I straightened up the room and let Tove shower first down the hall. Something seemed off with him, and I thought it would be better if he had a chance to rest instead of doing more work.
“What are you doing?” Tove asked. He came back to the room after the shower, his hair all wet and a mess.
“I’m making the bed.” I was smoothing out the sheets but I turned to face him. “How was your shower?”
“Why are you making the bed?” he snapped and rushed over to it. I moved out of the way and he pulled down the sheets.
“Sorry,” I said. “I didn’t know it would upset you. I thought it would be—”
“Why?” Tove whirled around to face me, his green eyes burning. “Why would you do that?”
“I just made the bed, Tove,” I said carefully. “You can unmake it if you want. Why don’t you get into bed? Okay? You’re exhausted. I’ll go shower, and you get some sleep.”
“Fine! Whatever!”
He ripped the sheets off the bed and muttered to himself. He’d done too much today and overloaded his brain. My head was still buzzing, and I was stronger than him. I couldn’t imagine how he felt.
I grabbed the duffel bag I’d packed in Förening and went to take a shower. Leaving him alone to rest would probably be the best thing I could do for him. I wanted to take a long hot shower, but by the time I got to it, the water was cold, so I showered quickly.
Even before I made it back to the room, I could hear Tove. His mutterings had gotten louder.
“Tove?” I said quietly and pushed open the bedroom door.
“Where have you been?” Tove shouted, his eyes wide and frantic. All the cleaning I had done in the room had been undone. Everything was strewn about, and he was pacing.
“I was in the shower,” I said. “I told you.”
“Did you hear that?” He froze and looked around.
“What?” I asked.
“You’re not even listening!” Tove yelled.
“Tove, you’re tired.” I walked into the room. “You need to sleep.”
“No, I can’t sleep.” He shook his head and looked away from me. “No, Wendy.” He ran his hands through his hair. “You don’t understand.”
“What don’t I understand?” I asked.
“I can hear it all.” He put both his hands to the sides of his head. “I can hear it all!” He kept repeating that, and he held his head tighter. His nose started to bleed, and he groaned.
“Tove!” I rushed over to him and I reached out, just to comfort him, but when I did, he slapped me hard in the face.
“Don’t you dare!” Tove turned on me and threw me back on the bed. I was too startled to do anything. “I can’t trust you! I can’t trust any of you!”
“Tove, please calm down,” I begged him. “This isn’t you. You’re just tired.”
“Don’t tell me who I am! You don’t know who I am!”
“Tove.” I slid to the edge of the bed, so that I was sitting, and he stood in front of me, glowering down at me. “Tove, please listen to me.”
“I can’t.” He bit his lip. “I can’t hear you!”
“You can hear me,” I said. “I’m right here.”
“You’re lying!” Tove grabbed me by my shoulders and started shaking me.
“Hey!” Loki shouted, and Tove let go of me.
I’d left the bedroom door open when I came in, and Loki had been on his way back to his room from his own shower. He was still shirtless, and his light hair was dripping water onto his shoulders.
“Go away!” Tove yelled at him. “I can’t have you here!”
“What the hell are you doing?” Loki asked.
“Loki, it’s not him,” I said. “He’s used his abilities too much, and it’s done something to him. He needs to sleep.”
“Stop telling me what I need to do!” Tove growled. He raised his hand like he meant to slap me again, and I flinched.
“Tove!” Loki shouted and ran over to him.
“Loki!” I yelled, afraid that he would hit him, but he didn’t.
Loki grabbed Tove by the shoulders, making Tove look at him. Tove tried to squirm away, but within seconds he was unconscious. His body slacked, and Loki caught him. I moved out of the way so Loki could lay him back down on the bed.
“Sorry,” I said, unsure of what else to say.
“Don’t be sorry. He was about to hit you.”
“No, he wasn’t.” I shook my head. “I mean, he was. But that’s not Tove. That’s not who he is. He would never hurt anybody. He just . . .”
