by Everly Frost
Nathaniel quickly checks my face, peering into my eyes as I try to focus on him. In the bright light, the deepening circles under his eyes fade, a trick of the light that makes him look well-rested.
He’s as fatigued as I am.
“You need to sleep,” he says, focused on me. “You’ll get through this if you sleep.”
He props me against the wall, sweat already dripping down his face as he presses his hand briefly to my cheek. “I’ll make shade. We can sleep under it.”
I inch my way along the wall, determined to help him. As soon as he sees me following him, he takes hold of my hands again, urging me to stay still. “You need to conserve your energy. Let me do what I can to help us both.”
My vision blurs as he drags tables into position, turning three onto their sides with their legs facing outward. He rapidly positions them with their corners touching before he upturns a fourth table and places it over the top, forming the beginning of a shelter. The opening faces away from the beams of sunlight streaming in from above.
Judging by the thudding sound outside, Cyrian has everything he needs to barricade us in now.
Climbing the wall, I force myself to move. “Is there any chance they’ll come in here sooner than they threatened?” I ask, lowering my voice. Air puffs in from the cracked roof, the door bangs once more, but then it’s very quiet and I’m not sure how far sound will travel.
“Cyrian will leave us in here to sweat as long as there’s sunlight. He’ll only come and get us before sunset if the Vanem Dragon arrives sooner.”
“Is that likely?”
“The Vanem Dragon can choose to arrive when he pleases,” Nathaniel says as he slides a second overturned table into position across the top of the shelter to complete its roof. “But it won’t be soon. Hagan and I can only fight once the dragon binds us. Cyrian then has from that moment until dawn to make sure I die.”
He kneels in the opening and removes his shirt, his head disappearing and his voice muffled as he ducks inside. “The longer the dragon waits… the less time Cyrian has to end me.”
I can’t endure my armor in this heat. The black material is attracting the sunlight and trapping the warmth against my skin—it’s designed for winter frosts, not the summer sun. My hands are slippery with sweat as I tackle the clasps at the side, finally peeling the suit off my arms and down to my waist as I stumble toward the shelter.
I need the shade or I’m going to pass out.
Moaning with relief, I drop to my knees and slip into the shadow of the shelter.
My groan is loud enough to startle Nathaniel, who’s wiping out the base of the shelter with his shirt. At my sudden appearance, he jumps and bangs his head on the table above him.
“Are you okay?” I twist in the entrance, my suit sitting awkwardly around my waist as I reach for him, trying not to bang my own head. “Show me.”
He winces at me, rubbing his scalp but refusing to turn his head for me to see where he bumped it. His gaze flickers from my naked stomach all the way up past my human underwear to my eyes. “I’m fine. It was just a bump.”
There isn’t enough room to sit up in the shelter, so I drop onto my back and lift my hips off the ground to peel the armor over my backside. I vaguely register Nathaniel pause in the entrance and can’t imagine how provocative my pose is right now, but he’s shown me that I can trust him. He’s demonstrated more respect and care for my body than I thought possible.
Tipping onto my side, I shimmy the suit down my legs one by one. As soon as I kick my boots off, the armor finally slips from my body.
I shove the boots into the corner above my head where I can grab them easily, bundle the armor under my head, close my eyes, and sigh out an exhale.
The floor is gritty, it’s not nearly as dark as I need it to be, but inside the shelter is a whole world better than outside it.
“Thank you.” I sigh.
“Don’t thank me, woman.”
His response is unexpectedly gruff. I crack open one eye to see him.
“That word means something more here, doesn’t it?” I ask. “When Hagan called Christiana woman, she nearly tore his head off. What does it mean?”
A wonky and unexpected smile softens Nathaniel’s face before he slides into the space beside me, pulling the final table over the gap at our feet, an awkward task.
“It means mine,” he says, lying down beside me. Not touching. “You need to sleep now, Aura.”
The beating sun made me feel like I was going to pass out—all I could think about was getting inside the shelter and surviving the glare.
Now that I’m safe, all of my questions resurface.
I follow the contours of Nathaniel’s face, his shoulders, muscles, the dirt clinging to the droplets of sweat dripping down his skin. He turns away from me, a resolute movement, seeming determined to shut down all conversation. All it does is remind me of the crisscross of scars on his shoulders, along with the remains of the symbols inked beneath the scars.
“Who are you?” I whisper.
“A traitor,” he says. “A human who fell in love with a fae.”
My eyes widen as heartache fills my chest. I remember the way his people looked at him when my identity was revealed. They were shocked. Confused. The foundations had shifted beneath them. They didn’t understand why he hadn’t killed me.
I slide toward him, slipping my arm around his waist and pressing up against his back. “I’m a traitor too.”
He turns in my arms, allowing me to hook my leg around his hip and nestle my head in the crook of his arm. He strokes my back before he tips my chin. “We have the same wounds again.”
Yesterday, he and I ended up with nearly identical cuts on our left arms from wounds sustained during different battles. Today, we both have bruised ribs in nearly identical places—again, sustained during different battles and for different reasons. Nathaniel’s back is bruised because of his charge into the tree. Mine is bruised because of the arrows that hit me and because Tanner kicked me when he forced me to become acquainted with the dirt. Both of our chins and chests are cut.
