Heart of Thorns

by Bree Barton

  I’m keeping him safe, she told herself. She would keep Quin at a distance to protect him. Love was not something that could exist between them. Not now, not ever.

  A cloud passed overhead. The sky crackled midnight blue, pocked with stars. The air was too heavy to breathe. Mia was worn out, thin as paper, rubbed raw from trying.

  No matter what she did tomorrow, someone would get hurt.

  Chapter 52

  The People You Love

  MIA WOKE TO A rustling, then a hush. A twig snapped under a boot.

  Every nerve in her body arched. Was it Tristan? She listened. Another snap.

  Her eyes swept the camp. The others were sound asleep. Dom lay under the tarp with two hands on his belly. Pilar was sprawled across the earth, good at taking up space. Zaga was still sitting against the tree, spine curved like a scythe.

  Quin was gone.

  She heard the branches being shoved aside, footfall, breathing. Something heavy splashed into the river. No one else stirred as she stood and slipped soundlessly between the trees.

  The forest floor was caked in green mosses and white lichen blooms. She passed leaning towers of ivory shale, gneiss, and quartzite marked with glacial striations like a lady’s pocket fan. Mia imagined the river goddess, banished from her three sisters and their volqanic paradise. She saw her roaming this strange, stony kingdom, tears rolling off her cheeks and sluicing down the rocks until they swelled into the Natha.

  The earth grew pliant, sifting to fine granules. She’d made it to the river.

  She heard a swash, then saw a blur of gold against the black. She took a breath and stepped out of the trees.

  Quin was sitting on the riverbank, throwing rocks into the Natha. His shoes were lined up neatly on the sand and his feet were bare; they dangled in the water. He bristled when he saw her.

  “It’s all right.” She held up hands in surrender. “Zaga didn’t send me to spy on you. I’m here as a friend.”

  “Friend.” He smiled sadly. “Since when have you and I ever been friends? Refugees, maybe. Partners in crime. Questionably married. But never friends.”

  “Can I sit?”

  “You can do whatever you like. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about you, it’s that you will anyway.”

  She sank into the sand. Together they watched the water surge past their feet. The air was rife with all the things they did not say.

  “It’s funny,” she said at last. “I used to find such comfort in the trees. My mother always loved trees, and I think I loved them because she did; these big friendly giants watching over me as a little girl. But I think that was a lie. So much of what I believed was a lie. Now the water seems truer. Black and murky and able to kill you in the blink of an eye—and far more honest.”

  Quin stared into the dark swirling river for a long time.

  “I don’t want to go back, Mia.”

  “I don’t blame you.”

  “Let’s say Zaga doesn’t kill me. That I make it back to the Kaer in one piece. If I go back there—back to my father, to that world—they’ll crush me. They’ll make me into someone I don’t recognize.”

  He dug his fists into the sand. “I know you want to save your sister. And I don’t want anything to happen to Angelyne. But I can’t shake the feeling I’ll die if I go back.”

  The blackthorn blossoms clung sweetly to the cool night air. The scent had been a staple of her childhood, a simple pleasure. Now it smelled of loss.

  “I’m sorry.” She looked down at her hands. “I’ve brought nothing but fear and terror into your life.”

  “No. The fear and terror were always there. I was scared of you, yes, but I’ve spent most of my life afraid of my father. After what he did to Tobin . . .” He shook his head. “I don’t know why it surprised me. For years I’d watched him string up the hands of the women he killed. Girls. Such little girls . . .”

  He choked on the words, unable to finish.

  “I’ve spent my whole life scared of my father. But I’ve also been scared of turning out like him. Scared that sitting on the river throne would make me ruthless and brutal, someone who built a kingdom on bigotry and hate.”

  “Quin. Look at me.” She cupped his chin in her hand. “You could never be like your father. Never. You are good and kind and generous. You care about people. Back in the Kaer, I thought you were selfish—just another coddled prince. But I was wrong about you. I was wrong about a lot of things.”

  He pressed her hand to his cheek. “You broke me out, Mia. You took me places I’d never been and gave me a taste of freedom. You showed me what my life might have been like. What I might have been like.”

