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“No.” Tristan didn’t even have the decency to turn and face me, just kept hauling me away at this breakneck speed. If I wouldn’t shatter both legs, I’d jump, but if I did, I’d be no use to anyone. “He told me to get you to Zor and that’s what I’m fucking doing.Those are fucking hounds, Anaria. They will devour us if they catch us.”
“Please, Tristan,please. We can’t leave him behind.” I whirled around but we were already too far away. The mage’s were lifting Raziel off the ground, and then they were gone. “Let me go.” I was splattered in Raz’s blood from the first arrow, and agony turned to rage.
“You’re a heartless coward, leaving him like this.”
“I’ve known him far longer than you, so don’t you dare lecture me,” Tristan bellowed, his face twisted into an ugly grimace. “Do you think I want to save your sorry arse instead of his?He’s fucking worth ten of you.”
My heart stuttered at what I saw in Tristan’s face. Not hatred, exactly, more like disgust. As if I wasn’t even worthy of the former. Thank the gods the wind took my tears away as fast as I shed them.
Worthless tears that wouldn’t help Raziel one bit.
But I wouldn’t beg. Wouldn’t waste time convincing him I was worthy.
“You were supposed to be the end of this fucking nightmare of ours. Instead, you’re the beginning,” he growled before urging his horse even faster, the reins stretching out as my mount fought to keep the frantic pace. “You are poison. Everything you touch is either ruined or dies.”
Whatever was left holding me together shredded apart with those words.
Because he was right. He was so fucking right. I couldn’t see, couldn’t breathe. All I could do was feel wave after wave of failure wash through me. Tristan was right. I’d gotten Raz killed.
I’d get them all killed.
Or turn them into monsters. I pushed down the sobs trying to claw their way up my throat.
We pulled ahead of the oncoming forces, the sounds of the hounds’ baying fading away until all I heard was the thud of my hammering heart as we raced across the desolate plain.
I didn’t know how long before we stopped, the world a dark blur, my guilt even darker as it reached up and squeezed my heart in an unforgiving fist.
The Fae King had Raz.
He was hurt…he could be dead.
Some deep part of me stilled at the thought, considered it, then rejected it in the same breath.
I wouldknowif Raz was dead. I’dfeelit somehow. In my heart. In my fucking soul, I’d know if I lost him. He was mine and I was his and we were meant for each other.
The betrayal of leaving him behind gnawed at me, and by the time the Solarys army came into sight, I didn’t care that I was safe, didn’t hardly care I was alive. Better to have stayed—to have died—with Raz than leave him alone and injured with our enemies.
I well-remembered what happened down in that prison and had no illusions the king would wait to start working on Raziel. He’d want answers and he was an impatient male.
I’d called Tristan a coward, but I was the one who’d balked at using my magic, when I should have collapsed the entire cave onto their heads and crushed every last one of them.
I would make them pay for what they’d done to him. Fury, raging, fiery fury crested inside me, turning my blood to vapor. Stars danced around me in the vibrating air, and the closest soldiers retreated, murmuring and pointing.
Then I took a breath.
Spooled my magic back in. Tamped down my anger until it simmered like banked fire.
Still, anger was better than self-pity, even if it was more dangerous.
The moment we stopped, I wiped my face, pushed the iron band tightly onto my arm and yanked my jacket back on, though my fingers shook too badly to bother with the buckle.
Tristan dismounted, tied his horse and mine to the back of a wagon, and stalked away, not bothering to say a word.
My legs crumpled beneath me when I dismounted. I couldn’t stop shaking, my empty chest aching, weakness spreading through me as the adrenaline leached from my body and my last image of Raz kept flashing through my head. His dark eyes filled with regret and fierce emotion when he’d murmured his final words to me.
I love you. I will always love you, in this world and the next.
How could he leave me with that?