“I don’t have this one,” I whisper, hovering my palm above the cut on his forehead.
He gives me another wonky smile. “I won’t allow this one to happen to you.”
My lips find his, brushing the shape of his skin. “Nathaniel, please tell me about your name. I know Cyrian released the spell that was stopping you from speaking it. I felt the dark magic lift.”
He stiffens in my arms, but I clasp him tightly, refusing to let him go. “Yesterday, you said that if you told me who you are, I wouldn’t trust you. But that was then. This is now.”
He reaches out to brush the hair from my temple, his thumb grazing my cheek, but his lips are drawn into an unforgiving line, merciless. It’s the same way he looked at me when he first saw me.
“To answer that question is to tell you all the things I don’t want you to know about me. All the answers you want, but none of what you need.”
“Who are you to say what I need?” I ask, trying to quell the frustration rising inside me. “You’ve known me for a day and a half. You’ve barely scratched the surface.”
“You’re right.” He nods, but it’s a suddenly angry movement. “There’s so much more I want to know about you, so much more I need, but there’s no time. I need a lifetime to understand your thoughts and your heart. But I don’t have it. All I have is now. I don’t want to lose you in the few hours I have left.”
I study his face, the hard lines of his jaw, his broad shoulders, bare arms corded with muscles, and the way his dark hair falls across his cheeks. Even lying in the dirt with me, I’m reminded that he’s dangerous. He beat every hunter who came after him today. But the only person he didn’t beat is the man who is going to fight him this evening.
A sudden shiver runs down my spine. “Is Hagan capable of killing you?”
“We trained side by side. He knows every move and strategy I do. He knows my
weaknesses like I know his.”
Until now, I haven’t once considered the possibility that Hagan will kill Nathaniel today. Suddenly, sleep is the last thing I need. The next hours with Nathaniel may be the most important hours of my remaining life.
I need answers and I’m not prepared to wait any longer.
I tighten my arm around his waist and clamp my upper leg across his hips, not caring about the dirt and sweat. His arm flexes around me, dragging me even closer, his hand resting flat against my spine.
“Aura?”
The sound of his voice and the nearness of his body trigger every need inside me, but I refuse to be distracted.
I tilt my head back to meet his eyes.
“Tell me,” I whisper. “Everything.”
Nathaniel strokes the hair from my cheek, his fingertips lingering on the shape of my neck. I don’t think he’s going to speak, but then he says, “My true name… is Exalted.”
I tip my head a little, pursing my lips in thought. Human names represent status and occupation, so… “Exalted means…?”
He is very quiet and still. “Highest.”
“I don’t understand.”
His fingertips rest on my neck lightly. Precariously. “To be the highest is to be above everyone else.”
I give a little laugh because what he said is obvious, but he still hasn’t answered the riddle of his identity. “Higher even than the King?”
Nathaniel’s speech is careful, cautious. He watches my face as he speaks. “Cyrian wasn’t born into the royal line. He was my father’s Champion. When my father died, Cyrian became the caretaker of the throne until I was old enough to—”
“Stop.” I draw back from him. Fear rises like a tide inside me. My speech is as stilted as his was calm. “Your father was the King.”
“He was.”
My heartbeat slows, but it’s like the pause before a storm begins to rage. “You’re telling me that Cyrian stole the throne. That you’re the rightful heir.” My heart pounds hard inside my chest. “You’re the Fell King?”
“I am.”
Chapter 24
Fear. Too much fear rises inside me.
When Nathaniel came for me, he planned to convince me to help him overthrow Cyrian. Now I know that means he wanted me to help return his Kingdom to him.
But before he could carry through, I invoked the Law of Champions.
Now, the fight between us is for control of both lands.
We’re fighting on behalf of our monarchs, but if Nathaniel is the true King of the Fell Kingdom, then that means…
I’m frozen in his arms. “You have everything to gain from my death.”
He starts to speak, but the darkened space spins around me and I can’t stop talking, can’t find my foundations. They’ve been ripped out from beneath me. “Even if you win for Cyrian, he doesn’t have the right to rule. You can claim your birthright. If you kill me, you will have power over everything—”
“I don’t want power over everything!” His response is loud enough to break through the buzz in my ears. “I just want freedom for my people. I want them to wake up to a day without fear, to know that they’re cared for and safe from harm.”
His arms tighten around me, but I struggle against him, trying to get free. “You need me to die.”
“No—”
“That only happens if I die!” I scream, wrenching against him. “You only get justice for your people if I’m dead. That’s the only way.”
“I don’t want—”
“Don’t want what, Nathaniel? Don’t want me to die?” Tears leak down my cheeks. I sense them slide across the marks Nathaniel made with the wedding ink—golden wedding ink, the kind a king would use to mark his queen. “That’s a fool’s wish.”
He opens his arms, letting me go.
I bang up against the other side of the shelter so hard that I nearly topple the table above us. A beam of sunlight streams in and I edge away from it.
