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These are not the eyes I search for in every crowd. Not the eyes that rake over me with a reverence I revel in. Not the eyes that have counted every freckle dotting my nose, every shiver of my body.
Damn the pretending. Damn the hiding. Damn everything but him and us and this moment where I need him. But he’s nowhere to be found. And for the first time since stealing those silvers from him on Loot Alley, I feel utterly alone.
I watch Paedyn through the gaps of a gawking crowd, just as I will for the rest of my life. I’ll be forced to spend my days at her service but never at her side. In her shadow but never truly seen. In love with a girl I’d have bowed to long before she became my queen.
I’ve been nothing but willing when it comes to drowning in those ocean eyes. But now, I can’t fathom drowning if she is not the anchor I’m sinking with.
Why couldn’t we have just stayed in that field of poppies? 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.
My ears ring in the sudden silence smothering the throne room. Every eye is pinned on her, every jaw slackened by her words. My future queen has just made her first decree.
“I am no one’s queen.” “Is that so?” My fingers find her cheek before trailing down the smooth slope of her nose. “Then you have no idea how much power you hold over me.”
refuse to let this be her fate, and yet, fear twines around me, tightening my chest even as I tease her. Because if she truly becomes Kitt’s, I will spend the rest of my life mourning her.
“You’re not supposed to touch me at all.” “But you could command me to,” I drawl. “Then I’d simply be following an order.” Her laugh is breathy, and I memorize the sound. Her arms twine around my neck, and I wonder if she will hold him like this. Her nose nudges mine, and I silently beg that she will never flick another’s. Her lips have only just brushed mine
The smile she gives me is far slyer than I thought her capable. “Yes, I do recall you informing me how you’d crawled out of garbage the day we first met.”
Hell, she is my Silver Savior. And hating her is not as simple as it may seem. But for me, it is not loving her that has proven to be difficult.
“I don’t want this to come between us,”
Pff fuck you
My heart bangs against my chest, beating for her, beating for every moment we may never get to spend together.
And when words finally spill from her lips, she might as well have plunged a dagger into my back like she promised so long ago.
My gaze climbs from the expanse of dark wood until it lands on… Comfort. Relief. Him.
“Darling, I’d be in this bed beside you if my brother hadn’t slipped a ring onto your finger.” His mouth hovers dangerously close to my own.
Oh God
“A butter knife? Really?” “It’s all I have at the moment,” I grumble. “Well, that just won’t do.” He flicks my nose lightly. “What if someone had broken into your rooms?” I can’t help the laugh that bubbles out of me.
His words are a whisper against my lips. “You are devastating, Pae.”
“Not every time.” I shift, slipping off his chest to sit beside him. “Not when I’m with you.” He props himself up on an elbow, tugging at my tank until I’m leaning down toward him. “Then I’ll never leave your side.” I give him a look. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.” “It’s not promises I care to keep—it’s you.” His words never fail to have my stomach flipping, heart fluttering, lips falling silent. So, I flick the tip of his nose with a soft “You’re quite the poet, Prince.”
“So, I’ve had a lot of practice climbing up chimneys, even when I hate small spaces.” I shoot a pointed look at Kai. “Which is why I didn’t burn to death when you lit my house on fire.” “My search had to be thorough, darling,” he muses. “Don’t take it too personally.”
DARLING!!!
Those eyes are like honey. So similar to her sweet gaze. Suddenly, it’s Adena dying before me all over again. And all over again, I cannot save her.
“Dammit, Pae. You never follow orders, do you?” His voice is harsh, but I hear the tinge of sorrow lacing every word.
I love how he's always there
“But it has been years since the people have heard about me. Seen me. For all they know, I died shortly after giving birth to Kitt.”
Okay. Iris is Kitt's mother and she never died... Then who is she giving birth to now? What happened to her? Is she secret so that people won't hurt her to get to the king?
He watches me now, an ache in his gaze that mirrors my own. I want nothing more than to be held by him, enveloped in the comfort of his arms. He is a weakness I am not supposed to indulge in. Not in this life, at least.
“If you want me to fight you, I won’t, Paedyn. I told you in that field of poppies how I would never do that again. That when I lay a hand on you, it would only ever be in a caress.” Raindrops drip from his lashes, but he doesn’t dare blink as he murmurs, “And I plan to keep that vow.” A long moment passes between us, in which I attempt to fathom just how much he cares for me. And nothing has ever felt so right, vowing to never fight the Enforcer again.
