there in great, swallowing waves.
“It seems I was wrong about that, too.”
His hands opened at his sides, palms up in complete surrender. “So here I am, waiting like a beggar, so I could say this—”
He moved, not to stand… but to kneel before me, head bowed, inky hair falling forward, and the sight punched the air from my lungs.
“No, Rooke, don’t—”
“Come back to the Shadowlands with me. Please.” His voice came rough, stripped bare of everything except raw yearning.
“Stand by my side and help me finish this. If my plan works, then maybe…stay a little longer and show me how to build a city to keep children safe, where lovers can walk hand in hand with the stars shining over their heads, and snowflakes melting on their cheeks. That is all I ask. Give me just one more day, Lyrae, and then…” His throat worked. “Then go wherever you desire.”
I stared at him, my heart doing a furious, traitorous stutter in my chest.
Behind me, a door creaked softly.
Ariel’s presence flickered at the edge of my awareness like sunlight sneaking under a door. I didn’t have to look to know she was there—wide-eyed, hungry for drama, eating this moment up like sweetbread.
Rooke didn’t glance back, his entire being fixed on me.
He swallowed, hard. “After, you can have Zephryn fly you back here. I won’t stop you from leaving.”
Something in my chest loosened, then tightened again, conflicted. “You’re letting me go.”
“I’m not letting you do anything,” he said fiercely—then stopped, forcing the words into something softer. “I’m… I’m giving you what I should have given you from the very beginning. A choice.”
His voice dropped. “But I would like you to stay,” he confessed.
“Because I will miss you. Miss your prickly disposition. Your terrible coffee.” Those lines at the corners of his eyes crinkled.
“The way you always tell me the truth, especially when I don’t want to hear it.
Come and help me build something,” he whispered.
“Because I don’t know how to do anything but survive the day.
I don’t know how to be the kind of ruler a realm deserves. But I would very much like to learn.”
Ariel made a tiny, strangled sound from behind the door—suspiciously like a sniffle.
I looked at Rooke, hands open in front of him like an offering. I remembered the hunger in his eyes when he’d looked at this city, like he was ravenous for a life outside his island.
I reached out and touched his hand.
Rooke froze, staring at my fingers like he couldn’t trust the sight, then pressed his forehead to my knuckles like a vow.
“There’s nothing to forgive, you know,” I said quietly. “Since we’re both so obviously shit at this sort of thing. And yes—I will come watch you undo Gravelock’s corruption, if you make me a promise, Kaden.”
“Anything,” he breathed. “Ask me for anything, and it’s yours.”
“I want you to go into my suite, take a bath, and get some sleep. I’ll go to the kitchens and find you food, and ask Zeph to hold off leaving until noon, which should still give you a few hours of daylight to do your…magicking.” His lips quirked up in a tired smile.
“Do we have an agreement, Lord Rooke?”
“We have an agreement, Commander.”
Behind the door, Ariel let out a delighted gasp as Rooke rose, then offered me his hand and pulled me into a hug that felt like coming home.