“The Beast is rising, True,” I reminded him.
“And if he rises, we shall find a temple, wed immediately and join the others. Cassius and Elena can do the same. We do not need parades and grandeur and spectacle. All we need is you and me.”
All we need is you and me.
He was right.
But I wished it was that simple.
And that was what he truly wanted, a him and me.
“This is true,” I murmured.
“In Wodell, it’s my understanding a woman dreams about the man she’ll marry and her wedding day from the time she’s wee. As she grows older, she plans and hopes and says prayers to the gods to bring her the man who’ll make those dreams come true, and a wedding that will represent the start of a life filled with joy. Do girls think of these things in Firenze?”
I nodded.
“Did you?” he asked.
I pressed my lips together, for I did.
I’d wanted a man like King Ares.
A man who was handsome and tall and strong. A man who was wise. A man who was not afraid to show affection. A man who loved his wife and son above all, but his country and his people held a powerful place in his heart. A man who did not concern himself with what others thought of him, if he believed what he was doing was right, that was all he needed.
A man like True.
His gorgeous green eyes watched me bite my lip, and he said, “You did.”
I fought squirming and started, “True—”
His gaze came again to mine. “Sadly, I cannot give you the wedding of your dreams. I could not wrest the planning of this wedding from my mother if I had a thousand oxen. It will be the spectacle she set her secretaries to organizing with lists on scrolls three stories tall before we left for Firenze.”
“Three stories tall?” I asked with big eyes.
He grinned again and moved his hand so his knuckles were stroking my jaw.
“I exaggerate, sweetling. Though I’ll warn you, in matters such as this, my mother does not think small.”
“In matters such as this, matters that involve her son who will be king.”
“Precisely. Therefore, I do believe she will not demur should I say we need more time, for that gives her more time to make something grand into something ostentatious.”
I wrinkled my nose.
He chuckled and said, “We will survive it. But before we have to do that, we will do something else. Something for us. I cannot give you the wedding of your dreams, but I can give you that.”
He could give me that.
Gnomes and lights in the sky and chocolate custard swirls.
It sounded amazing.
“Thank you, True,” I whispered.
“It will be my pleasure, darling,” he whispered in reply.
I slid up a bit and asked, “Do you think your people will take to me?”
“Farah, the instant your feet crossed the Dellish border, you became the most beautiful woman in this realm. The men will love you and envy me. The women will either love you and emulate you or hate you simply because they wish they were you.”
He sounded certain.
I was not.
“Do you think?”
“I think this is one concern you shouldn’t worry yourself with for I couldn’t care less what they think. You will be my wife. I will be proud to have a wife as beautiful and kind-hearted as you. And that’s all that matters.”
His hand at my jaw slid into my hair so he could press my cheek to his shoulder then glide his fingers through my hair.
He did this and continued speaking.
“But before, we will have time on our own. We’ll leave the others behind. Take my men and a few additional guards, and I’ll show you my home.”
“Your home isn’t Birchlire Castle?”
I felt him nod again. “Of a sort. I have rooms there. But my home is all of Wodell, and when you see it, Farah,” his fingers curled around the back of my neck and gave me a squeeze, “you will understand why I claim it.”
I saw the wisdom in this plan and not only because, how he described it, I wished to see his home.
But because we would be away from the others.
Mars and Silence, the latter of whom was his cousin and he worried about her, and from what I had seen, there was something to worry about.
Cassius and Elena, the latter of whom he was in love with. And although True never showed it to me, I knew it was hard for him to see the two of them together. They were not an easy match, but the sparks that flew between them were easy to interpret.
Also, his parents, both frustrating to him for his father was weak-minded and weak-willed and his mother calculating and remote. The former tried his patience, while the latter tried his temper.
We would be only amongst people who loved and respected him, his men (and, it was coming to be true in all ways it could be, me), traversing a land he adored.
“Shall we leave tomorrow?” I asked his chest and felt him shift before I felt his lips against my hair.
Incidentally, that kind of kiss was very nice.
But it didn’t count.
He settled back and answered, “Yes.”
“As we’ll be traveling your realm, and there are customs here that most adhere to, and many will surely know who you are, perhaps we should find a second tent for me or if we stay at inns, I should have my own room so that—”
“Farah?”
“Yes?”
“Not another word, darling. All right?”
I closed my mouth.
True.
So protective.
So patient.
So generous.
So everything.
“Now, roll to blow out the lamp, and come back to me,” he murmured.
I did as told, casting the tent into darkness. And when I rolled back, he wrapped both arms around me and held tight.
I sighed and snuggled closer.
I was coming close to sleep when True’s voice rumbled softly under my cheek and into the tent.
“It was the assault on the palace.”
My eyes opened.
