Page 28 of A Fate of Ice and Lies (Fated #1)

“It’s okay,” I said, staring at our joined hands. “I’m fine. Doesn’t hurt much anymore.”

“Do they teach you how to be a terrible liar in fae school?” she asked, angling her head to the side.

Her tease ran through my veins. I barked out another laugh that made her dip her head, and I wished she wouldn’t hide any of her smiles from me.

“George and Brenton taught me the art of lying,” I replied, toying with her fingers. “I’ll let them know they were lousy teachers.”

Donnie cleared his throat, and Teddy pulled away. I drew my hand to my lap, where I fisted it.

But she let me touch her. That was something. More than something.

“Teddy texted us, which is why we’re all here,” Donnie said. “Daniels wouldn’t treat you, but he did give us some gauze and antibiotic cream that should help. ”

“I asked him to give you something stronger for the pain, but. . .” She frowned.

“He shouldn’t waste it on me,” I told her, wanting to erase the worry from her face.

I would’ve reached over and smoothed the creases between the bridge of her nose, but I wasn’t brave enough to find out if she’d let me.

Anger rose over her cheeks to her expressive eyes. “It’s not wasting it,” she spat out. “He’s a doctor. He’s supposed to help people.”

“His people,” I agreed. “Humans. He’s doing exactly what he’s supposed to and saving the medication for humans.”

From the short distance between us, I heard her heart start to thunder. It both broke and elated me that she felt that strongly toward helping me.

“I’m okay, Teddy,” I reassured her. “I heal fairly quickly, and what you gave me last night helped. I took three more before you woke up, and I’m almost pain-free.”

“Don’t lie to me, Elias,” she whispered, furrowing her brows. “It doesn’t make me feel better. It only makes me feel like I can’t trust you.”

I swallowed and then swallowed again. Her words wrapped around me like a vise, knowing I didn’t deserve her trust. Not when I kept our first meeting away from her.

“I’m sorry,” I said just as low. “I do heal quickly, and yes, I’m hurting, but I can manage.”

“This has happened to you before?” she asked.

“No, never.” I drummed my fingers on my thigh, wondering how much to tell her.

How much of me she wanted to know. “My parents, the king and queen of Niev, have never punished our kingdom in such a way. Neither did my father’s parents nor their parents.

This type of punishment is. . . it hasn’t been used in a long time. ”

“Then why is the commander enforcing it here?” she asked.

“I don’t know.” I stared down at the table.

Although I didn’t know why the Elders or the commander were doing this, I had felt a change in my uncle. I remembered the pleasure I’d scented after my beating, the way he’d seemed to revel in telling Teddy how I was at fault for her people’s downfall.

“I can’t do it, though,” I whispered. “I won’t put someone through this for stealing.

I don’t know if a human can survive this, and if I killed someone just to appease him.

. .” A knot in my stomach grew, making me nauseous.

“He isn’t like this or wasn’t back home. Something’s changed. He’s changed.”

“Careful what you say,” Nalari warned.

“I trust Teddy,” I replied.

“So do I,” she said.

Surprised, I jerked my attention to Teddy, who studied me with open curiosity. That openness made me want to lay myself bare for her.

“Will you allow us to hold each other accountable?” Donnie asked.

“I’d prefer it.” I bit the inside of my cheek.

“No,” Nalari snarled. From above, her thunderous roar made the walls of Teddy’s cottage tremble.

Teddy and Donnie stared at the shaking ceiling, their faces pale and bodies rigid.

“Nalari,” I pleaded.

“While I trust your mate and possibly her friends, the rest of her people would destroy you if they had the chance.”

“Of course they would,” I countered. “I don’t blame them. ”

“Ask your mate what happened last night,” Nalari ordered. “Why her friends stayed the night, and why she slept facing the door with a rifle in her hand.”

“What’s a rifle?”

Another roar.

“What’s a rifle?” I asked Teddy.

She pointed toward the metal stick I’d seen her sleeping with that now leaned against the wall behind her.

“It’s a weapon,” she answered. “Like a gun but can do more damage. It shoots bullets and can kill.” She glanced up again when Nalari’s roar thundered through the house. “We weren’t going to use it on you or anything.”

The worry in her voice made me want to reach for her. Instead, I stood with Donnie following me. I reached for the rifle, but he grabbed it first. His face mirrored Teddy’s, so I took a reassuring step away from the weapon, wanting to ease whatever troubled them.

“I wasn’t going to use it.” I pushed a hand through my hair, my back protesting at the movement.

“Does Nalari think we were going to use it on you?” Teddy asked, pointing at the rifle Donnie held in his hand.

