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When at last they had finished packing up and the princess was settled in her carriage, Thea couldn’t stop her gaze from falling on Hawthorne, who waited by his stallion for her. He stood tall and powerful, despite the irons at his wrists, the irons that he’dlet herchain him with. Manacles or no, he wasstill every bit the seasoned warrior: his armour splattered with wraith blood, his muscled body primed for battle.
The sight made her knees weak.
The last thing she needed was to share a saddle with him. If anything, she needed to be as far away from him as possible, before her resolve fractured, before she bowed to the questions that had started brimming at the edges of her mind.
When she reached him, her chest ached at the thought of what came next.
One last ride together, she thought, fitting her boot to the stirrup and mounting Biscuit. She hated that she cared, despite how many times she told herself that she didn’t, that he was a traitor and deserved whatever fate awaited him.
The saddle rocked as Hawthorne swung himself up behind her. His thick, muscular thighs cradled her sides, the heat of him already tempting her to lean back against him.
‘Do you mind…?’ he said gruffly, trailing off as his chains rattled.
She twisted to see him gesturing with the manacles, and her stomach dipped. He meant to put the chains over her head and around her front.
‘Otherwise my fists will be digging into your back the whole ride,’ he explained.
With her heart in her throat, all Thea could manage was a nod.
Hawthorne’s arms came up and over her, his bound hands locking around her waist, a broad palm flat against her abdomen.
Furies save me, she thought, her gaze lifting to where the sun broke through the canopy before she addressed Cal and Kipp. ‘Shall we?’
Cal was atop his own mare, while Kipp was in the driver’s seat of the carriage, looking cold and uncomfortable.Serves him right, she mused, squeezing Biscuit’s sides.
‘You take the front, we’ll take the rear,’ she told Cal before she guided Hawthorne’s stallion to the back of the princess’ carriage and trained her gaze ahead.
They started down the road, the carriage rattling along, and her friends staring very intensely ahead. There was nothing to focus on but the press of the warrior at her back, and that warm palm spread across her middle.
Thea warred with herself, with everything she had told herself over the last year, with everything she’d thought she had known. She couldn’t shake the sinking feeling of dread in her gut, nor could she slow the whirring of her mind. Ignoring the brush of Hawthorne’s beard and the heat of his breath against her neck, she thought back to their detour through the mountain pass and what he’d told her along the way.
That the shadow-touched were innocent. That Talemir Starling was one of them. That Anya, the woman touted as the Daughter of Darkness, was on the side of light.
Thea shook the notion from her head. It wasn’t possible. Not after all she had seen of the winged leader. Not after she’d taken Wren.
‘I can hear you thinking.’
The rich timbre of Hawthorne’s voice sent a shiver down her spine. His grip around her tightened slightly, as though he’d felt the wave rush over her.
‘What can I do?’ he murmured softly. ‘What more can I do to prove myself?’
‘You —’
But Hawthorne forged on. ‘I have fought beside you. I have saved your life. I have saved a princess of the midrealms. I have killed shadow wraiths and cursed reef dwellers. I have comewillingly, submitted to your chains, all for a chance to talk with you…’
‘And I have listened,’ Thea replied, her knuckles burning with how hard she was clutching the reins.
‘And yet…’ The warrior’s words were sad.
‘And yet it’s not up to me. I’m a warrior of Thezmarr. You once knew that better than anyone. My loyalty is to the guild, and it demands you face trial.’
‘The guild is not all that matters in these realms.’
‘No?’ Thea snapped, her blood heating. ‘What else matters, then?’
‘Us,’ he said simply.
‘There is no us, Hawthorne. You made damn sure of that —’