My chest is hurting
“Paedyn.” I tip my forehead against hers, aching to say what she is so scared of. In that field of poppies, I told her how impossible it was to stop myself from falling in love with her. And yet, the three damning words have yet to fall from my lips. I love you.
It’s as though she is whole again in my arms, reunited with the ghost of her father and held in the arms of her Enforcer. And when she kisses me, long and fierce, 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.
Now, the Enforcer is something far more devastating than a lover, yet we have never been further apart. Keeping my distance from him is a Trial of its own. It is cruel, not being able to call him mine after everything we’ve endured.
Perhaps in another life, I am brave enough to confess that I love him. Perhaps in another life, I learn to love him from afar. And that is the most fearless thing of them all.
I have been unwanted in this kingdom from the moment I was born. But not to the man who found me on his doorstep after losing a wife and child of his own. I became his everything. And maybe that is all you need to earn the title of “father.”
I follow the beam’s path, my heart stuttering at what lies glinting within it. I drop to my knees beside the scattered silver strands, eyes wide as I take in the pieces of a girl I left behind. Blood coats each sliver of severed hair, dulling the silver braid beneath. Tears prick my eyes for the version of me that still lingers in this cave where Kai held the broken shards of me together.
She found her hair!?!?!
Bats—hundreds of them.
Ewwwwwww
I slice wildly through the air, managing to hit several of the bloodthirsty beasts.
All the diseases they carry.... Ugh
Perhaps the king really does know how tragically in love I am with his betrothed. Perhaps he is as well.
No one loves her like you do, Kai.
“If I don’t marry her, I have no choice but to kill her.” Kitt’s words haunt my thoughts, dash my hopes.
Fucking moron Kitt
Though, it’s comforting to know that she doesn’t need my help—the Silver Savior has made that abundantly clear since the day she earned the title. And yet, one day I hope she does. Just to show her the extent of what I’m willing to do if only she asks.
“I thought I was broken after losing Ava,” she continues softly. “But it seems that the loss of your father will be the death of me.”
Ugh... Love makes you crazy lady
“He never really was much of a father to me,” I state. “So, no, I can’t say I was terribly grieved by his death.” The words are harsh and laced with an anger I rarely let myself feel for him anymore.
Totally valid. PoS Father. PoS in general.
“Kai,” she murmurs, suddenly serious. “She is your brother’s.”
I REFUSE
In return, I remind her that Paedyn Gray has been my weakness since that very first dinner before the Purging Trials.
Adena’s warmth returns shyly, as though her very memory does not recognize the creature I’ve become. I’m shaking, every part of me trembling in fear of what I’ve done. In fear of myself.
Adena’s light, however dim, is returning to my soul. I am alive. I, an Ordinary, survived a Trial. Again.
I will her to walk through those doors. If not for this kingdom, then for me. I need her to come back to me.
She did!!! For you.
No one dares speak, dares move beneath her commanding stare. But when that blood-splattered face turns in my direction, I nearly smile. This formidability is not unfamiliar to me. I’ve seen it within her since the moment she saved my life. Her eyes meet mine, and it feels like relief.
I push slowly through the crowd, my gaze unable to stray from such eminence. But watching isn’t nearly enough. I could fall to my knees, beg to be the only one worthy of witnessing her.
“Don’t steal her away from him when they finally get a moment together.”
What do you mean "finally"? As if! Bullshit. Shut up. #annoyedasf
“You look like someone who has just done the impossible,” he murmurs, face close. I smile, tasting blood on my cracked lips. “So I look like hell?” “If you look like hell,” he whispers with a sly grin, “then I’m fortunate to be going there.”
Dead
“Look at me, Kai. Look at what you chose to lose yourself to. I may have seemed strong in that throne room, but I will always be an impostor among the truly powerful.”
Both of my hands are cupping his face now. “I worry about you, Malakai.” The sound of his full name has those gray eyes fluttering closed. “If I die—” “Stop.” “If I die,” I repeat sternly, “I need you to find something else worth losing yourself to. I won’t let my impending death be yours as well.”
“I would lose my life for you before finding something else worth living for.” His fingers weave into my hair, slide along the back of my neck. “You are my inevitable. In life and in death.”