  “Your life isn’t over.”

  “It might be, depending on what happens tomorrow.” He dropped her hand, reaching for a pebble and smoothing it with his thumb. “I never expected to be here. I couldn’t have imagined it in a million years, not in all my pretending and my make-believe. But I don’t regret it. I don’t regret a single minute of getting to know you.”

  Mia wondered why she had regrown a heart if just to break it.

  “I’m not going to let anything happen to you,” she whispered. “I swear it.”

  He smiled. “You’re beautiful when you lie.”

  When she flushed, he quickly added, “Not to diminish you or suggest that beauty is an indicator of your worth.”

  She didn’t understand what was happening in her body. It wasn’t the honeyed melting of an enthrall, but a feeling of spinning in midair, weightless. She imagined this was what desire felt like.

  “But what about Dom?” she said.

  “He’s beautiful, too.” Quin tossed the stone across the water, where it glided like a crane. “More than one person can be beautiful, you know.”

  “But do you . . .”

  “I’m in love with you, Mia. For all your magic, did you really not know?”

  She leaned forward, raked her fingers through his curls, and pulled his lips to hers.

  Desire licked her collarbone, curling through her limbs. She hadn’t known she could want someone. Not like this. Quin’s mouth was soft, his lips warm and salty. He cradled her face in his hands and ran his thumb down her jaw, her skin melting into his touch.

  She pulled back. “I’m not enthralling you. I don’t want you to think . . .”

  “I know.” He fished a chain out of his pocket. A piece of uzoolion swung from the end. “A parting gift from Lauriel,” he said, and snapped the clasp around his neck.

  She held her breath, terrified that the desire would seep out of his eyes, that maybe she was enthralling him after all. But she felt steady in her body, powerful in a way she never had during an enthrall. She wanted him. That wasn’t her magic; that was her.

  “I want this,” he said. “I want you.”

  She felt it pouring through her, the spiced fire of his want. When she’d enthralled him, it was artifice dressed in a pretty gown. It was manipulation masquerading as desire, and from the outside, it was lovely, even bewitching. But the feelings were manufactured, born of magic, not need.

  This—now—the heat she felt pulsing through her, quivering in her fingertips, pulsing in her hips—was real.

  He dug his hands into her curls, transforming her hair into streaming sunlight. With his other hand he swept his fingers across the soft skin of her nape. Gently he tilted her head back and pressed his lips to her cheek, her jaw, her neck. He traced the top of her shirt as he planted kisses on her collarbone like sparks. He was setting her aflame.

  “Too warm,” she murmured.

  “What can I do?”

  “Cool me off.”

  He peeled her shirt down at the neckline, just an inch, and blew cool air over her sweltering skin. Delicious sensations shivered down her spine.

  “The river,” she said.

  They eased themselves into the Natha, the cool rush of water spilling over them. Their clothes clung to them like a second skin. Mia dug her fingers into his curls, ma
shed wet against his forehead, and tasted the plumpness of his bottom lip. She dragged her palms down his chest and stopped where the crest of his hip bones met the top of his trousers.

  “Is this what drowning feels like?” he murmured. “Because I think I’d like to drown forever.”

  She laughed. “Sorry. I’m sorry. But I swear I read that exact line in one of my sister’s novels.”

  She was scared she’d ruined the moment, but he laughed, too. “Needless to say,” he whispered in her ear, “I read the same book.”

  His fingers were tangled up in the slick coils of her hair as he pulled her closer, his greedy lips exploring hers. She wrapped her legs around him, his body lean and taut, stronger than she expected. The cloth between them was dissolving in the river. Everything was dissolving. She felt like sugar sprinkled in the sea.

  Quin’s kisses were molten, incinerating her thoughts, her reason. She couldn’t believe she’d ever thought the prince didn’t have a red beating heart. She felt it now, crashing against her ribs.

  Her body vibrated in a long, low hum. She lost track of time, seconds entwining into minutes, minutes to hours. There were no theorems to explain this. Why would she want to? What Quin was doing to her defied logic.

