by Everly Frost
His big hand brushes my cheek. “Aura.” He closes his eyes. Presses his forehead to mine. Exhales quietly. “These remaining hours are ours. Nobody else’s. I want to spend them sharing everything with you that’s good about my world. There are places in the Misty Gallows where the streams flow and the moss is like emeralds. I want you to see that not everything here is ugly.”
I want to say ‘yes’ immediately, but reality presses in on me. “Cyrian still sits on your throne. You need to kill him before we fight.”
Nathaniel nods, a slow acknowledgement against my forehead, but he says, “We nearly died trying to fight him, Aura. I had a path that I walked, and now I’ve reached its end. Cyrian’s fate will be determined by the outcome of the battle between us. Until then, I don’t want to think about him—or Imatra—or any other person except you.”
“Okay,” I whisper, hoping it will be that simple.
He pulls back with a serious smile. “Then let’s start with a warm bath. We’ll find a way for Maggie to smuggle us some food after that.”
Capturing my free hand in his, he draws me to my feet and toward the bathroom, his footsteps slow and quiet. He checks my position as he moves, as if we’re running away together again. I guess we are. Running away from the future, trying to stop each passing minute.
Stay with me, Aura.
He draws me inside the bathroom, urging me to sit in the chair while he strides to the clawfoot bath that rests in the center of the room. Reaching for the cast-iron water pump located at the back of it, he pumps the lever, but he only fills it half-full.
Then he returns to me, eases my arm out of the sling, and supports my limb while drawing my armor the rest of the way down my torso and then my legs.
Every move he makes is careful. Silent.
His fingers linger on my skin. My shoulder, my bicep, my wrist, my waist, extending each touch like it’s the last.
Finally, my underwear lies on the floor, and I make my way to the bath. Sliding into it, I keep my arm pressed to my chest. The bath is full enough for me to slip beneath the surface, immersing my hair for a moment, but it’s shallow enough that I’m not forced to be completely submerged in the blood and dirt that wash off me.
Breaking the surface, I find Nathaniel kneeling beside the bath with a washcloth in hand. He sets about cleaning off all of the blood and dust that still coat my neck, face, hands—even my stomach where my skin was exposed. He is careful around the scrapes across my stomach and pays particular attention to the scratches across my face—including the cut on my chin where Tanner’s whip nicked me.
The water slowly turns red as Nathaniel’s blood and my blood wash away from me.
“The wounds are clean,” he murmurs. “I don’t see any signs of infection, but we’ll need to keep watch.”
I burned the ends of my hair last night when I removed the black dye that had hidden my identity for part of the day, and he pauses as he draws the cloth across the strands. This time, he doesn’t say anything.
He helps me out of the bath and wraps me in two towels—one around my body and another smaller one around my hair. After returning me to the chair, he drains the bath, refills it, turns his back to me to remove his clothes, and quickly disappears inside the bathtub.
Water splashes outside the tub as he slides beneath the surface.
The tug inside my chest is undeniable.
I need to be able to see him.
My feet move, taking me to the edge of the bath.
Nathaniel remains beneath the surface, his eyes closed, fists pressed against the inner sides of the bath to keep himself underwater. The liquid slowly turns red as the remainder of his blood washes off.
The surface breaks as he sits up, but he doesn’t look at me, fixating on the opposite wall as water streams down his hair, face, and shoulders.
His eyes are red. “I made you a promise that I can’t keep,” he says.
I know the promise he’s talking about: He swore to fight me with all of his strength, to strike, hurt, and tear me apart. To treat me as his enemy.
“You won’t be fighting me,” I say, pushing my left arm free of the towel to reach across and rest my fingertips against his heart. “I will be tucked up in here. And in your memories. I will be the wife you once had, who no longer exists. The woman you fight will be the Fae Queen’s champion. She will have no mercy and neither will you.”
I inject the full force of my convictions into my speech. I need him to believe that I will fight him with all of my strength, that I will not give up.
