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She sniffed but didn’t pull away. “I’m scared. My whole body hurts.”
My other hand flew to Talia’s face, and I tilted her head to look me in the eyes. “Where does it hurt?”
Panic touched her eyes. “Everywhere. My bones ache, and my muscles feel as if they are about to tear into pieces.”
“Sun forsake me,” I hissed, scooping her into a hug against my chest. “First and Last, not this. I’ll live a thousand lives of pain and torment, but do not do this.”
She loved me.
My wife, my bride, my sacrifice.
And now I wanted nothing in the world but to hold her body together, to keep it from shifting, to reverse her love for me, and keep her whole.
“Talia, try to stop,” I begged. “You have to try to stop loving me.”
She pressed her hands to my chest and shook me. “I can’t, you idiot! I love you,” she shouted. “And I want to keep loving you. Even if that means turning into a bear, and only loving you at night, I don’t care, as long as you never let me go.”
I planted a kiss on top of her head, tears spilling into her hair. “Why do you have to be so stubborn?”
Everence cleared her throat. I’d nearly forgotten she was present. “We must hurry. The coronation ball starts in less than an hour.”
I pulled Talia to her feet and wrapped an arm around her. Everence snapped her fingers and a fresh suit emerged, woven with iridescent thread. I’d be at home in the palace of the Sun Sovereign.
“Now that it is night,” I told Talia as I slid my arms into the new jacket a few minutes later, “the pain will likely increase until the moment the curse has completely transferred from my body to yours. When that happens, I will…”
But in truth, I had no idea what I would do when the moment of her death arrived.
Instead of finishing that sentence, I stepped forward and kissed her.
I took Talia’s face in my hand, threading my fingers into her hair. She smiled and a small half-sob, half-laugh sputtered from her. I wrapped my arms tightly around her.
“I will hold you until the stars fall and the earth melts, if it would mean I could keep you safe.” She crashed against me.
Over her head, I met Everence’s cold stare. My shoulder was already fully healed. The curse was leaving my body. And as if to prove it, a spasm hit Talia, and she moaned in pain.
I slammed a fist into the stone wall, cracking it and causing the whole room to shudder. Talia winced in pain as another round of muscle spasms rocked her small frame.
“Ev, help me. I can’t lose her.”
Everence stood beside us. “You’re gaining strength now. Do you feel it?” As I nodded, she continued, “Then you should also be able to call up more magic now. Your true magic. You can try to keep her alive with that.”
Talia’s fists curled around the fabric of my loose shirt. I smoothed away hairs from her face.
“I don’t even know my true magic. It’s been too long, and I never fully learned.” I’d been twenty years old, still a child in fae years, when Fabian had cursed me. Fae often spent two hundred years learning about the magic they’d been born with, then another thousand years perfecting it.
My cousin placed a hand on my shoulder. “You know enough.”
Talia’s eyes peeked open and she sat up. “There’s a chance I can live through this?”
I tucked my face against her neck once more, the way I had in the stairwell. For a moment, hope surged like an inferno in my veins, and my body tingled with crackling energy.
Everence answered before I could. “He’s the heir of the Sun Sovereign.” Then to me, she added, “That crown belongs as much to you as to your brother. With the crown, you could save her.”
37
Talia
When he looked up at me, his eyes burned amber, bright and strong and terrifyingly beautiful. “I will get that crown.”
