Page 27

When Aemyra regained consciousness, she was lying on the settee in Fiorean’s chambers and her chest was stinging painfully.

With a groan, she tried to sit up.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, Princess,” Fiorean drawled from where he was kneeling on the floor beside her.

His right hand was dabbing at the wound on her chest with a damp cloth and his other holding a bowl of bloodstained water. A healer was hovering behind him, looking like he wanted to intervene.

“What are you doing?” Aemyra whispered nervously.

Fiorean’s eyes were fixed on her wound. “I would have thought that was obvious,” he said tersely.

Squeezing out the cloth once more, Fiorean carefully cleaned the blood off her chest, his fingers gentle with the edges of the wound.

“You were lucky. A few inches higher and Sir Nairn might have severed something important,” he muttered.

“Maybe he should have thought twice about swinging a knife at my throat.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t have thrown yourself at someone holding a knife while unarmed.”

“Perhaps I wouldn’t have had to, if the person holding the knife hadn’t just killed my mother, ” Aemyra growled, throat burning with unshed tears.

Fiorean’s green eyes were glittering dangerously.

The healer stepped forward. “Your Highness, I think this arguing is unhelpful for the princess’s recovery. She has lost rather a lot of blood and needs to regain her strength.”

“I need to murder Sir Nairn,” Aemyra spat, whipping her head around. “Can you assist me with that?”

The healer’s face paled and he backed hastily out of the door.

“Sir Nairn has lost more than most at the hands of the Dùileach,” Fiorean said quietly. “His early life in àird Caolas was not an easy one.”

Aemyra felt her face flush with anger.

“I don’t care if Laird Lonan himself threw Sir Nairn into a cave full of chimeras, I will kill him for what he just did.”

Fiorean placed the bowl of water on the floor, and Aemyra dared to look at the wound on her chest. It was deep but not dangerously so. A twinge on her forearm spoke of a second injury she hadn’t felt while grappling with the captain.

“Well, at least the blade was clean and sharp,” she said, trying to muster her courage.

Until she remembered that the same blade had cut through the flesh of Orlagh’s neck.

“I’m going to vomit,” Aemyra managed to choke out before Fiorean quickly held a different bowl up to her mouth.

Bile burned up her throat from her empty stomach, her split lip throbbing painfully. Tears stinging the corners of her eyes, she panted as she lay back onto the cushions, the room spinning.

“Here,” Fiorean said quietly, offering her a goblet of watered-down wine.

She eyed it hatefully, knowing that it was probably laced with the potion that bound her magic.

Fiorean read her expression correctly. “It is from my personal store. This wine has not been tampered with.”

She shouldn’t trust him, but the blood loss had made her desperately thirsty. Grasping the goblet with both hands, she sipped it carefully.

“What an absolute mess,” she muttered.

Fiorean did her the kindness of not responding as Aemyra screwed her eyes shut against the pain. Having her mother returned to her for a brief moment and then ripped away again was something she would never forgive Athair Alfred for. Sir Nairn was dead for carrying out the order.

Aemyra suddenly lost her taste for the wine when she thought of the look in Sorcha’s eyes as she had been dragged back to the dungeons.

Before she could try to reach for the table, Fiorean plucked the goblet from her fingers.

“Why are you helping me?” she asked.

“Because this is my fault,” Fiorean finally muttered.

Aemyra’s brow furrowed as she once again glimpsed the man who lurked underneath the hateful exterior. The crackling fire behind the settee was a mocking imitation of the power she could no longer summon.

“I thought you would be finishing the job Sir Nairn started by now,” Aemyra said, a slight tremor in her voice.

He didn’t meet her eyes. “You’re more useful to us alive. If you die now, your dragon—and likely your father as well—will burn this city to the ground.”

Despite his words, Aemyra knew that her freshly Bonded, magical womb was now their greatest asset. Was it possible they wanted strong Dùileach children Bonded to hatchlings and blackmailed into the service of the Chosen? The thought made Aemrya even more nauseous than she already was.

“Wouldn’t you have preferred to marry a woman from ùir? You have all turned your backs on the Goddess anywa—”

“Have we?” he interrupted, lifting his eyes to hers.

Holding her gaze for a long moment, Fiorean uncorked a small vial from the bag the healer had left beside the settee.

Aemyra looked more intently around the room for any sign of Brigid. There was the large fire, obviously, but no burning oil or woven crosses.

Fiorean tilted a small vial over her skin and she jerked out of her thoughts.

He rolled his eyes. “Are you so obstinate that you can’t tell when I’m trying to save your life instead of end it?”

