Page 74

Roan

Isat outside on the evening of my fifth day on the island and waited, looking towards the east.

“What are you doing?” Fen asked, walking out and sitting beside me.

I gave her half a smile. “You’ll see.”

It didn’t take long. There, between the branches, came a bright, full moon.

I began unwinding the ribbons at my wrists. Fen watched, her eyes gone wide.

“Baer said that if you weren’t back by the full moon, the marriage would be null,” I told her, dropping the first ribbon on the ground in front of me and starting in on the second. “We’re tied to each other no longer.”

“He—he said that?”

It came out of her like a whisper, and I slid my eyes over to hers. They were unfocused, like she was hearing me from somewhere else.

“Yeah.”

She looked at me then. Emotions seemed to come and go quicker than I could discern them. It was like constant lightning illuminating her face, then plunging it into darkness, then illuminating it again, and each time,with a new feeling to show. I couldn’t keep up, couldn’t understand this reaction of hers.

“Are you happy?” I asked.

Her brows were furrowed, but they rose with my words.

“Yes,” she said several beats later. “Of course.”

Then why did she look like she might cry?

“Fen—” I started, hands gripping the last ribbon tightly, ready to wind it back around my wrists and kiss her a hundred times in apology.

But a smile broke over her face. “Yes, I’m happy,” she said. “Finally. The clan gives me what I wanted all along.”

My fingers loosened.

She stood abruptly. “All I had to do was leave,” she said, and I heard the hardness of her voice. “That’s it. Just give up everything I’ve ever known, and half the shit I love.”

She walked away several strides, then swung back, shaking her head.

“Well, they can forget it,” she said, looking reckless. “I’m going down in flames, and I’m taking their golden-boy with me.”

Now it was my turn for my brows to raise.

“And look at you. So happy to rid yourself of those ribbons.” She drew up in front of me where I sat, and I had to crane my neck to see her. “I guess you’ll be eager to get back to the village now, huh? Maybe try your chances with Runa?”

“Runa?”

“Well, too bad. Put those ribbons back onnow.”

She wanted me to…oh, this was too good. I rose to my feet. Now she had to tilt her head up to keep my gaze. I took a step closer, so we were a hair’s breadth from touching, and I looked down into her moon-bathed face.

“Or else what?” I murmured.

She blinked up at me.

“What will you do if I refuse?” I asked.

Her mouth opened, then closed. After a moment, her brows furrowed. I’d done it now. She looked ready to thrash me.