A Forbidden Fate (A Forbidden Fate Series Book 1)

by Kaven Hirning

He looks at me in the same way he once gazed at the rare sparrow in the aviary. The prize that carefully selected him. Something rare.

Taking in every inch of me, he slides in and out, both raw and graceful, as if I were made for him and him alone.

His blue eyes burn above me, and I see a gold-laced trail of sparks shoot across his irises. The sky fires that Lachlan ignited for Sera pale in comparison to the explosions building in me.

They could have been a strong, unmovable tree, but they will never have the chance to bloom.

“If I never see the castle in the trees, my parents, my people, or my friends again. If I die as a traitor at my father's hands because—all because I brought you here, to live and be happy, to be with him, I’d do it again. A hundred times over. For you.”

“Knowledge is deemed dangerous by the wicked. They don’t want those beneath them to learn too much because wisdom threatens power.”

“I think I know a way you and Idalia can break the curse.”

“Shut up, Idalia! I’m trying to tell you that we can break this curse!”

Go to him. Find him now.

“If we find the Woman of the Woods and discover that she can’t help us, I won’t care,” he says gently. “We would’ve tried everything, and we would’ve tried together. That’s all that matters to me.”

“What about us?” I ask quietly, somehow feeling both embarrassed and frightened. I sense his hand under my chin, tilting it up to meet his stare.

“Little Sparrow,” he muses with a gleam in his eyes. “You needn’t worry when it comes to us. I’ll take care of you. Whether it’s a malevolent mist that comes after you or a bad day where all you need is to laugh, I’ll be there. I’ll be whatever it is you need me to be.”

“My fate has already been chosen for me, Idalia. The day I laid eyes on you, it was sealed, and I was yours. Wholly and true. I don’t need to touch you to know that I love—” His hand drops to his side, and he lets out a shaky laugh. “You also have to choose me,” he continues. “I’m not the only one who’ll sacrifice. You’ll never feel an intimate touch or be able to have children. We both must consider the price we’re willing to pay if this doesn’t work.”

“I do,” he cuts in from behind me. “I’m starting to believe it’s worth every gods damn flame, every crumbling stone, and rotting vine.”

“Idalia, I haven’t been able to sleep in these last few days. I’m kept awake by the thought of you, of your skin. Jealous of the hair that drapes over your shoulders. Envious of the wind and how often it wraps itself around you. I would choose death— gladly choose death—if only to touch you. Just once. To hold your cheek. And trace your lips. To drag my tongue over every single part of you. Because if you really want to know what I believe, it’s that a life of being robbed of your skin against mine for even a second longer is a fate far worse than death. To not have you by my side, a misery far worse than the grave.”

To be with him is to die. But to be without him is no way to live.

“I’m prepared to lose my life in that Wood as long as you’re by my side. It’s better to die together than to live apart.”

“I can sleep while you wash up. Unless, of course, you’d rather me watch you.”

She hovers above the river in a watery form.

Mufasa?

“She can be anyone; she can be anywhere!” Or, more often: “She will devour them all, and then nothing can stop her from tearing our world apart.”

“The golden ring is fading; the world will be swallowed whole.”

“And the thing is,” I whisper at the sky. “That I’d rather spend the remainder of my life hoping, begging, and dreaming of the day I could touch you than live a moment, even a moment, without you here with me. Close enough to risk the world.”