He nods, but it’s automatic. He has no choice but to agree. His movements are wooden as he rises from the water.
“I want to fight beside you, not against you,” he says.
His statement tears at my heart. When he steps from the bath, I close the gap between us, wrapping my free arm around his stiff torso, the towel hanging half off me, my hurt arm curled between us.
He slowly pulls the towel back up over my shoulders, but when I look up, his expression has softened. A faint smile touches his lips. “It’s a shame we both need to eat right now.”
I give him a sultry smile that seems to surprise him before I release him and shrug the towel right off my shoulders, allowing it to drop to the floor, leaving me naked. “It is a shame.”
Turning, I reach for the folded-up beige training gear that I left on the seat in the corner of the bathroom yesterday. The rips in my armor are a liability and I don’t want to put it on again now that it’s covered in blood—even if the gore doesn’t show against the black material. Luckily, Esther provided me with multiple pairs of clean underwear yesterday, so I pick some underpants and pull them on one-handed.
Staring, perplexed, at the top, I consider how I’ll get my injured arm through the strap.
I sense Nathaniel come up behind me before he drops a kiss onto my bare shoulder, murmuring, “Let me help you with that.”
When I turn back to him, he surprises me by tugging the underwear from my fingers and dropping it back to the chair. He’s wearing a towel slung low over his hips, but it wouldn’t take much to remove it.
He arches his eyebrow at me, a smile playing around his mouth.
I bite my lip before I take a step, rise up onto my tiptoes to meet his height, and plant a swift, brief kiss on his smiling mouth. His jaw is shadowed with growth and the bristles tingle against my lips.
With a tug as quick as the one with which he took the underwear from me, I loosen his towel.
His arms wrap around me and he lifts me, nudging soft kisses against my lips as he carries me from the room, making it to his bedroom in a few quick strides. Glitter bulbs float up into the air, disturbed as we pass them, but they glide back to the floor again without any disasters.
I sense Nathaniel’s restraint when he lays me on his bed, control in the way he makes sure my arm is resting at my side, bending it at the elbow so that my right hand rests on my stomach. Planting tantalizing kisses along the back of my hand and my forearm, he follows the arch of my arm as far as my breasts before he kisses every inch of them, sending strikes of heat all of the way to my center.
I’m surprised when my skin reacts to his touch with the softest glow. I thought my power would be completely drained by now, but his nearness is too overwhelming, the promise of his body too much.
Heat rages through me by the time his lips crash against mine, hungry and demanding. Shivers rocket through me, rippling back and forth as his hands stroke down my sides, seeking the curve of my hips and my thighs.
I forget my injured arm, reaching for him before he takes hold of my wrist and presses my hand firmly back to my stomach, kissing the back of it again before his hand remains pressed over it, keeping me from hurting myself.
His kisses trail lower, down across my stomach and pelvis. When his mouth reaches my center, it’s nearly more than I can take. My breathing bursts out of control and my body is beyond ready. But the closer I come to complete release, the more my emotions sp
iral out of my control.
My heart hurts.
There isn’t a part of my body and mind that isn’t aching right now, screaming quietly. My future is as trapped as my right hand, clasped in Nathaniel’s, forced to remain still, intertwined, when all I want is to break us both free from the rules, the magic, and the Law.
I flex my fingers beneath his palm, pushing upward before I slip his hold and tug on his arm, drawing him back to me.
The intensity in his eyes burns through me, cutting my heart as he hovers above me before he drops a soft kiss on my lips. “Aura? Do we need to stop?”
“No.” I shake my head with a sob that I can’t control. My emotions are a mess of heat and sadness, of physical need and emotional want. “I never want to stop.”
Tilting my pelvis, I hook my legs around his hips, moaning out the intoxicating rush as he slides inside me. He moves slowly, drawing out the joining so that every second of pleasure feels like it will last forever and release is a crash that will end it all.
