Page 113 of Prince of the Sun

Now is the moment. The moment I tell him. I know it is. But even after everything we’ve been through—even after we both sacrificed ourselves for the sake of the other—I can’t. I’m too scared.

His voice grows even softer. “And the other part?”

I gather a fistful of the blanket.

“Quinn.”

“Because of you, you moron,” I say, throwing the blanket back onto the bed. Pain sings through my chest, but I ignore it. “Because you’re ableeding moron. You went against your father’s command, even though you knew the punishment. Even though it meant death. And when I pictured you gone… when I pictured a world without you…” My eyes squeeze shut. I inhale raggedly. I have to force the next words out, because I know my voice will crack around them. “I couldn’t do it, Daerios. I just couldn’t.”

When I finally open my eyes again, Daerios has gone completely still. I’m so used to his restless playfulness—the jokes and jibes, the flirtatious winks—that his stillness unnerves me. His face is blank. He seems to have ceased breathing entirely.

I blink once. “Daerios?”

“There’s something else,” he blurts out. He fidgets, hands twisting in his lap. “Something I didn’t tell you. About how you survived that sword going into your heart.”

“So, itdidgo into my heart.” I edge up further on the pillow. “I knew it. I should be dead, shouldn’t I? So, how am I not? How did I survive?”

When Daerios doesn’t immediately go on, I prod further. “Well?”

“Do you, um…” He clears his throat. “Do you rememberwhen I told you that it’s rare for elves to fall in love? And even more rare to marry, to remain monogamous throughout their entire lifetime?”

“Yes.” I narrow my eyes. “What does that have to do with my miraculous recovery?”

“Well, the thing is…” Daerios raises a hand to ruffle his black hair. His eyes search the corners of the room, looking anywhere but at me. “The thing is, is… um…” He exhales, then says, “When elves fall in love—and I meantrulyin love, not just a passing lust, like, the kind of love that makes you want to spend all of eternity with someone—a connection forms between them and their partner.”

My eyes narrow further. “What kind of connection?

“A life bond.”

“What the hell is that?”

Daerios is practically squirming in his chair now. I’ve never seen him this nervous before. It’s kind of adorable, actually—not that I would tell him that.

“Daerios.”

He glances up at me, then back down at his lap. “A life bond is a magical connection that forms between two mates. It’s a form of protection. A fail-safe. If one mate is injured, the other can channel part of their life-force into the injured mate to help speed along the healing process. It comes at a cost, of course. The mate giving their life force will be significantly weakened, for a time.”

“For a time,” I repeat. For the first time, I register the slight tremble of his shoulders, the quiver in his fingertips. Until now, I thought it was simply nerves. But now—

“Daerios.” My voice lowers to a venomous whisper. “What did you do?”

At last, he looks up, meeting my gaze and holding it. His chin lifts. When he speaks, he echoes my words from before: “I didwhat I had to do.”

I stare at him for a long time. Emotions swim through my body in a chaotic, confusing mixture: gratitude, anger, sadness, fear, concern. And something else, too. Something warm and heavy and glowing, as if I can finally feel the sunlight that lives in my body. Each emotion does battle with the other, trying to fight its way to the surface.

In the end, naturally, anger wins.

Pain be damned, I bend forward and hit Daerios’s shoulder as hard as I can. “Youidiot,” I shout. “Youcomplete.”I hit him again. “Bleeding.” A third time. “Idiot.” I sit up as straight as my injury will allow, ignoring the ache begging me to lie back down. “You were in the middle of a war, and you purposefullyweakenedyourself? Were you raised under a rock? Is your brain made of vaaska? How can someone so brilliant be so fuckingstupid?” I close it out with one last punch to the shoulder, then slump backward, chest heaving.

For a beat, we say nothing. I glare at him with as much poison as I can muster. I wish I could cross my arms. For his part, Daerios peers innocently at me through his eyelashes.

“So…” he says at last. “You aren’t mad, then?”

For a beat, I just stare at him. Take in the hard lines of his jaw, his nose, his neck—softened only by the humor always hiding just beneath. Sometimes as a defense, sometimes as a weapon, sometimes purely to make me smile. To make me feel the tingling warmth that starts in my stomach and travels all the way to the tip of my tongue. I want to hit him again.

Instead, I start to laugh.

The laughter shakes my chest, my pelvis, sending shocks of pain through my body that somehow both hurt and heal at once. Daerios’s eyebrows leap up in pleasant surprise. He lifts one hand, as if to reach for me, then drops it back to his side. Still laughing—and ignoring the tremendous lurch of pain thatshocks through me as I do it—I shoot forward and throw my arms around him. I pull him tight to my body, nestling my head into the crook at his shoulder.