Page 164 of The Reaping Rose

“Well then maybe you should go. I need to get ready for the ceremony.” I tip my chin to the door.

Atlas’s hands fall to his sides. He’s so broad he overwhelms my room. I can’t see past him. I can barely breathe with his scent flooding my senses.

“My sister almost died,” he says finally, ignoring most of what I’ve said as he steps closer. “Do you think it hasn’t crossed my mind how easy it would be if I didn’t have to feel that? If I didn’t have a godsforsaken weakness like her?”

I shrug, feigning indifference.

He takes another step closer, and heat flushes my skin. “But then what’s the point of any of this? What’s the point of even being here if I don’t give a crap about anything?”

I try to stand firm, arms crossed over my chest as he paces the room, not stopping until he’s directly in front of me. Atlas tucks a tight dark curl behind my ear, dragging a finger along the silver-winged cuff that decorates it.

“I’ve spent as much time sharing beds as I’ve spent in battle,” he says, and I hate that it makes my stomach ache. “Not one of them brought me to their doorstep the next day. Not one of them made me feel the need to explain myself. Not one of them meant anything close to you.”

He traces my jaw with his fingers, leaning in and daring to kiss my forehead.

I almost shove him off—punch him for having the audacity to do that. But I’m frozen when his hot lips press to my skin. My eyes flutter, and I breathe him in.

Atlas steps back, but nothing cools this endless burning.

“I just thought you deserved to know what you mean to me, considering what we’re walking into tomorrow.” He turns to leave, and I’m aching to stop him.

My fingers twitch, and I want to shout for him to stop. To stay. My throat burns, but none of it comes out. Silence stretches, and I let him leave. But those eyes—violet-flecked galaxies—stay with me long after the sun sets and my room turns dark. Long after he’s gone.

No one has meant anything close to him either. And that’s why it’s better we stop this now.

Chapter 55

Wilder

When night falls in Quietus, the air changes. Dusk was always my sister’s favorite time of day. She said the sunset reminded her of the start of a storm. Selia found peace in a downpour. She found quiet between the bursts of rolling thunder. She’s the reason I thought to mold my magic into something that looked like lightning, so no one would discover my aether wielding.

I glance out the window at the mountains. Selia and I used to sit at the highest peak, watching the sunset. She’d wait for darkness to fall, while I’d wait for the stars to come alive.

At the first pinprick of light in the obsidian sky, something in my chest would open. As if I knew even then that among the blots of light something was waiting for me. Selia would lie on her back on a mossy boulder, drawing pictures of the constellations. She’d tell stories late into the night while I stared at the dark spots between realms, unknowingly waiting for my mate to find me.

The Kingdom constellation was Selia’s favorite. The night would often shift and change, but those particular stars always hung above the palace. She would trace the outline with her finger and laugh at the thought of me being king someday.

To her, I was her annoying older brother. Overprotective, constantly stopping her from getting into trouble. And yet, in those final years, she slipped through my fingers.

I was too focused on my own responsibilities. On the magic I was having trouble shaping—containing. What would our mother have done with my aether had she known the extent of what I wielded? What destruction would she have demanded?

I ran so far from that fear that I left my sister behind. What she then became was my fault.

Selia should be here tonight, keeping my ego in check like she once promised. But now, she’s gone.

I fasten the buttons on my royal jacket. There’s an emptiness to this room. To the spot at the window where my sister would no doubt be perched, talking my ear off. She would have found something to distract me from the fact that I’m about to accept the weight of my kingdom’s fate on my shoulders.

My gaze pauses where Selia should be sitting on my windowsill. It’s empty.

“Am I interrupting?” Elorie’s voice tests the thread before she steps into the room.

“You’re never interrupting, Starfire.”

I turn as Elorie rounds the corner, dripping in glittering starlight.

Her hair is loose around her shoulders, with a braid wrapping her head like a crown. Small gems are embedded in the dips of her white strands, making them sparkle. Silver starlight silk shimmers with her steps. It hangs off her shoulders, curving like a heart that accentuates her breasts. The fabric melts to her curves. Sheer as it moves over her legs. Like she walked out of a star, and its remnants drip behind her.

At her fingertips, her magic dances. White sparkles glow and flutter up her forearms.