Desperate to anchor myself in his body, I grip his shoulder with my good hand, my other resting on the bed as my body rocks against his. I would give anything for more time. Just one more day. Two. I need a lifetime with him.
I gasp. “Tell me a lie, Nathaniel. Just one.”
He pauses mid-thrust, making my body ache even more, wanting and needing every part of him.
His jaw tenses, but a fierce determination enters his voice. “We will both be alive tomorrow.”
I nod, choosing to believe that all of his rage and willpower can make it true. “We will.”
I lose myself to the intensity of his touch, his lips, the heady strokes, the suddenly wild rhythm. I push back against the crash, holding on to every second of want and need until the intensity in his eyes and the way his hands stroke every sensitive inch of me, tip me over. The crash feels like falling and never hitting the bottom, waves that promise a future I can’t have.
Gathering me into his side, he holds me close, my head pressed to his chest.
His heart beats pound in my ears.
“We will both survive this,” he says.
It is a beautiful lie.
Chapter 8
When we finally emerge from his room, we’re dressed but beyond hungry. Nathaniel wears a fresh set of black pants and a new short-sleeved shirt. He creates a sling for me out of a clean shirt and helps me put it on so it will be harder to accidentally use my sore arm. I’m dressed in the human training gear that I’m sure will only invite their anger, since it will look like I’m trying to be one of them, but I have no other clothing options. I also have no choice but to put on the boots that are still coated in blood and dust, but Nathaniel cleans them for me first.
He surprises me when he pulls on a weapon harness, slipping a sword into the carry pouch across his back and also attaching three daggers. He holds out a harness to me and helps me pull it on, clipping it beneath my sling before we retrieve the dagger and sword from my armor and he slips them into the harness for me—the sword at my back and the daggers where I can reach them with my left arm.
“Are you sure about this?” I ask him. “Me walking through Null carrying weapons like this could invite conflict.”
“Our conflict already exists,” he says. “I understand their anger, but I won’t tolerate it.”
My stomach growls loudly. I take hold of Nathaniel’s hand to keep him safe from the glitter bulbs as he pulls me toward the door.
Shaking off his anger, he gives me a smile. “Let’s go steal some food.”
“What should we do about the bulbs?” I ask before we reach the door. “We can’t leave them floating around outside.”
“We could bring them inside,” he suggests. “That way, they’ll be contained.”
“Okay.” I laugh, picturing him chasing them across the porch. “But I’ll be holding one of your hands to keep you safe, and I can’t use my right arm. Will you be able to catch them all by yourself?”
He shrugs. “It will be like chasing bubbles.” His free hand darts out in demonstration toward the nearest one, taking hold of it in a firm grip. “See? Easy as—”
A shock of light passes across his hand, shooting down his arm and across his chest so quickly that it bites my side where I’m pressed against him.
“Nathaniel!”
He freezes where he stands, his inhalation interrupted, his breath held as he stares at the bulb.
He exhales with a sharp question. “What is this?”
Inside the bulb, images swirl and shift.
The white light blazing across the bulb’s surface clears, turning into steam that rises from a firehorse’s nostrils. The animal’s body is slick with sweat and fear. The saddle on its back is empty other than the gleaming halberd attached to the harness that rests around the horse’s belly. As its full body comes into view, the weight of a man drags across the moonlit ground beside it, his booted foot caught in the stirrups.
“This is the night my father died. Why is it showing me this?” Nathaniel grips the bulb so tightly that his fingers are becoming bloodless, so tightly, he might crush it.
Sliding my hand along his arm, I try to pry his fingers loose, worried about the destructive power inside the bulb. More worried about the effect of the painful memory on him.
“Don’t…” I whisper. “Don’t watch it.”
His father’s body bumps across the stones leading up to the outer wall of the Fell castle, lit by the firelight flickering from lamps along the path. A shout rises up from the battlements, so loud in the silence of the hut that I jolt.