The burn across my skin draws another thought to my mind. A horrible, clawing, heartbreaking thought. “Did you make me fall in love with you so I would choose to die instead of fighting you?”
His eyes widen. Pure shock. “You know I didn’t. Hating you would be far easier. If I hated you, I would have killed you already.”
“But you wouldn’t.” A laugh tears out of me. Cruel. I don’t even sound like myself. “You need my help to overthrow Cyrian first. Then you can kill me.”
Nathaniel is completely frozen opposite me, not even a breath. Then he sucks in air, and his chest rises and falls far too fast, his inhalations hitching as if he’s in pain. He suddenly presses his palm against the location of his heart. “I made you a promise, Aura. I promised to protect you—”
“And to fight me on the final day.”
“I won’t let you die! You’re my wife—”
“Then let’s do something about that.” My fingers rub in the dirt beside me, gritty and harsh. I lurch into a sitting position and slap the granules against my face, rubbing as hard as I can against the symbol he drew on me, scratching as deep as I can into it.
The pain barely registers.
I’m angry. And afraid. More afraid than I’ve ever been.
When I thought that Cyrian was the rightful King, I could balance out the future in my mind. Imatra and Cyrian are both cruel and reckless with their power in different ways. Neither would make a peaceful ruler of both lands. But Nathaniel… his people love him, respect him, trust him. Maybe a little less right now, but they will come to trust him again. He would treat them with fairness and justice.
He would make a good King.
Even for the fae. He may not love them like he loves the humans, but he would treat them fairly.
Tears fall down my cheeks because I know… in my heart… that Nathaniel has to live and I have to die.
My hands are shaking. My face hurts. I’ve rubbed too hard across my temple and now I’m bleeding.
“There,” I say, my voice catching. “Now we have the same wound.”
He didn’t try to stop me, but I sense the storm in his emotions. He withdraws into the other side of the shelter. The light on my side is brighter now that I displaced the table.
“You’re breaking my heart, Aura.”
I rotate toward the wall before my tears turn the dirt to mud. “Better to break now than when you have to kill me.”
The light from above me glints in my eyes. It reminds me of the glow inside Nathaniel’s chest when I looked into his heart.
The sun will carve a path toward the horizon soon. Then I’ll be strong again.
I’m sure I won’t be able to sleep, but emotional exhaustion has drained me. Somehow, my eyes close and I welcome the deep oblivion.
Darkness presses in around me. The cold expanse in which I sleep squeezes my chest, freezing me in the nothing where I belong. I’m dreaming. I know I’m dreaming, but even in the dream, it feels so real.
Pain bursts inside my mind, dark light tearing through the nothing and curling around me like a hook, ripping through my chest, my body, dragging me down where I don’t belong. I drop like a stone, burning through the cold expanse, unable to fight back, screaming as I fall.
I hit solid ground and the world explodes around me. Bright white light tears across my vision, expanding my senses, rippling outward in waves so massive, it’s like the world is an ocean and I am a storm crashing across its surface.
A woman runs within the wash, racing toward me, a crimson glow around her silhouette so bright that it obscures her face.
She carries a blade in her hand.
When she drops to her knees, I realize that I’m lying on the ground and the ripples rolling across the world are spreading across the sky above me.
Her dagger glints as she raises it, sharp, curved, its target certain: my chest.
I can’t fight. Can’t breathe. Can’t move.
An angry, golden light grows behind her, a male form holding a swinging blade strong
enough to cleave off her head. It carves a space through the wash toward her neck, the symbol etched into it burning into me: the sun and the moon.
He’s too late.
The woman’s hands are already splattered with my blood.
I wake up screaming, my cries rebounding off the surface of the overturned table that I’m facing. My palms are pressed flat against it and my power blasts it across the room, shattering wood, sending shards spiraling into the air. The two tables that lie above me drop without the support beneath them. My reflexes kick in and I roll backward into the safe space—the triangle that the fallen tables now form.
Nathaniel’s arms clamp around me the moment I hit his body in a full-length collision, my back pressing to his front.
My heart is pounding—a wild thud—but it’s still beating. It hasn’t been ripped out of me. The dream wasn’t real. Even though the man’s blade really does exist. It’s the only weapon Imatra ever seemed afraid of when she saw it in Nathaniel’s hands yesterday. His father’s halberd.
Outside our shelter, everything is quiet again. Dark too, telling me that night has fallen. The air is much cooler, drifting through the cracks in the shelter and easing the heat. My armor and boots are now outside the shelter, since the tabletops have fallen short of their location. The cold trickle of power through my chest means the moon will dominate the sky very soon.
“Aura?” Nathaniel asks.
“Your father was there when I woke up fifteen years ago,” I say, drawing the only conclusions I can from the dream, spilling my thoughts more quickly than I probably should. “Imatra wanted to kill me, but he wanted to kill her.”
Nathaniel doesn’t say anything. He promised to always tell me the truth and I’m slowly learning that means sometimes he will choose silence rather than lie to me.
“What now, Aura?”
He asked me the same question this morning. In answer, I placed my hand in his and followed him into the dark, but I won’t do that again.
“Now I will keep you alive,” I say, preparing to shimmy out of the small space.
