AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I couldn’t save Ellyn; I could only hope she was wily enough to see him for the fiend he was and escape.
Arin left the inn, shrugged the old coat he wore tighter around him, and made his way across the street, avoiding the icy patch Draven had slipped on. He handed over my coat. I shrugged it on, and we both stared into the well in silence.
“I have a plan,” he finally said, looking up, squinting into the sun. “But it means we must all work together. We don’t have to be… involved, if that’s your wish, but I need your mind, I need your wit and your will. Are you with me, Lark?” He offered his hand for me to shake, like two strangers agreeing to a trade, not lovers whose hearts were entwined. I’d wanted him at a distance, but it hurt like no physical wound ever had.
“Will it stop Razak?” I asked.
“I hope so.”
He always had hope enough for us all.
I grasped his hand and shook it, holding on longer than required. Or perhaps he held on to me. We half-smiled and let our hands drop. I opened my mouth to tell him I was sorry, that I loved him so much it made me crazy, that I was so damn afraid of hurting him, either by my own actions or by Razak’s, that it was easier to push him away. But he turned and headed toward the inn, and the moment slipped through my fingers.
I watched him go—my prince bathed in winter sunshine—and I ached to love him in the way he wanted. But in what world would he and I ever be free to love? Certainly not this one.
Arin would say that perhaps, one day, we might make our own future. But only fools dreamed of happy endings.
* * *
The Court of War’shuge gates hadn’t gotten any less intimidating in our absence.
“All right, wait here.” Draven started toward the gates.
Sand swept in wisps about his boots. The sun was beating down. Draven had suggested we arrive during the evening, not at the height of midday. Of course, Arin was of the mind that criminals and thieves arrived among shadows, so here we were, at midday, sweating in our boots, probably about to be arrested. Again.
My patient kareel snorted into my hand. We’d secured several of the odd animals at War’s borders, and since we didn’t encounter any sandworms, we made our way across the desert dunes in good time. Draven was home, but a long way from safe.
I shielded my eyes and watched Draven’s figure grow smaller in front of the gates. “Do you trust him?” I asked Arin.
“Not in the least.”
Noemi stood with Arin to my left. Their flimsy linen shirts rippled and flapped in the wind.
Gods, I hadn’t missed the wind, or the heat.
Everything now hinged on Ogden not executing us the moment we stepped through those gates. Noemi would be fine; he didn’t have any issue with her. Draven too, as these people were his kin. Arin and I, however, were on thin ice—or should that be shifting sands?
Arin stared at the gates, chin up, determined. His hair had turned into an unruly mop of golden locks, and the sun had summoned his freckles. He looked good, as though nothing would stand in his way, not even War’s great gates.
A gust of wind caught Noemi’s blue cloak and whipped it around her ankles. She swore and tried to kick it back. She’d insisted on keeping it. She carried Draven’s folded under her arm. They’d struck up a bond these past few days. Perhaps, something more? The both of them could likely do with a vigorous tumble between the sheets.
War was our last hope.
If they refused to help, then the shatterlands would fall to my brother.
Still, Draven had a card up his sleeve to play. We just needed Ogden to listen and not swing his axe and take our heads without first granting us an audience.
“Can you see what’s happening?” Noemi asked, squinting against flying sand.
“The gates are opening,” Arin said. “He’s being greeted.” His eyes narrowed. “Hm.”
Hmwas not a good sound. I glared into the heat haze. Draven had been joined by three guards. They spoke a while, then Draven broke off and began to head back toward us.
“He still has his head,” I said. As starts went, it was promising. But as he drew closer, Draven’s face was not a happy one. The loose cuffs swinging from his fingers probably had something to do with that. “They’ll take us in,” he said, gruffly. “With Lark in cuffs.”
With a sigh, I extended both arms. “It’s as though they do not trust me.”
“Did you explain Lark saved everyone from poisoning?” Arin asked. “He’s done more for War than any of us.” Arin’s voice grumbled lower, gaining a threatening edge. “He almost died to st—”