Inside the bulb, the castle gate’s large, iron spikes rise. A boy runs through the opening, darting to the man’s side while the shouting continues above him. The boy has to be Nathaniel. I recognize his dark hair and eyes.
He’s carrying a dagger that he uses to cut through the stirrups in one deft move before he drops to his father’s side with a shout. “Where are you hurt?” His dark eyes are wild with fear. “Tell me!”
His father grabs Nathaniel’s shoulders and draws him closer. The older man’s voice is a bare rasp, fading with every breath. “Nathaniel… remember… when I die… it is up to you to keep the light.”
Young Nathaniel’s eyes widen. His shout breaks my heart. “No! You can’t die!”
He struggles against his father’s hold, but the older man grips him with bloody hands, his voice becoming stronger. An order that only a king can give. “Nathaniel! You will promise to carry out my final wishes.”
Nathaniel’s eyes fill with tears as he grabs his father’s arms, but Nathaniel becomes still, no longer fighting. “Tell me what you ask. I will do it.”
His father exhales slowly, his strength visibly failing. “Find the girl… with hair whiter than bone… Give this… back to her. Tell her… she doesn’t belong to them.”
“I don’t understand. What girl? Why?”
“She has the power to turn the war. She has the power…”
Dark light washes across young Nathaniel’s body, casting him into shadow. Mathilda appears behind him, her arms outstretched, her skirt swishing around her legs as if she just arrived in time to hear the king’s last words.
“No! Tobias!” She bends to Nathaniel’s father, but the older man’s eyes are already vacant.
The tumult of sound inside the bulb stops and the image fades.
I stare at the glittering emptiness it leaves behind. “Nathaniel… I’m sorry.”
His gaze is bleak. “That was the day our paths first crossed. Yours and mine.”
Suddenly agitated, he turns to the other bulbs, his eyes narrowed as he snatches another orb out of the air. There’s a flash of color inside the bulb, another set of images, these ones disappearing so quickly that I can’t catch them, but Nathaniel seems to recognize them immediately. He grabs another bulb with the same effect, dropping it just as fast.
“All of these are painful memories,” he says. “All of them are moments in time that b
rought me to you. The ripples of my life keeping me on the path to find you.”
He releases the last bulb, dropping it to the floor as his gaze burns mine. “These bulbs aren’t here because of you. They’re here for me, to remind me what I need to do, to keep me on my path.”
He steps away from the bulbs so that I can safely release his arm. The bulbs he touched are all piled in the corner of the room now, except for one, which has floated toward the table. Cautiously, I reach for it, closing my fingers around it. Rather than bursting into images, the surface softens, transforming at my touch into a living daisy with pure white petals and a bright golden center.
I crush it slowly in my fist.
The day Nathaniel’s father—Tobias—died was the day I woke up. Nathaniel’s future was determined by his father’s final words while my future was spent trying to understand my past.
Dropping the broken flower onto the table, I turn to press my hand against Nathaniel’s heart, hoping to remind him that his heart is still beating, that he is not alone.
He’s tense beside me. “I handed you the stone yesterday, but I was supposed to make sure you took it. My father told me to give it back to you.”
Taking a deep breath, Nathaniel draws away from me, crosses to the mantelpiece, and returns with the small wooden box he showed me yesterday. I refused to touch it and we left it here when we went to find Christiana.
My response is sharp. “I don’t want it.”
He pauses, his arm half-outstretched toward me before he lowers it, the box gripped in his fist.
He studies my face. “I saw your fear of this stone yesterday, Aura. Why are you afraid of it?”
“I don’t know,” I whisper, taking a step back. I shake my head, trying to verbalize my feelings. “Because it feels like staring into an abyss. Like the nothing that I remember before I woke up for the first time at the burn site.”
When I took Nathaniel to the burn site where my first memories began, I told him that I was born on that spot, a fully-formed seven-year-old girl. I remembered nothing from my life before I first woke up that night, but the nothing I remember is a vast, endless space. The same nothing that surrounds me when I sleep.