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The peaceful roll of the lake beckoned me closer as my mind whirled with every interaction that I had ever had with Riven and Killian. It seemed so clear now. Where Riven had gone to that night in Cereliath while I was dancing with the prince. I had been so shocked that Killian would press a kiss to my neck but it had been Riven the entire time.
Someone moved behind me and the cool breeze carried the scent of parchment and fire. I flung a rock across the lake. “Go away, Killian.” I winced. I hadn’t meant to be mean.
A flash of violet light and the air was filled with the scent of dew and birchwood.
I turned on Riven as his shadows coiled around my feet. “You think now is the time for jokes?”
“I’ll likely die tomorrow.” Riven shrugged. “It would be nice to hear you laugh one more time.”
The casualness of Riven’s words tore at me. I hadn’t considered that he would be there for the final seal. But I knew the truth now. Riven needn’t pretend. He could fight as the prince, without the distraction of the pain.
“Though I’m glad to know that I will be buried with my true face.”
I let the last rock drop from my hand. “Is that why you keep switching to this form even though it causes you so much pain? You think it more worthy than the one with the crown on its head?”
My words drove through Riven’s chest. His violet eyes hardened. “It is the form I prefer. And the one that I wanted you to know.”
I shook my head and kicked the stone into the water. It sent a flock of glowing flies into the air from the ripples. “Don’t start telling half-truths again.”
Riven’s brows furrowed. “How is that not true?”
“I’ve been thinking about all the times I’ve spoken with Killian.” I crossed my arms. “Each one is like the scene of a play, recast over and over again in my mind. But I think I have sorted you and Vrail amongst the dozens of encounters. But there’s still something that does not make any sense to me.”
“What?” Riven’s question was part fearful and part daring. The shadows curled higher up my legs and his brow twitched in pain. He could barely keep them leashed.
“If you were so desperate for me to love Riven and not the prince. Why dance with me in Cereliath? Why share those parts of yourselfthat you hate so much at all? Why kiss metwice.” I coated that last word with all the venom I could muster.
Riven’s brow peaked and his gaze trailed along my chest. “You’re angry because I flirted with you?” Riven asked hotly. There was an explosion of light and he stood in front of me as Killian once more. “Or becauseIflirted with you?”
“See, it’s all just a game to you.” I shook my head and started walking back down the path to Myrelinth. “I’m done playing games.”
Riven grabbed my arm, still in his Killian form. “I wasn’t playing a game,diizra.”
“Don’t.” I turned on him like a viper. My skin sizzled as I walked across the sand. “You’ve been flirting with me since Cereliath. It’s like you needed me to fall for the Faeandthe prince.”
Riven didn’t bother to deny it.
I clenched my jaw and his Mortal cheeks went red. “You wanted me towantyou? Like this.” I gestured to his Mortal form. “If the secret meant so much to you, why toy with me at all?”
A feral hunger I had never seen on Killian’s face tugged at his lips. Somewhere in the heat of his jade stare I could recognize Riven within it. “You think Imeantto flirt with you as openly as I did at that ball?” Riven stalked toward me, still in his Mortal form, but somehow just as commanding of the shadows around us. “That Harvest was meant to be a reprievefromyou. I couldn’t help the way my Fae body reacted to your presence. I couldn’t stop the bond making my magic call out to you even when I despised our alliance. I wentweekswithout shifting back, without a moment of relief from the pain, only to find that this body yearns for you all the same becauseIyearn for you.”
Another violet flash and Riven stood only inches from me cloaked in shadows. I took a step back and found myself pressed against a tree trunk. “You asked me once if we would be together ifit weren’t for our magic.” Riven pressed a hard, scraping kiss to my throat, it sent a shiver down my spine, so powerful I couldn’t push him away. I wasn’t sure I wanted to. “If we weren’tmiiskwithir.” His teeth tugged on my ear. “But I cravenothingexcept the taste of you, Keera. In this form”—a flash of violet light—“or this one.”
I was engulfed by the scent of parchment and ink as Riven’s hands tangled into the hair at the base of my neck and pulled. My eyes fluttered open and I was met with soft jade eyes wrapped in amber. My pulse quickened, but I didn’t look away. For so long those eyes only reminded me of everything I had lost. My childhood, my first love, myself. All the pieces I had to carve out of my soul and offer up to the Crown. But now, I stared into the eyes I’d known so long as Killian’s and found a chance to reclaim some of what I’d lost.
“Prove it,” I whispered in a hard voice.
Riven raised a blond brow. “What are you asking me?”
I ran my finger across Riven’s mouth, feeling how much thinner and firmer his lips were in his Mortal form. “You crave me just as much as a prince?”
Riven nodded his head against my thumb.
“Then show me.”
A grin grew along his thin Mortal lips before Riven grabbed the back of my head and kissed me. He tugged the hair at the nape of my neck until I gasped against his lips. He scraped his teeth down my throat and squeezed my thigh, bringing it to his waist.
His kisses were desperate and harder in this form, knowing that he could not hurt me in his Mortal body. There were no shadows pulling at his focus, no distraction in his touch. His hands gripped the neck of my tunic and ripped it down the middle. I could see it in the feral way he looked at me that his entire world ended at my skin.