I trailed off. I wanted to cry. My face stung from where Tove had slapped me. But that wasn’t even why I wanted to cry. He was sick, and he was only going to get sicker. Tomorrow he’d be better, but eventually his powers would eat away at his brain. Eventually, there wouldn’t be any Tove left.
Loki leaned in, staring at my cheek with a pained expression. My cheek began to throb, and I realized there must be a red mark. I turned my face away, embarrassed.
“Thank you,” I said, “but I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not,” Loki said. “I don’t care if he’s your husband, and I don’t care if he’s lost his mind. There’s no excuse for hitting you, and if he does it again . . .” The muscle in his jaw twitched, and his eyes flashed with a protective anger.
“He won’t do it again,” I assured him, even though I wasn’t entirely sure if that was true.
“He better not,” Loki said, but his anger seemed to lessen, and he touched my arm tenderly. “Now come on. You can’t stay here with him tonight.”
SIXTEEN
one night
I’d gotten Aurora and sent her in to stay with Tove for the night. I felt guilty for leaving him, but she would be better equipped to handle him if he got out of control again.
Since she was staying with Tove, I took her room. The four-poster bed sat in the corner, draped with red curtains and sheets. One of the walls was very crooked, practically leaning on top of the bed, and it made the room feel even smaller.
“Are you going to be all right now?” Loki asked. He’d walked me over here, and he waited just inside the doorway.
“Yeah, I’m great,” I lied and sat down on the bed. “The entire kingdom is falling apart. People are dying. I have to kill my father. And my husband just went crazy.”
“Wendy, none of that’s your fault.”
“Well, it feels like it’s all my fault,” I said, and a tear slid down my cheek. “I only make everything worse.”
“That’s not true at all.” Loki walked over and sat on the bed next to me. “Wendy, don’t cry.”
“I’m not,” I lied. I wiped at my eyes and looked at him. “Why are you even being nice to me?”
“Why wouldn’t I be nice to you?” he asked, looking confused.
“Because.” I pointed to the scars covering his back. “That’s because of me.”
“No, it isn’t.” Loki shook his head. “That’s because the King is evil.”
“But if I had gone with him in the first place, none of this would’ve happened,” I said. “None of these people would’ve died. Even Tove would be better.”
“And you would be dead,” Loki said. “The King would still hate the Trylle, maybe even more so if he blamed them for brainwashing you. He would eventually attack them and take the kingdom for himself.”
“Maybe.” I shrugged. “Maybe not.”
“Stop.” He put his arm around me, and it felt safe and warm. “Not everything is your fault, and you can’t fix everything. You’re only one person.”
“It never feels like enough.” I swallowed and looked up at him. “Nothing I do is ever enough.”
“Oh, believe me, you do more than enough.” He smiled and brushed a hair back from my face.
His eyes met mine, and I felt a familiar yearning inside of me, one that got stronger every time I was with him.
“Why did you want me to remember?” I asked.
“Remember what?”
“When we were in your room, you said you wanted me to remember that I wanted you to kiss me.”
“So you admit you wanted me to kiss you?” Loki smirked.
“Loki.”
“Wendy,” he echoed, smiling at me.
“Why didn’t you just kiss me?” I asked. “Wouldn’t that have been a better thing to remember?”
“It wasn’t the right time.”
“Why not?”
“You were on a mission. If I kissed you, it would’ve only been for a second, because you were in a rush to go,” he said. “And a second wouldn’t be enough.”
“So when is the right time?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he whispered.
He had his hand on my cheek, wiping away a tear, and his eyes were searching my face. He leaned forward, and his lips brushed against mine. Delicately at first, almost testing to see if this was real. His kisses were soft and sweet, and so very different from Finn’s.
As soon as I thought of Finn, I pushed him from my mind. I didn’t want to think of anything else. I didn’t want to feel anything except Loki. The exhaustion of the night was pushed away as something surged through, something warm and intense.