“They fade,” he went on. “I face battle, they return.” He pulled me closer. “They’ll fade again, Farah. Do not worry about me.”
He was talking about his dreams.
“True—”
“Do not worry about me.”
“But you said, you’ll be strong when I need—”
“Farah,” a jostle from his arms, “do not worry about me.”
I nestled closer, grousing, “You can’t order me not to worry.”
“I’m sorry?” he asked. “Were you not listening but seconds ago?”
“I was.”
“So you know I did just that.”
“It’s ludicrous.”
“I’m a prince and a general, people do what I tell them to do.”
“Well they shouldn’t, if it’s ludicrous.”
“A royal can be as ludicrous as they want. Have you not paid any attention to my father?”
I stilled, right before I burst out laughing.
The moment I saw my mother on that bed covered in asps…
No, the moment, years ago, when I’d been told King Ares had been assassinated, even before knowing my father was the one who’d done it, I had not laughed like that or ever thought I would again.
But right then, I was, and I kept doing it when I heard True’s deep chuckles accompanying me.
I lifted my head and said a shaking, “I think you just spoke treason.”
“It’ll be our secret.”
“I hate to share this with you, my True, but I don’t think you’re keeping it much of a secret.”
I watched his head come up and then I felt his lips press tight to mine. So tight, and he kept them to mine so long, I felt their softness that mingled with firmness and all I smelled was True.
I stilled.
Now that…
Oh my.
That was a kiss.
He lifted up farther and kissed my nose.
I stayed unmoving.
He lifted up even farther and slid a hand up my neck to cup the back of my head so he could kiss my forehead.
I remained immobile.
He fell back to the bed and pressed my cheek again to his chest.
“Now sleep, darling,” he murmured. “For when we break camp and strike out on our own, we will not force our horses to walk slower than a wee babe would crawl.”
“We’ve not been going that slow.”
“It feels like it.”
“I’m betrothed to a man of action,” I muttered.
“You’re betrothed to a man who does not wish inertia to turn him into a statue.”
I started giggling again.
I felt his body relax but his mouth warned, “Farah.”
“Fine. Fine.” I snuggled deep. “I’ll sleep.”
Some time later, I was again close to slumber, when he whispered, “My True.”
My eyes opened again.
He said no more.
But something about the way he said that…
No.
No.
It was foolish to hope.
I had what I had.
And it was beautiful.
The life I’d led after my father’s ugly deed, even with Mama’s untimely passing, I knew I was lucky.
My bones could be in a pit.
But I had True as I could have him and he gave so much.
I was greedy to want more.
I’d have Doors.
And I’d have Lights.
I’d also have chocolate custard swirls, something I didn’t know what it was, but it sounded marvelous.
And eventually, if we defeated the Beast, I’d have children and grandchildren.
But I’d always have True as I could have him.
And even if it didn’t include his whole heart.
With all he gave me, I couldn’t ask for more.
48
The Splendor
Queen Ha-Lah
Deep Beneath the Triton Sea
OFF THE WEST COAST OF FIRENZE
Rotating my fin in a corkscrew movement, I coiled through the depths of the salty sea, eyes wide, schools of glinting fish racing me.
I was free.
Free.
I twirled up, through the deep blue-green, feeling my fin brushed by my fellow creatures. I undulated it, speeding toward the surface, and the moonlight, murky in the depths, brightened as I got closer.
I surged up, breaking the surface, throwing back my head, the gills under my jaw sealing to invisible instantaneously, and I drew in surface breath.
“Heaven,” I whispered.
I felt my darlings peck cheekily at my fin before they darted back toward the depths.
When they left me, I allowed my bottom half to float up and I drifted on the waves.
It was very late at night.
Under a guise of magic, I’d left Aramus and his men sleeping in their tents on the beach.
And I’d come home.
Home.
I did a twirl on the surface, a flip under it, pitched back up and coasted on the surf.
Aramus had been so adamant that we leave, we’d departed Fire City even before Sofia’s death ceremony.
We’d arrived at the shore three days prior.
The journey was long and hot, and it was only made less of the former because Mars and his father before him had been erecting roads across Firenze that were straight and maintained—and cutting over those dunes—they probably took weeks off the journey.
And three days of walking the beach and feeling the saltwater on my feet and legs was heartening, but it wasn’t what I needed.
This was what I needed.
Now I was restored.
Now I felt I could face anything.
However, the night would not last forever and I did not wish my husband, maddeningly attentive since he had injured me so greatly with his angry words after the attack on the palace, to find me gone.
And he might. The magic I’d used to keep him and his men slumbering peacefully while I departed didn’t last forever either.
I had to go back.
But Aramus had told me that we would stay as long as I wished, and we’d journey to join the others in Notting Thicket only when I was ready.
