Page 75 of A Bond so Fierce and Fragile

Merrick pushed the urge for liquor and sweet oblivion away.

He’d need to be strong for her. Only for her. Continue fighting like Lessia had promised him she would.

For as long as she breathed, he’d take all the pain in the world. Fuck, he’d take hers as well if he could. But if she didn’t breathe anymore… He ground his teeth when the souls around him roiled in fury.

“Death… Ah… Merrick, a-a word?” The Fae soldier sprang backward when Merrick spun around to face him, and his face whitened as he lifted his hands, fire sparking from his fingers—probably in response to Merrick’s magic flickering in the air.

Merrick deliberately moved his gaze to the male’s hands, wondering whether the decision to save him had been hasty, when the Fae spoke again, the sparks fading.

“I apologize.” He jerked when Merrick’s eyes landed back on his, but he didn’t take another step backward. Instead the Fae straightened, trying to lift his chin.

He was young, Merrick realized as he observed him. Very young.

Barely older than a Faeling—perhaps thirty or maybe forty years old.

Still, Merrick didn’t have it in him to be soft. Not right now.

Not when he needed to save whatever warmth there was in him for Lessia.

So he raised a brow when the Fae only opened and closed his mouth, and demanded, “Yes?”

The Fae’s swallow echoed between them before he finally spoke again. “My name is Cedar Reinsdor, and I… I just wanted to say I am forever in your and your mate’s debt.”

Merrick froze, eyes flying across the Fae before him.

“You’re not… Dedrick’s son, are you?” Merrick took a step closer to the Fae, pretending not to notice how the younger one couldn’t stop himself from shrinking back again even as he nodded.

“I-I am.”

“How the fuck did you end up here?” Merrick frowned as he eyed the expensive clothing the Fae was clad in and the bejeweled sword and dagger hanging by his waist—so much more elaborate than his own… than the dagger he’d gifted Lessia.

He should have noticed it before—only the noble Fae could afford such extravagant weapons, and the clothing… It was something one was more likely to see in Rioner’s castle’s vast halls than on a warship in the middle of the Eiatis Sea.

And the Reinsdors… They were one of the oldest and most powerful noble families.

“I… My father owed the king a debt.” Cedar’s long blond hair fell into his eyes as he bowed his head. “Rioner… he wouldn’t settle for anything else but my utmost loyalty to him.”

Merrick flicked one of his teeth with his tongue, trying not to show the rage that burned so hot within him that he was surprised he didn’t burst into flames.

Of course Rioner had wanted this male.

His flames were truly magnificent, and the king couldn’t have someone like that on the loose…

Like with Merrick, Lessia, and most of the others blood-sworn to the king, his gift posed a threat to the king himself.

Merrick’s whispers whipped the air—the oily vibrations from them sharpening with every moment he thought of the damned king.

Rioner needed to die.

A slow, painful fucking death where he was alive until the very last drop of his blood was drained from his body. Suffering. Suffering in the way he’d made Vastala and its people suffer.

Merrick had heard stories from other realms of bloodsucking monsters hidden within facades as beautiful as the Fae’s bodies.

How he wished they had time to go in search of one of them.

The whispered legends told by far-traveling Fae spoke of these monsters being able to deliver the most gruesome deaths.

Not that that would be enough for the king. He deserved to die again and again and again—reliving the pain and fury of those he’d hurt for several lifetimes.