Page 46 of Between These Broken Hearts (Cursed Stars #2)

“We need to stop,” Kendrick says after a day of traveling through Fairscape on horseback. The sun is sinking toward the horizon

and since there are no ley lines to the oracle, we’ve been traveling since sunrise. “You’re exhausted.”

“I can keep going.”

He absently strokes my stomach with his thumb. “I could use a full night’s sleep too, and I know a place ahead.”

My stomach knots at the idea of waiting until tomorrow to see the oracle when we only have three days left, but I know he’s

as anxious as I am. “If we keep going, could we get there tonight?”

It’s just been the two of us all day. Kendrick sent the others back to the Midnight Palace with the Grimoricon so Brie could

start combing it for the answers they need. They tried to object, to insist Remme stay with us, but when Kendrick pointed

out that taking more than two people to the oracle at once is asking for trouble, they stopped arguing.

“I won’t take you to her mountain after dark. It’s too dangerous.”

I nod. “Okay. Maybe we can get up early enough to make it there by sunrise?”

He presses a kiss to the side of my neck. “I promise I’ll get you there.” His hand slips under my shirt and his thumb strokes the underside of my breast. “But after riding so close to you all day, I need the break too.”

“Is it that bad?” I joke. “I promised I bathed this morning.”

He tucks his fingers beneath the waistband of my pants and groans against my neck. “Dare I confess to you how many times I’ve

wanted to stop at a passing just to have you under me again? I thought waking you before the sun would help get me through

the day, but it’s only making it harder.”

My cheeks heat as I remember the way he woke me—slowly and patiently, with exploring hands, then lips, then tongue. By the

time I was fully awake, he was kneeling on the floor with my hips on the edge of the bed and kissing me in ways that made

the world disappear around us.

“I can’t stop thinking about the way you taste.” He sucks gently on the side of my neck, his fingers brushing just below my

waistband, and I shiver in his arms.

He guides the horse down onto a dirt road and then spurs her ahead, pushing her to ride faster. I cling to his arm, holding

on for dear life as he makes us both greedy for a private room, kissing and touching me for the rest of the ride.

When he finally slows the horse to a trot, we’re riding through a field of wheat and there’s a farmhouse in the distance.

“Whoa,” Kendrick murmurs, pulling on the reins and bringing the horse to a halt. He pulls his hands from underneath my clothes

and smooths them down before dismounting.

“What is this place?” I ask, looking around as he helps me to the ground.

“This is my home,” he says, eyes bright, then nods to the back porch, where the door stands ajar. “This is where my mother lives.”

“You didn’t!” I smack him in the stomach, then regret it when my hand meets a wall of muscle. “You could’ve warned me.”

He grabs my hand and grins. “What’s the problem, Slayer? Nervous about meeting my mother? I promise she won’t hurt you. She’s

protective of her children but—”

“I look like I’ve been to the Underworld and back!” I brush my ride-mussed hair from my face. “No, I look like something that

crawled out of the Underworld!”

He rakes his gaze over me. So slowly my cheeks heat. “I had no idea that place had so much to offer.”

“Stop,” I squeal. “This is serious.”

He’s still grinning as he bends, his mouth brushing my ear as he whispers, “She’s going to love you because I love you. That’s

all it takes.”

“Hale?” a female calls from the door. She has light brown hair and rosy cheeks, and while she has the rounded ears of a human,

I know it’s just a glamour to protect her in a realm that doesn’t welcome the fae. “Is that really you?” she asks.

He gives me a final encouraging look before turning to the door, my hand still in his. “Mom.”

“Oh, the gods are good,” she says, rushing toward us with open arms.

Kendrick releases my hand and catches her in a big hug, lifting her up off the ground. When he returns her feet to the earth

and draws back, tears are streaming down her cheeks.

“Is it finally done?” she asks. “Can you and Lis come home now?”

His face falls but he schools his expression so quickly I wonder if I even saw it. “Not yet, Mama. We’re still figuring it out.”

“But you’re here, and who’s this?” She offers me her tiny hand and I shake it self-consciously. “I’m Georgie.”