Loki kissed me more deeply and pushed me back on the bed. He wrapped an arm around my waist, lifting me up and pulling me farther onto the bed. I clung to him, my hands digging into his bare back. The scars felt like braille under my fingers, scars he’d gotten to protect me.
“Wendy,” he murmured as he kissed my neck, his lips trailing all over my skin and making me tremble.
He stopped kissing me long enough to look at me. His light hair fell into his eyes. Something about the way he looked at me, his eyes the color of burnt honey, made my heart beat faster.
It was like I’d never truly seen him before. All his pretenses had fallen away; his smirk, his swagger, were all gone. It was just him, and I realized that this might be the first time I was really seeing him.
Loki was vulnerable and kind and more than a little frightened. But more than that, he was lonely, and he cared about me. He cared about me so much it terrified him, and as much as that should’ve scared me too, it didn’t.
All I could think about was that I’d never seen anything more beautiful. It felt strange thinking of a guy that way, but that’s what he was. Looking down at me, waiting for me to accept him or push him away, Loki was beautiful.
I reached for him and touched his face, almost astonished that he could be real. He closed his eyes and kissed the palm of my hand. One of his hands was on my side, and his grip tightened, sending hot shivers all through my body.
“I hate to even ask this, but . . .” Loki trailed off, his voice husky. “Are you sure you want to do this?”
“I want you, Loki,” I said before I could let myself think about anything.
I wanted him, needed him, and for one night I refused to think about the consequences or the repercussions. I just wanted to be with him.
Loki smiled, relieved, and he almost seemed to glow. He bent down, kissing me again, only deeper and more fervently.
His hand slid under my nightgown, strong and sure on my thigh. I loved his strength and power, and the way I could feel it in even his smallest touches. He tried to hold back so he wouldn’t hurt me, but when he tried to slide off my panties, he tore them in half.
I took off my nightgown, slipping it up over my head, because I didn’t want him ripping that too. He tried to be gentle with me, and some part of me did want him to be, because that was the way I thought my first time should be. But we were both far too eager.
He started out slow, trying to ease himself in me, but I moaned in his ear, gripping tightly on to him, and any pretense of restraint was gone. It hurt, and I buried my face into his shoulder to keep from crying out. But he didn’t slow, and very soon the heat grew inside me. I was glad he didn’t slow. Even the pain felt like pleasure.
Afterward, he collapsed on the bed next to me, both of us gasping for breath. We’d knocked the bed off-kilter, and I vaguely remembered hearing the sound of a board cracking, so we might have broken it. The red curtains of the four-poster bed had been tied open, but they had come loose, so they fell around the bed and closed off the world around us.
A few candles lit the room, and we were shrouded in a warm red glow as their light flickered through the curtains. I felt sheltered, like I was wrapped in a warm cocoon, and I didn’t think I’d ever felt more content or safe in my life.
I lay on my back, and Loki moved next to me, almost encircling me. One arm was behind my neck, and the other one was draped over my belly. I wrapped my arms around his so I could hold him closer to me.
Because I was nestled in his arms this way, the scar on his chest was right next to me. I’d never seen it this close before. It looked so jagged and rough. It slashed at an angle, starting right above his heart, and stopping below his other nipple.
“Do you hate me?” I asked quietly.
“Why on earth would I hate you?” Loki asked, laughing.
“Because of this.” I touched his scar, and his skin trembled around it. “Because of what my father did to you over me.”
“No, I don’t hate you.” He kissed my temple. “I could never hate you. And it’s not your fault what the King did.”
“How did you get this?” I asked.
“Before he decided to punish me, the King considered execution,” Loki said, almost wearily. “He used a sword before deciding that torture might be more fun.”
“He almost killed you?” I looked at him, and the very thought of Loki dying made me want to cry.
“He didn’t, though.” He brushed back my hair, his fingers running through the tangles of it, and he smiled down at me. “The King couldn’t, no matter how hard he tried. My heart refused to give up. It knew I had something to fight for.”
