"I don't know," he says. "This—you—have thrown my plans in disarray. I can't very well bargain and barter a woman I'm falling in love with, can I?"
"Love. That's a powerful word." I choose my own words carefully, as my heart beats too hard in my chest.
He shifts so that we are looking each other in the eyes. "Am I wrong? Did you not feel what I feel?"
I sigh, because no, he's not wrong, and it scares the hell out of me.
He grins. "I thought so."
"That still doesn't answer my question. What now?"
"Now," he says as he brings my fingers to his lips to kiss. "Now, we go back to Stonehill and find out what happened to the Midnight Star and your brother."
Chapter 13
REFORGED
"I've got a sword and a very angry wolf. That will have to be enough. Now I just need a plan."
—Arianna Spero
In the great hall of the Pleasure Palace, seated on a lounge by a fire, Es sips a mug of hot cocoa as Pete sits next to her reading something he found in the library. I tuck my feet under me and curl into the corner of the lounge, thinking. Yami sleeps around my neck, exhausted from the recent events. He has been moodier of late, and I think he remembers the destruction he caused. Soldiers managed to save some of the grove. Three trees, they told me. The rest burned and died.
I haven’t trained since then. I haven’t done much of anything.
A servant girl draped in silk comes by and hands me a hot drink and a plate of candied fruits and breaded meats. I thank her and set the food on the table next me, but I hold onto the drink. The warmth helps dispel the chill in my body, so I sip at it without tasting anything.
"You should eat, darlin'," Es says. "You look pale as a ghost."
To appease her I pick up a honey-glazed strawberry and take a bite, but that's all I can manage. "I'm not hungry."
"It wasn't your fault," she says. "And we're fine."
"People are hurt. Buildings ruined. The grove gone. And it was my fault. Varis warned me, but I didn't listen."
We're interrupted by a voice coming from the hall. "Where is she? Is she injured?"
I set my drink down and stand, a smile coming to my lips for the first time in awhile.
Fen runs to me and wraps me in his strong, warm arms. "We heard the news. A dragon laying ruin to the city? What happened?"
I quickly explain what I did and the harm I caused.
Then Dean walks in. "The people will rebuild. And the grove…" he turns away, and I see he is devastated by what I did. "We will plant more trees. It will take centuries, but eventually, the grove will be restored."
I reluctantly pull away from Fen and hug Dean, whispering in his ear. "I am so sorry. If I could change things, I would."
He smiles briefly, then leaves me to sit down and drink wine.
"What? No hug for me?"
That voice…
"Asher!"
He stands in the doorway, his arms spread out and a big grin on his face. I run forward and embrace my second favorite prince.
He smiles and pets Yami. "I see you've taken to setting the world on fire more literally these days?"
I scowl at him. "It's not funny. But yes."
"We've just come from Stonehill," Fen says. "It's worse than we could have imagined."
I find that hard to believe, until he describes what they saw.
Asher leans against the wall, studying his perfectly manicured nails. "I can't tell you how relieved we were to hear of Yami in full form. We're going to need him in the coming battle."
"That's not going to work," I say, my chest tightening. "I can't control the power."
"Then don't," Asher says. "Unleash him and let him win this war for us."
"The innocent will suffer," I whisper, ashamed. "Too many will die."
"There are no innocents in war," Asher says.
He’s darker than usual, more anger behind his eyes. But I haven’t seen him in nearly a month. Who knows what he endured.
Fen looks down at me, squeezing my shoulder. "I do not presume to know what it does to you to summon such power. But you didn't see what we saw. The torture. The suffering. The deaths. If there is a way to stop Levi from spreading his darkness to the rest of Inferna and beyond, we must take it."
I can see the pain in his eyes, at having witnessed what he did— at having to ask me to do something he knows causes me hurt—and part of me breaks. "I can't… " I step away from him and look at all of them. "I can't decide this right now. I must think on it."
I walk away before any of them can respond, my whole body alert to someone reaching to stop me. But none do. They allow me the time, and for that I am grateful.
The moons are still high when I exit the palace, and a gentle breeze carries the smell of fire and soot on the air. And worse, burning flesh. Tents have been erected in the palace square, and they are quickly filling with burn victims in need of treatment. My illusion should make me anonymous to anyone who would otherwise recognize the princess, but even then, how many people really could? With no technology, no televisions and photographs and smart phones capturing every moment and face on film, these people live in oblivion. They know of royalty, but don’t know what they look like half the time. And if they were to see them at all it would be from a great distance, where they are but well-dressed specks on the horizon.