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“She needs to make an appearance as soon as possible.”

I felt the growl in my chest before I heard it. “She is not even awake yet.”

“But she will be soon. In the meantime—”

“In the meantime, I will stay at her side,” I snarled.

“You are the High King of Annwyn. Your court needs reassurance that all is well after the spectacle at the Joining,” Gwen said, her voice perfectly measured.

Perhaps Gwen wasn’t as wise as I thought.

“Do not presume to tell me how to rule my kingdom. You are not the queen or the heir, Guinevere. You are a guard. Get outside the door and do your Ancestors-damned job.”

I felt the roiling menace of her power from across the room. A half a thought was all that separated her from shifting into that vicious dark lioness.

“I dare you,” I breathed.

I would tear her limb from limb if she dared to shift in the presence of my wounded mate. No amount of friendship, no number of years spent fighting together on a battlefield, none of it would be enough to save her.

“As you command,” she said, her voice a faint snarl. “Your Majesty.”

I barely heard the door close through the animal roar in my head.

A soft chuckle floated through the air, penetrating my mind, my chest, my soul.

“Do I have to call you ‘Your Majesty’ while you fuck me?”

10

VEYKA

Having every major bone in your body mended is damn painful. I’d endured some excruciating things, but the feeling of my own bones knitting together beneath my skin was probably the worst. I would have begged for the tea to knock me out, if I thought Arran could handle it.

But one look at his drawn face, the nearly feral set of his mouth, the fire burning in his eyes that had nothing to do with lust, and I knew that seeing me unconscious again would sever the fragile tether he had to reality.

I recognized the look on his face. I’d seen it in Cyara in the moments after her sisters’ deaths. Ancestors, I’d seen it in the mirror often enough in those months after Arthur’s murder.

I was the one laying broken in bed, held together with cleverly crafted splints and a heavy heap of magic. But he was the one barely holding on.

I lifted one eyebrow. I couldn’t lift my hand to reach for him, still kneeling on the floor. “You can sit on the bed.”

His throat bobbed as he swallowed. “I don’t want to jostle you while you’re healing.”

“That is what the splints are for.” I’d surveyed the splints when I first woke. The extent of them said enough about the damage done to my body when I literally fell through time and space and crashed back into the goldstone palace.

Mentioning the splints was a mistake. Arran’s eyes dragged downward, the worry shining in his dark eyes.

“They spent hours tending to you, to get you arranged just so,” he said, voice hoarse.

Ancestors, this was bad. I thought I’d seen worry after the Tower of Myda. But this…

How long had I been gone?

I ground my teeth, ignoring the headache forming at the base of my skull.

“Arran, come and sit on this bed or I swear to the Ancestors, I will get up and drag you over here myself.” Not that I could. But I’d try, and ruin all the work the healers had done in the process.

He looked like he wanted to strangle me. But he did as I asked, easing himself down until his weight was balanced on the edge of the bed near my hip.