“You shouldn’t say things like that.” I swallowed back tears and lowered my eyes. “Tonight was . . . beautiful and amazing, but it was only for tonight.”
“Wendy.” Loki groaned and rolled onto his back. “Why did you have to say something like that now?”
“Because.” I sat up and pulled my knees to my chest. The sheets hung over my legs, but my back was bare to him. “I don’t want you to . . .” I sighed. “I don’t want to hurt you any more than I already have.”
“It looks like I hurt you, actually.” Loki sat up and touched my arm. “You have a bruise.”
“What?” I looked down and saw a purplish blotch on my arm. “I don’t remember you doing that.” I’d probably have bruises on my thighs, but Loki didn’t grab my arms. “Oh. This isn’t from you. It’s from Tove.”
“Tove.” Loki sighed. He didn’t say anything for a minute, then looked over at me. “You’re going back to him tomorrow, aren’t you?”
“He is my husband.”
“He hit you.”
“He wasn’t in his right mind. Once he’s back to himself, he’ll feel terrible. It won’t happen again.”
“It better not,” he said firmly.
“Anyway, I married him for a reason, and that hasn’t changed.”
“What reason is that?” Loki asked. “I know you don’t love him.”
“The Trylle don’t want me to be Queen,” I said. “They don’t trust me, because of who my father is, among other things. Tove’s family is very influential and helps balance it out. If I wasn’t married to him, his mother would be leading the campaign to get me overthrown. Without Tove, I’d never be Queen.”
“Why is that a bad thing?” Loki asked. “These people don’t trust you or like you, and you’re sacrificing everything for them. How does that make sense?”
“Because they need me. I can help them. I can save them. I’m the only one who can stand up to my father, and I’m the only one that cares enough to fight for the rights of the trackers and the less powerful Trylle. I have to do this.”
“I wish you didn’t say that with such conviction.” He put his arm around me an
d moved closer. He kissed my shoulder, then whispered, “I don’t want you to go back to Tove tomorrow.”
“I have to.”
“I know,” he said. “But I don’t want you to.”
“You can have me for tonight, though.” I gave him a small smile, and he lifted his head so his eyes met mine. “That’s all I can give you.”
“I don’t want only one night. I want all the nights. I want all of you, forever.”
Tears swam in my eyes, and my heart yearned so badly it hurt. Sitting there with Loki, I didn’t think I’d ever felt quite so heartbroken.
“Don’t cry, Wendy.” He smiled sadly at me, and I saw the heartbreak in his eyes mirroring my own. He pulled me to him and kissed my forehead, then my cheeks, then my mouth.
“So, if this is all you’ll let me have, then I will take it all,” Loki said. “No talking or even worrying about the kingdom or responsibility or anyone else. You’re not the Princess. I’m not Vittra. We’re only a boy and a girl crazy about each other, and we’re naked in bed.”
I nodded. “I can do that.”
“Good, because I’m determined to make the most of it.” He smiled and pushed me down on the bed. “I think we broke the bed a little bit last time. What do you say we see if we can destroy it?”
I laughed, and he kissed me. Tomorrow I might regret this. Tomorrow I might have hell to pay. But for one night, I refused to think or worry. I was with Loki, and he made me feel like the only thing in the world that truly mattered. And in that night, he was the only thing that truly mattered to me.
A knocking woke me in the morning, and I was surprised that I’d even slept at all. The night washed over me in a hazy, happy blur. Everything felt like a wonderful dream, and I’d never known that I could feel that close to another person or that . . . happy. Loki’s arms were strong around me, and I snuggled deeper into them. I wanted to stay curled up next to him forever.
“Princess?” Aurora called from outside my bedroom, and it was like a cold slap pulling me from my dream. “Are you up? I need to get my clothes.” Loki’s arms tensed around me, and before I could answer, the bedroom door creaked open and Aurora walked into the room.
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