Narrowing her eyes, Aemyra replied, “This is hardly a mortal wound, but now that you mention it, no. You are the one who brought me to Evander and told him about my dragon. Saving my life doesn’t count if you were the one putting it in danger in the first place.”

This time, Fiorean held her gaze. “I didn’t know the Athair was with my brother. For what happened because of my actions you have my deepest sympathies. And apologies.”

Before she could tell him to shove his sincerity up his arse, Fiorean spoke again. “Sir Nairn also witnessed your magic use. If I hadn’t brought you to my brother, we both would have been questioned. Under duress.”

Aemyra sighed. “You were right. I understand nothing about this court.”

Fiorean held the vial up to her nose and she gave it a gentle sniff.

“It’s mostly honey, I think. There’s a faint trace of anise, which will do nothing more than give it an impressive color. Elear’s favorite healers are certainly no Beatons.” With a brisk nod of permission, Aemyra removed her grip from Fiorean’s skin.

His fingers were gentle and efficient, but Aemyra remained rigid under his ministrations.

“Did your mother teach you all of this?” he asked gently.

Grief enveloped her again and Aemyra turned her gaze to the fire. Neither of them had access to their magic, but the flames were high in the hearth, like Brigid knew two of her children were in this room.

“Orlagh taught me how to heal with both plants and magic. Many believe fire to be the most destructive of the blessed elements, but they forget that fires cleanse just as much as they destroy,” Aemyra said quietly, a tear leaking out as she gazed into the flames. They reminded her of Solas’s tail.

Aemyra turned her gaze back to Fiorean.

“Where is my mother’s firebird?” she asked in a quiet voice.

Fiorean stilled and his face adopted an unreadable expression. “He was consumed by Aervor’s flames, alongside…”

Aemyra didn’t need him to finish the words. The emptiness in Orlagh’s eyes hadn’t only been from losing her husband and child, she had lost her beathach. Part of her soul had already been in the Otherworld. Aemyra supposed it should have been some comfort to her that Orlagh was now at peace, reunited with her family and Solas—but it made her feel worse.

By reaching for the throne, she had condemned the very people who had raised her.

Brigid, hold them in your embrace until I see them again.

Aemyra sent up a silent prayer to the Goddess and begged to never have to endure a grief this heavy again. An ache began in her soul as she thought of her twin. She had to get back to Adarian.

With a determined sniff, she stemmed the flow of tears while Fiorean rubbed some of the healing salve onto the small wound on her forearm. Three stitches had been sewn in while she had been unconscious.

“You need to drink this,” Fiorean said, rising to his knees so that his face was above hers, holding another vial in his hands.

Instinctively, Aemyra smacked his hand away, wincing when the movement jostled her wounds.

“We have already established that I’m not going to poison you,” Fiorean ground out.

Aemyra glared at him. “No, you just want my magic stifled so you can keep me here and ensure my father doesn’t burn this caisteal to the ground. Don’t worry, I already feel a prize fool for falling into your trap outside that inn.”

She didn’t dare speak aloud her deepest fear, the true reason why she was being kept in this prison, married to a prince she hated.

“This doesn’t contain the binding agent,” Fiorean explained like she was testing his patience. “It is oil of henbane, for the pain. Your chest wound needs to be closed or it will fester, and the needle will hurt.”

Still, Aemyra glared up at him.

“I don’t want to be unconscious around you people any longer than I have to. And don’t explain the finer arts of healing to me—I know far more about them than you do. Orlagh’s third great-grandmother was a Beaton.”

Something she said gave him pause, the shadows from the fire casting his scars into sharp relief. After a moment, he dipped his hands into the clean water bowl, before picking up the needle and thread.

“What are you doing?” Aemyra asked, nervously eyeing his hands.

“Tending to my wife’s wounds,” Fiorean muttered, testing the strength of the knot around the eye of the needle.

“But the healer…”

“I didn’t need him to sew up your other wound, and I certainly won’t need him for this one. If you want to look as scarred as I do, then I can call him back in, but if you want this to heal properly, you should let me continue,” Fiorean said, his eyes meeting hers.

For the first time, Aemyra realized that he might have endured more pain than she knew about. As he tied his hair into a knot and revealed his facial scars, she wondered what else he was hiding behind his cool exterior.

Fiorean paused, both hands above her chest, the needle held between the index finger and thumb of his right hand.

Aemyra blew out a tense breath and nodded her permission.

His left hand probed gently at the edge of her wound, the lowest corner just above her right breast. His touch was gentle as he pressed the edges together.

“Last chance to change your mind,” he muttered, his eyes glancing quickly to the oil of henbane.