“No,” I rushed out. “She told me you slept with a rifle. I didn’t know what that was, and when she didn’t tell me, I asked you. I was just curious about it.”

Donnie went to the other side of the small kitchen, where he punched buttons that beeped on a large cabinet. When it opened, he put the rifle in before closing the metal door. I took a seat next to Teddy, turning my mug that was now empty.

“You want to learn about guns, I’ll teach you,” Donnie said, turning back to us as he sat back on his chair. “Until then, you can’t mess with it.”

It seemed very different from the weapons we used in Niev. Not as threatening as a sword, and I couldn’t imagine how it’d shoot anything more lethal than an arrow. But I respected Donnie enough to agree.

“Why’s your dragon so angry?” Ryenne asked, rubbing her eyes as she yawned and walked into the kitchen.

Her lover, Nate, kept his hand on her waist and only let go to kiss her temple. Without greeting us, he headed for the coffee and poured himself a cup. I wasn’t sure how he did it, but he drank deeply, not bothered by the burning liquid.

“Why did you need a weapon last night?” I asked Teddy.

Shifting uncomfortably, she nibbled her bottom lip. “Elias, I ...”

“Some people from town heard you were here without any other fae,” Ryenne said, her tone matter-of-fact. “We all saw how weak you were last night, and they thought they could. . .” She stopped, suddenly unable to look at me.

“They wanted to kill me?” I asked.

I suppressed the anger that rose inside me, pushing down my primal instincts that flared.

Teddy scooted her chair closer to me and twined her fingers with mine. “We wouldn’t have let them hurt you,” she promised.

“That’s why you all stayed?” I questioned. “Why you slept with a weapon?”

“We all slept with guns,” Ryenne said, lifting her shirt enough to show me the gun she kept sheathed to her waist. “Just in case.”

I breathed through the hot fury that engulfed me. These people would have come here, to Teddy’s home, armed. Would they have hurt her while I was helpless to protect her?

I wouldn’t allow it. Would destroy anyone who’d think of hurting her. Would burn this entire town, this entire realm before anyone could reach her.

Teddy ran a hand over my trembling shoulder. “Elias,” she whispered, and somewhere in the darkness of my mind, I heard her. “No one came.”

If they thought the commander was lethal, they knew nothing of real danger. I’d happily strip them of their flesh and rip their heart straight from their chest. A slow, torturous death wouldn’t be enough to appease my rage.

Her hand dipped to my thigh, where she squeezed. “Look at me, Elias.”

Obediently, I turned to her. She took my hand and turned it over, where she ran a finger across my palm and over my arm. Back and forth, she stroked me. Soft yet firm. Back and forth.

It wasn’t until she brought me back that I realized I’d opened myself to my primal instincts. Would’ve let it take over completely and lay waste to her town. Ashamed, I retracted my canines and shook my head.

With my head bowed, I stood and raked a hand through my unbound hair. “I’m sorry. I. . .”

She tipped my chin up to look at her. Only her, with her friends fading so far in the distance, I forgot they were there.

“You have every right to be angry,” she assured me. “I’m angry. Hell, I’m pissed. You’ve done nothing but help us while we—me, included—have distrusted you. I wouldn’t have let them. . . kill you. I would’ve shot them myself before they could.”

The way her bottom lip trembled made something inside me break. I touched her lip, and when they parted, I stroked her cheek with the backs of my fingers. I wanted to kiss her and thought maybe she wanted it too.

But I was a coward. Too much of a coward to try.

“I don’t ever want you to harm someone to protect me,” I said, thinking of the thunderbirds I’d killed. “It does something to your soul. Rips a part of you out that you can’t get back.”

She blinked a few times, and when her eyes became glossy, I drew her to me and hugged her to my chest. Her arms encircled me, and just as she started to hug me back, she dropped her hands to my waist, where her fingers grazed my bare skin.

This—this was unadulterated bliss.

For the briefest of seconds, she nestled her head against me, where my heart hammered against her ear. Could she hear the way it pounded for her? She must have. Then—then she completely undid me by pressing her lips to my bare chest in the most tender kiss.

It seared my skin, my heart, my soul.

I was hers. At that moment and forever—hers.

She leaned her head down, but I let her go when she inched back, her face red and lips wet as if she’d just licked them.

“I, uh, sorry.” Her cheeks flamed redder. “I shouldn’t have?—”

I cupped her cheek. “You can kiss me whenever you want.”

Her eyes darkened, and just as I leaned in to kiss her, taste her, Hee-haw belted out a scream from somewhere in the house. Soft giggles followed.

“Tori’s awake.” She pushed a thick strand of hair behind her ear.

I nodded.