“I didn’t leave, princess. I was punished. For trying to help you.”
Sudden images came to the forefront of her mind. “You flew me out of the castle. I begged you to get me away from there, and you did.”
“But once you were away, you cried for your sister.”
“I was afraid of what our father would do to her if I wasn’t there for him to torment.” Liv couldn’t shake the sensation of his wings around her body. She missed it, and she could only imagine the pain he suffered daily with their permanent loss. “I learned early on that she couldn’t dull her fear and emotions the way I could. But there were ways to protect her. Most of the time, he ignored her. I provoked him so that he would. She found ways to hide from him, but I worried he wouldn’t be satisfied with that. He would search her out and make her life a living hell. I could never have been happy knowing she suffered.”
He loosened his hold on her hands, and she let them drop to her side. He rubbed a heavy hand down his face and planted the other on his hip. “I flew you back, and your father was waiting for us. The minute you were inside, he turned on me with a vengeance. My wings were chopped from my body, causing the most excruciating pain I’ve ever experienced, and he left me to die, broken and bleeding on the ground. A fellow slave named Thelatan collected me and tended to my wounds.” She felt the strength it took him not to let his emotion show in the retelling, but he took heavy breaths through his nose a few times before he said, “I wanted to die. In those days, as I lay there, in a fitful fever, Thelatan convinced me that I had to live. I had to stay alive so that I could make Grawl pay. He instilled a hatred for the Strongwills so deep inside me that it gave me an even stronger reason to live. Slowly, I recovered, and Thelatan managed to smuggle me out of the castle, and I traveled by portal through multiple dimensions until an underground community of escaped slaves deep in the Sulfaretta Mountains found me and took me in. There, a group of men raised me to be a warrior, and I vowed that I would make Grawl pay dearly for everything he dared to take from me.”
His eyes burned with fury, and he stared at her with a tangible heat, reminding her why he had taken her in the first place. And yet…
“But you saved me.” His eyebrows dipped together, and his mouth tightened to a thin line. “Just now, you gave me your breath. If you hate me so much, why did you do that?”
Through gritted teeth, he said, “I told you. I need you for leverage. You are my ticket close to him.”
Yet, his adamant response lacked the strength from before. His brows lowered further, showing how conflicted he obviously was.
“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry for my part in the loss of your wings. If I had known…” Her voice broke with the emotion that she struggled to hide. “Even as young as I was, I shouldn’t have used you without thinking about the consequences. I didn’t see you for the beautiful life you were…you are. I am so sorry.”
“Dammit! I don’t want your sorry, Liv! Stop…messing with my mind.”
She watched his retreating back as he stalked away, heading toward the cliffside, far from the water. He mumbled to himself, and she understood that they had more in common than even he knew. Grawl had taken his mother and his very identity. His life had been taken with the snap of her father’s fingers, and he had had no power to stop it then.
But she could help him stop it now.
He grabbed his pack from the ground and called over his shoulder, “Come on! We need to make camp before it gets too dark. Who knows what other bloodthirsty, crazy creatures your sister let into my dimension?”
Her gaze jumped to the water, and she felt the weight of all the liquid she’d inhaled. One minute she was being swung through the air by a slimy, suctioned arm, and the next, shewas coughing up and expelling the water she’d once thought so beautiful. Rise’s panicked expression hovering above her
He’d saved her.
She turned, grabbed her discarded clothing on the ground, and trudged with heavy limbs after him. Each step felt like she had absorbed half the lake.
Maybe he’d saved her for the reason he’d given. She could be used to get him close to her father. Grawl certainly wanted to get his hands on her. But if anything had happened to Liv, she had a sister, one who their father wanted dead just as much. Rise could use Val as leverage just as easily.
By the time she caught up to him, he had stopped at the mouth of a small overhang where water trickled out of a dark cave.
“We’re not staying here, are we?”
“No, but we need to wash out wounds, and you need to dry off and get dressed.”
He seemed to be avoiding looking at her as he spoke, and as she looked down, she finally understood why. If she had once had any secrets, she no longer did. That was for sure. Of course, she’d never been raised to be shy. The coven of witches who had been her teachers and guardians hadn’t had a bit of shame when it came to their bodies. As a matter of fact, shape, size, color, or physique didn’t matter a whit. Worth was based on contribution to the coven. They had nothing to do with what other societies might value, such as looks or beauty. Everyone was beautiful in her own way.
“Here. Take off those…wet…clothes.” He handed her a folded shirt and pants from out of his bag. “I don’t think the pants will fit, but they’ll keep you warm.”
He reached into his bag once more and pulled out some soap, a washrag, and a small jar. “Wash off with this.” He held up thebar of soap and washrag before holding up the jar as he said, “And apply this to your wounds.”
“That sounds great, except my limbs feel fifty pounds too heavy. Lifting my arms alone would be an accomplishment. I might need your help.”
He looked at her as if she had a bug slowly crawling across her face. He shook his head slowly and said, “I don’t think that would be a good idea.”
“Then, my wounds will get infected, and you lose your leverage anyway, after all the trouble you went to in saving me.”
She had only been teasing him, but he motioned her toward him where he waited by the small creek at the mouth of the cave.
“Sit down beside me here.”
He knelt on one knee, setting the jar on the ground. He dipped the soap into the water and began to lather it against the washrag as she settled on the ground beside him, her legs tucked under her. She held out an arm and sucked in a quiet breath as he began to scrub her skin roughly. The rag he used felt like the same texture as the sand beneath her knees and feet. She was sure her face showed the heaviness of his touch, but he wasn’t looking at her directly. His gaze was focused above her head, onto the cave wall behind her.