  Mia ran her fingers over his wet skin, memorizing the map of his body. She was exploring the outer limits of his pleasure and her own, the boundary waters of desire. No science could describe the warmth extending outward from her center, sizzling spokes of fire and friction, like a sun-kissed star.

  When they finally drew their bodies apart, they climbed out of the river and collapsed onto its banks, spent. Mia shivered warm, if such a thing were possible. All things seemed possible at the moment. She was wrapped in a dreamy, otherworldly haze.

  Somewhere in the haze, she heard a distant whisper: The people you love are the ones who hurt you most. She shoved it away. She didn’t want to hear it. Not now, not when the sorrows of the last week had finally given way to bliss.

  “Lovely,” Quin said, kissing her wrist. “Lovely.” He kissed her collarbone. “Lovely.” He got sidetracked by her lips.

  She let out a low moan of pleasure, and the river moaned back.

  Then a woman screamed.

  Chapter 53

  Moonlight

  THEY HEARD THE SCREAM again, pierced with fear.

  Mia and Quin scrambled up from the riverbank and ran toward the sound.

  There was no time to discuss a plan of action. They were flying through the forest, tripping over rocks and tree stumps. Seconds later they stumbled into a clearing where a stunning white mare was tethered to a tree. The horse nickered and stamped her hooves, clearly agitated.

  A girl was pinned to the ground by two men. One had her by the thighs, the other by the wrists. Her hair stuck up in wild tufts, and her shirt was torn and gaping, one breast exposed.

  “Karri!” Quin shouted.

  Karri looked up at him, her eyes white with terror. She was fighting with all her might, writhing and kicking, but even the magnificent princess was no match for two men.

  As Mia stared at the men, vitriol scalded her throat. Cousin Tristan and his lone surviving guardsman stared back.

  The duke’s hand hung limply at his side, his fingers shattered from where he had grabbed her ankle. He and his ginger-haired guard had been trekking back to Kaer Killian for days, thirsty, starving, their pale faces rough and unshaven and their bodies gaunt. They hadn’t yet made it back to Mia’s sister.

  They had chanced upon Quin’s sister instead.

  The men should have been weakened by four days of snow and hunger, but lust had replenished their strength. They gulped down their power until they were glutted, drunk. They knew they could take what they wanted—and what Tristan wanted was his own cousin. For all she knew, the king had sanctioned it.

  Mia felt sick. Not even Karri, Daughter of Clan Killian, Rightful Heir to the River Throne, was safe.

  With a roar, the prince hurled himself at Tristan, hooking an arm around his cousin’s throat. They fell to the ground, the duke yelling and clawing at Quin wildly.

  Instead of retreat, the wiry guardsman thrust his whole weight onto Karri. He ran his dirty hand up the inside of her thigh.

  “Fine with me, Princess,” he growled. “I like ’em better when they fight.”

  Karri froze, and Mia felt fear, cold and deadly sharp. A lesson Zaga taught her in the boat ignited in her fingers; she knew exactly what to do. She wrapped her arms around the man from behind, digging the heels of her hands into his groin.

  Her blood screeched through her hands. She felt the heat drain out of the man’s groin as she channeled it down, down, down. She was unblooding him. Where his body had been rigid moments before, she could feel it deflating. She ground her palms in deeper, siphoning the blood to his feet where it couldn’t hurt anyone. He let out a yelp and let go of Karri, grabbing at his toes, now engorged with excess blood.

  The princess’s face was wet with moonlight. Mia had never seen her cry.

  “Mia,” she whispered. “Thank the gods.”

  The rapist clambered out of the clearing, bellowing for his lord to follow. Tristan seized the moment of confusion, using his good hand to land a punch on Quin’s shoulder that sent the prince spinning into the dirt. The duke and his guardsman crashed into the woods and vanished behind a copse of maples.

  Karri was shaking. “I never thought . . . I didn’t think he’d . . .”

  The shock in her face twisted, turned into something else.

  Mia heard a crunch behind her as a red arrow soared past her head and lodged deep in Karri’s stomach.

  She watched in horror as the princess sank to the forest floor.

  Chapter 54

  Weeping Blood

  “NO!” QUIN YELLED.

