"This is a job for an assassin," he agrees.
Approval acquired. That was easier than I thought. "We're leaving tonight."
"Rennalya, you will do no such thing. I have ten that work for me."
Scrap that, approvalnotacquired. I knew this was coming. Nothing is ever simple with him. "Rexxan, you cannot be serious. This job was designed for me and Stellan. This is the perfect job for us. I've been to this exact summit! I know a way up!"
"You will not risk your life for this. This is what they want, Renna. To have the Stone and the Sorceress just fall into their hands."
"This is so much bigger than that. This is about our responsibility as leaders to do the best thing for the people. The best thing is putting the best people forward for the job. I've done this for a living since I was a child!"
"Stellan and Onyx can go."
"While I stay here and look pretty, my lord?"
He pinches the bridge of his nose. "I am not losing you now."
"You won't. I'll get the stone and come back. Easy." That won't be how it goes, but it's easier to pretend than to face the truth right now.
He laughs in disbelief. "Easy?" I can feel waves of frustration emanating from his skin, the air is rich with it. I’m seeing him fight a losing battle with his own thoughts. "I don't want this."
I walk around to his side of the desk and straddle him in his chair. When I rest my head on his chest, the atmosphere in the room quickly switches from tense to serene. "I'll come back to you," I whisper, listening to his slow heartbeat.
"You don't know that," he replies, as I revel in the deep vibration of his voice through his muscular chest. It hits me then. When we were in Espan's Kingdom, I accidentally referred to Espan's palace as my home. Here, I call Rexxan's palace my home. It's not the palaces. It's wherever Rexxan is.
He has become my home. I’m not sure I could pinpoint the moment that this happened to me, but it did. He is where I want to be at the end of my day. I never thought I'd find something like that. "Rexxan...I…I’ll do this mission, and when I get back, I'll be yours for the rest of my life."
He pulls away, sensing the weight of my words. "You'll marry me?"
"If you actually propose. And I won't go through with the wedding until we've rewritten the laws together." This is utter madness. Onyx and Stellan are going to faint. I can't believe it either, but somehow, I know deep down that I've never been loved like this, and that I never will love like this again. I can’t see my life without Rexxan in it.
A wave of emotion hits me and I know that I have to prepare to never see him again. I'd rather die trying to save the world than not try at all. I'd rather die engaged to Rexxan than not. I'd rather die knowing I gave our relationship my all.
"I have to do this," I whisper, tears in my eyes as he tenderly holds my face in his hands. "I have to go. Thishasto be me."
He nods, tears rimming his eyes for the first time since I'd met him, and I know that deep down he knows it too. He places the gentlest of kisses on my lips, running his thumbs beneath my eyes to wipe the tears.
Chapter34
‘Love.’ (Renna)
Despite the gravity of the task I must carry out, I know that it is Rexxan who will have the harder job.
He doesn't like the idea of me feeling proud of him, but I am. Healing tents and makeshift shelters line the edge of the floodwater, ready to treat anyone who washes up, regardless of who they are or where they're from. Whilst I am travelling with Stellan and Onyx, he will be on that newly-formed riverbed sorting bodies between dead and alive with everyone looking to him for guidance, all whilst hoping his son isn't one of the bodies. I don't know how he doesn't crumble under the weight of it all.
Stellan, Onyx, and I are ready to leave for the Silver Mountain to hunt for Kelen, once Rexxan has shown me whatever it is he says he needs to show me. He takes me down winding stone stairs underground, putting a rusty key into an equally rusty lock, and by the creaky protests of the door, I suspect this is a room that hasn't been entered for many years.
Underground in Rexxan’s palace is a strange place. Upstairs, every single room is flooded with plants and trees and natural wood. Half the rooms have birds and butterflies overhead. Downstairs, the walls are cold stone. No light, no green leaves, no sound. It’s eerie, like there are lost secrets down here that no life should touch.
He illuminates a dusty lamp, the orange light skating along cobwebs on the ceiling. Hundreds of rectangles wrapped in dusty beige linen surround us. They all look the same, but he picks one out with clear purpose, like he could never forget which one he is looking for. It is wrapped in a chain with a lock that seems far too secure for just a bundle of cloth. "What is it?"
"Painting," he says, through gritted teeth, and I sense his burns are making it hard to talk.
"Rexxan, don't do this if it's putting you in pain."
"Needs to be done,” he grumbles, putting an oddly shaped key in the aged, rusty chain.
"Did you paint it?"