So tomorrow night, I’d steal away again, to the depths and be home for a spell.
Home and free.
And the night after that, the same.
Then, I knew, we should resume our journey.
Farah was grieving.
Silence was adjusting.
And Elena had much on her plate, with a mother I perceived was quite ill (though she attempted to hide it) and with Elena herself facing a marital union with a mortal enemy that would not be taken well in his land, or possibly hers.
Not to mention, all the things Aramus wished to do when we returned home.
All of this after we defeated an apparently loath-to-surface Beast.
As much as I’d like to remain for weeks, we couldn’t dally.
But Aramus had given me this. He’d gone out of his way to give me this. He’d been tremendously discourteous (leaving before the death ceremony was rude to the point of disrespectful, but he didn’t care, he was on a mission). The journey had not been enjoyable (this land was hot and there was a great deal of it). We’d face more on the trek to Wodell.
But we were here.
Solely because I desired to be here.
I did not wish for this to cause a chink in the armor I’d erected around my heart to protect it against my husband.
He was arrogant.
He was thoughtless.
When he was angry, or overly emotional, vicious things came out of his mouth.
He clearly spent far too much time around men and had no watery clue how to handle a woman.
And he spent equally too much time being crown prince and then king, thus thinking the very earth and all its seas rotated around him.
But as I flipped my fin and glided toward the shore (dipping to swim deep on occasion), I could not deny that having this, having Aramus go so far out of his way to give me this, did not put a chink in that armor.
A wee one.
But it was there all the same.
That was, I felt that until I surfaced closer to shore and noted a lone figure standing where I left my nightclothes on the sandy beach.
A figure I knew was my husband.
I kept my fin carefully beneath the surface, and as the area between the sand and sea became narrower, the resultant prickle down my back became a slight burn in my hips all the way to the end of me, which led to a tearing sensation that caused me to gasp.
And again, I had legs.
I stopped flipping and struck out swimming toward shore.
In the shallows, when I could swim no more, nude, I stood and slowly walked through the lapping waves toward my husband.
He stood immobile in the moonlight, watching me.
We had now been married many months.
And this was the first time he’d seen me naked.
I did not wish to wonder if he liked what he saw.
But I wondered if he liked what he saw.
I stared at his face in the moonlight as I made way toward him and noted he was carrying the long sheet of toweling I’d brought to dry off when I was done.
And as I got closer, I could not tell if he enjoyed the view for his expression was naught but a frozen mask of fury.
A mask with eyes that were locked on my face.
Many months of marriage, and I could not say I knew him.
What I could say was that his temper was quick, and when he was in the grips of it, what came from his mouth could be cruel.
But he was all words and bluster.
Thus, I was not afraid. At least not physically.
I stopped before him and said, “Husband.”
I barely finished the wor
d when he moved, far faster than I would ever imagine he could, and I was wound in the toweling in a manner my arms and legs were immobilized.
I was then tossed over his shoulder.
“Aramus!” I snapped.
“I would be quiet, wife,” he replied, his deep voice cold as the water at the poles.
Oh drat.
I decided it might be best to do as he suggested and have this out in our tent. I even managed to keep my silence when we made our encampment some ways away, up high on the shoreline, and I saw all his men awake and milling about the sand.
All of them.
And there were hundreds of them.
They looked as peeved as my husband.
It occurred to me then that Aramus woke to find me gone. It also occurred to me what he would do if he found me gone.
That being, he would look for me, and when he did not find me (for I was frolicking under the sea), he would wake his men to aid in the search.
This he very clearly did.
Oh dear.
Obviously, someone had spotted me swimming to shore, or found my clothing, and Aramus had sent them back to camp while he, alone, knowing I was swimming nude, waited for me.
Fortunately, he didn’t loiter on the beach with his men but carried me directly into our tent.
Once inside, he put me instantly to my feet.
I struggled with the toweling until I had my arms free.
I clutched it to my chest, turned angry eyes up to his face…
And clamped my mouth shut tight.
For his enraged face was an inch from mine.
“Have you lost your mind!” he roared at me.
In the face of such fury, to save him from himself (and, frankly, me from whatever might come out of his mouth), I immediately became soothing. “Aramus.”
“By the sirens, Ha-Lah. By the bloody sirens, woman!”
“If you’d—”
He moved back but an inch so he could get his finger in my face.
“I woke, you were gone,” he bit. “I searched, you were nowhere to be found.” He dropped his finger. “I roused the entire fucking camp, and no one could find a hint of you, but your bloody…fucking…clothes.”
I stared at his furious face.
And saw the fear behind his eyes.
And suddenly there was no armor around my heart.
It was gone.
In but an instant…
The Plan Commences Page 17