  Instantly he was kneeling by his sister’s side. She sputtered for breath, a halo of blood reaching outward, soaking her shirt, anointing Quin as he pressed his hands over the wound.

  Mia couldn’t move. She didn’t have to; Pilar stepped out of the trees, the bowstring hot in her hands. She was trembling.

  “My mother,” she whispered. “My mother said . . .”

  Zaga stepped out of the woods, white cane in hand.

  “I said to wound her, Pilar. Not to kill.”

  The blood thickened in Mia’s throat as the blood rose in Karri’s. They were both choking. Karri’s mouth moved around silent words. Help. Please help me.

  Zaga bent over the fallen princess. She pressed her lips into a wan line.

  “Heal her,” she said to Mia.

  “I don’t know how.”

  “You do know how. You have done it before, with a similar fojuen arrow.”

  “You should do it, Zaga. I don’t know if—”

  “Every second you waste is precious. I will guide you so you do not fail.”

  She sensed Pilar backing away, shrinking into the forest, and she was dimly aware of Dom on the riverbank, a large but quiet presence. Mia was still dizzy from the unblooding, but she knelt and gently moved Quin’s hands aside. He’d touched her with the same hands only minutes before, soft and warm; now they were blocks of ice, hardly human.

  “Take this,” Zaga said, and dropped a red stone into Mia’s hands. Her mother’s ruby wren, she realized with a jolt. Zaga must have retrieved it from the pallet in the forest.

  “Keep it close to your heart,” Zaga said, “so it will amplify your magic.”

  Mia nodded and tucked it into her blouse, then pressed her palms to Karri’s stomach, her fingers stiff with fear.

  “No,” Zaga said sharply. “The heart.”

  She did as she was told. Every second mattered, and she couldn’t risk any mistakes.

  “Tell the blood to calm itself.” Zaga’s voice was low in Mia’s ear. “You must quiet her raging heart.”

  Mia remembered healing Quin, the numbness in her fingers; the sensation of being a piece of wet cloth, wrung from both ends.

  “You m
ust slow her heartbeat. Send the blood away.”

  But wasn’t that unblooding? To shunt the blood away from the heart? When she’d healed Quin, she’d put her hands directly over his wound, but then his wound had also been at his heart . . .

  “You are distracted. You must wipe your mind clean.”

  Mia tried again. She closed her eyes and thought of quiet, steady things. The blue lake in Refúj. A pitcher of cream on a level table. A smooth white stone.

  “Empty your mind of everything,” Zaga rasped, and so Mia erased those images, too. She saw nothing. Only blankness.

  Something was wrong.

  Her hands weren’t working. They were heavy and far too cold. Color and sound were all mashed up, the sound black, the color screaming.

  “Stillness, Mia. A dark corridor. An empty room. You must keep her still.”

  She couldn’t breathe. Her body was an avalanche. Cold. So cold.

  The princess’s eyes flew open as her body seized violently. She looked so betrayed. Then she went still.

  “Karri?” Quin clutched his sister’s hand. “Karri!”

  Mia couldn’t feel her heartbeat. She couldn’t feel anything. The ruby wren was silent at her chest. The princess’s large body seemed impossibly small, slumped across the forest floor. How had she never realized Karri was beautiful? Mia had been seduced by the river kingdom’s idea of beauty: lithe waists, long hair, doe eyes. But in that moment Princess Karri was the most beautiful woman Mia had ever seen.

  And now her heart was silent.

  “You killed her.” Quin’s voice was so low she had to strain to hear it. “You killed my sister.”

  Karri’s blue eyes stared up at the night sky, seeing nothing at all.

  Quin wouldn’t look at her. Moments before they had been twined together, two delicate instruments of desire. How easy it was for love to turn to hate.

  Mia saw herself kneeling on the floor of their cottage, clutching her mother, desperate to call life back into a lifeless body.

  “Mia,” Zaga said coldly. “You have failed.”

  Men’s shouts flooded the forest. Either King Ronan’s guards had been waiting for them, or Tristan had returned and summoned them quickly. There was no time to react. The guards rode into the clearing, crushing delicate saplings and blackthorn blossoms beneath their horses’ hooves.