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“Every brutal act is born of love.”
She is the single most destructive thing I have ever desired, and yet, it is the diamond on her finger that will destroy me.
I can’t fathom drowning if she is not the anchor I’m sinking with.
I would spend the rest of my days making her flower crowns if she wanted to be a queen. My queen. Not Kitt’s. Not Ilya’s. Mine.
“So much as breathe on her again,” I snarl, “and I’ll ensure it’s the last time you ever do.”
“I will be the one to ensure that the next breath you take to insult me, or my people, will be the very last one you ever taste. And it will be me, an Ordinary, that ends your Elite life.”
It was her I was meant to adore in this world and crawl to in the one after.
“I don’t need you to fight my battles.” “Oh, darling,” I murmur, “I know you don’t. But if I am to be your Enforcer, then you better get used to it.”
“I am no one’s queen.” “Is that so?”
“Then you have no idea how much power you...
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“So be my weakness, then.”
“I’m too selfish to let you go so easily.”
But I suppose violence is one of your love languages.”
Those blue eyes crash into mine like a wave, along with the sudden realization that I’ve been nearly deprived of drowning in them since our arrival to the castle.
“We both know it will take more than a locked door to keep me from you.”
From the reminder of my fate. I am betrothed to the king, and yet, my heart beats for his brother.
“So bow at my feet with a sneer, if you must. I won’t see it with your face to the ground.”
Pae, let me force every person in this kingdom to their knees for you.”
“Where else would I be?” “Your own room, maybe?” “My room doesn’t have you in it.”
I realize how happily I’d live the rest of my life at the end of a blade. So long as she is the one holding it.
Only, it does not matter that every beat of my heart belongs to her. Because she does not belong to me.
“If you look like hell,” he whispers with a sly grin, “then I’m fortunate to be going there.”
“I don’t want to gain power if it means I lose myself in the process.”
“I would lose my life for you before finding something else worth living for.”
“You are my inevitable. In life and in death.”
But I am no stranger to drowning. I’ve been doing just that since the day I looked into her ocean eyes.
“You are forever my distraction, darling.”
Nothing and no one has ever devastated me more. Not the sand, the sea, the slow brush of Death’s hand. Because maybe, just maybe, he is the most ruinous thing of them all.
“Do you ever wonder if there is anything else out there?” I ask, my words nearly snatched away by the wind’s cold fist. Kai flips to another page. “Well, other than the myths?” He shrugs. “I’m not sure.” “The myths?” His brows lift. “Have you never heard of Astrum? The birthplace of shadows and the death of a great love?”
I will gladly drown, gladly burn, gladly fall into those blue eyes until the day she looks at me for the last time.
“I promised to save your life again and again. And I will, whether you allow me to stay in it or not.”
I have no idea how to speak to a queen, let alone be one.”
“Death himself couldn’t drag me from you.”
“Don’t fear power. Wield it. Perhaps even let it control you.”
“Being an Ordinary is not what makes you weak. It’s your heart.”
“I want to hide with you beneath the willow tree. You are the secret I will spend the rest of my life keeping.”
She looks over at me then, and I remember just how much I missed her doing something as simple as acknowledging my existence.
Now, please entertain me, darling. I’m bored. What am I to do if not count your freckles?
My duty may be to the king, but my heart, Pae, is wherever you are. It is in the palm of your hands, the pad of your thumb. So if you leave, I will follow. If you stay, I will bow. Because there has never been a moment when you did not own the only piece of me that mattered—loving you made me matter. And I ache to be full again.
I am more than his shadow. I am a moth to his flame.
“Paedyn, I love you. Like nothing else before, I love you. And I’ve been waiting to tell you since I realized your eyes are my favorite color and your freckles the only constellation worth looking at. I could lie—say that you’ve stolen my every thought and heartbeat like the thief you are, but all of me was already yours. Pae, you are my inevitable.”
“You are my inevitable. In death, and in love.”
“You don’t need a blade. I would bleed if only you asked.”
“A king left his mark upon my heart, and now, I will leave mine across his kingdom.”
He has always been a prince, always a puppet for power or instrument of Death. But just as constant and formidably fierce, he has been my home.
Peace is the place he resides, and passion is a word I only understand when I look into his eyes. He is the freedom I cannot grasp.
“No part of you will go unloved.”
“You are my forever.” Shadow and Flame. Formidably inevitable. “Forever my undoing.”
“I love you, Pae.” I say this sternly, unforgivingly. “And I am honored to get the chance to.”
“There is nothing I regret more than not having the time with you.”