“You’ve never had a problem hurting me before,” Aemyra said, gritting her teeth. “Why develop a conscience now?”

The first bite of the needle was worse than she had been expecting. It drew cleanly through her flesh, and she pressed her lips together.

“Try not to move,” Fiorean whispered.

She fisted her hands into the cushions underneath her as Fiorean worked.

He had completed fewer than four stitches before she spoke.

“Tell me something to take my mind off this,” she almost begged.

Fiorean dragged the needle upward, the translucent thread pulled taut.

“What would you like me to tell you?”

Aemyra rolled her eyes.

“Fucking anything, Fiorean. Right now you could tell me about your first time with a woman or your morning shit and I would be grateful.”

The corners of his lips twitched, but his eyes were fixed on his work.

“How did you come to claim The Terror?” he finally asked.

“You’re supposed to be the one doing the talking. I’m in need of distraction,” Aemyra complained as his fingers pulled her skin together.

“I am trying to concentrate as well, you know,” Fiorean replied, his voice barely above a whisper.

Struggling not to audibly groan as the needle went through her skin once more, Aemyra risked giving him some of the truth.

“I had always wanted a dragon. I just never imagined what that Bond would be like until it was forged.”

Fiorean looked pensive.

“I understand what you mean. My magic has always been greater than my siblings’, but my father enjoyed pitting us against one another. Evander continually reminded me that, as the eldest, he would claim Aervor and become the most powerful.” Fiorean’s mouth opened slightly as he pulled the needle. “When I was eight, Evander rode with me into the Deàrr Mountains under the pretense of finding the dragon nests. He left me on a ledge and told me that if I wanted to know what it was like to fly, I should jump.”

Aemyra witnessed the hurt of a small child pass over his face, the pain of humiliation that lingered all these years later.

Wishing that she didn’t feel sorry for the man responsible for so much of her grief, Aemyra sighed as the thread pulled through her skin.

“That wasn’t right,” she replied.

Fiorean’s hand stilled, and his eyes drifted up to her face as if he hadn’t expected her compassion.

“Children can be unnecessarily cruel. I know Adarian didn’t deserve half of the stunts I pulled on him when we were young,” Aemyra said.

Fiorean’s expression softened, and he returned to his ministrations. “You Bonded to a dragon who was supposed to be both untamable and dead.”

Aemyra sighed, her chest rising, and Fiorean had to lift his hands away.

“Scared of me yet?” she asked.

Fiorean narrowed his eyes, yet the glare held less venom than usual. “Hardly. Although I don’t know how I never realized you were of this clan. I used to pride myself in knowing everything that went on in this city.”

Aemyra rolled her eyes. “Forgive me, but you don’t seem the type to take notice of anyone below the rank of knight. Why would you have noticed a family moving into the city ten years ago when we looked just as dirty and tired as all the others?”

Fiorean lifted his eyes again, this time the expression on his face was a little too easy to read. “How did you do it?” he asked.

Aemyra didn’t know what made her answer truthfully, but she felt compelled to pass on the knowledge Orlagh had left her with.

“The idea that we control our beathaichean and steal their magic is an absurd narrative pushed by the Chosen. Beathaichean are intelligent, sentient beings who make their own choices. But doesn’t that make it even more exhilarating when they choose you?” Aemyra asked as Fiorean snipped the last stitch.

He cleared his throat and reached for a clean sponge. “You seem to control The Terror well enough.”

Aemyra frowned.

“You have been Aervor’s rider for years. You know that one could never hope to truly control a dragon, but we do respect each other enough to listen.”

Aemyra couldn’t touch the spot on her own chest because of her wound, so she reached forward before she could think better of it.

“It’s here. The space somewhere between your heart and your soul that speaks to your beathach. Without the binding agent I would be able to feel Te—The Terror even now if I closed my eyes and concentrated. I don’t need to tell my dragon what to do, although it’s certainly faster.”

Fiorean was leaning toward her, his emerald gaze fathomless as her fingers pressed against his skin through his shirt.

Then Aemyra understood.

She gasped quietly. “You don’t feel it, do you?”

Fiorean sat back up and her hand dropped from his chest. He wrung the cloth out between his hands, the now clear water dripping back into the bowl with a tinkling plop.

“No. I don’t feel that with Aervor,” he replied stiffly, a flush creeping up his neck.

“Fiorean, look at me,” she ordered, her heart pounding strongly enough that she thought her wound might open up again.

He lifted his face to her slowly and she was surprised to see that his emerald eyes were limned with tears.

“You didn’t kill Lachlann, did you?” she asked, hardly daring to believe it.

Her heart near stopped when he shook his head and replied, “No. Aervor did.”