“This is Jasalyn Kincaid,” Kendrick says, and if his mother is waiting for a label to explain my relationship with him, she

doesn’t get it. What would he call me anyway? Friend is too weak a word and girlfriend seems ridiculous given how painfully temporary this may all turn out to be.

“The princess,” she says, no small amount of awe in her voice. “The oracle said you could help us.”

I note that she doesn’t use specifics. Because there are people listening or because using Erith’s name could trigger some

sort of magical surveillance?

“I wish to,” I admit, glancing to Kendrick. “But nothing has yet worked the way we hoped it might.”

“Hale will figure it out,” she says. “He always does.”

Kendrick takes my hand again and Georgie’s face twists into a nervous grimace. “Oh dear.”

“What’s wrong, Mom?”

She looks back and forth between us before leveling her apologetic gaze on Kendrick. “A while back I took someone into my

care. I couldn’t send you word about it for fear of the message being intercepted, but... she’s here.”

My stomach plummets into the soft earth beneath my boots.

A line forms between Kendrick’s brows. “Who?”

But I already know, and I hold Georgie’s gaze when I say, “Crissa.”

Her smile wavers. “You know her?” Her gaze drops to my hand, still in Kendrick’s, as if to ask why we’re still touching if I know about his betrothed.

Kendrick’s hand tightens around mine. “You’re sure it’s her? Because we’ve been fooled before.”

“Hale...” Her gaze bounces back and forth between us. I can’t tell if she’s confused or upset or feeling guilty. “I’m sure.”

I pull my hand from Kendrick’s and lift my chin. He’s not mine. I’ve always known he’s not mine. “I’d like to see her.”

Georgie worries her bottom lip between her teeth. “You’re sure?”

“Jasalyn knows Crissa,” Kendrick explains. “Mordeus imprisoned them together.”

Her mouth forms a small O and then she nods toward the house. “Come this way, then.”

Moments ago, I was drinking in every detail of this place. The fields Kendrick grew up running through, the trees he probably

climbed with his sister, the porch I can imagine his mother stepping onto to call them in for dinner. Now everything feels

gray around me. I shouldn’t have let myself get so attached to him. Not when we both knew what was coming.

Yes, he said he plans to talk to the oracle about how he could have a future with me, but is it fair of me to want that from

him? She is their queen, and he has dedicated his whole life to becoming their king.

The house is dark and cool, all the shades pulled with none of the wall sconces flickering.

It smells like cinnamon tea and fresh bread, and for a beat I imagine a different reality—one where Georgie was as happy to meet me as she was to see her son, one where she invited us in and served us refreshments as she asked me endless questions about my life and relished the opportunity to get to know the woman her son loves.

One where I was a welcome addition and not a problem.

I shake the image away before it can latch on to me and drag me into the darkness.

“How is she?” I ask.

“She’s back here,” Georgie says, leading us through the house. “Healthier now. She was weak when they brought her to me last

month, but she’s grown strong with the opportunity to rest and heal.”

Kendrick’s steps slow until he falls back behind me, but I continue toward Crissa. Toward the reality I should’ve accepted

a long time ago.

Kendrick’s mom knocks twice at the door and then opens it a crack. “Crissa? May we come in?”

“Of course.” The familiar voice sends me back to that dark dungeon I would’ve done anything to escape, back to a time when

she was the only thing making me hold on.

Georgie pushes the door the rest of the way open, and Crissa comes into view, her long blond hair braided and twisted into

a crown atop her head. Her eyes light up, and in a single breath, all my self-pity is forgotten beneath the joy of seeing

my old friend. Kendrick saved me in those dungeons. But Crissa saved me first.

Crissa sets her book to the side and stands. “Jasalyn!”

I ignore the feel of Georgie’s and Kendrick’s eyes on me as I cross the room and Crissa and I embrace each other. She is stronger than the last time I saw her—that time she was so weak from using magic to help me survive.

“It is so good to see you,” she says, pulling back and beaming at me. “I knew you’d make it out of there.”

“Thanks to you,” I say, then chance a glance behind me. “And Kendrick.”

Crissa’s expression wavers, but she schools it into something unreadable when she gives her attention to her future king.

“Hello, Hale. It’s good to see you are well.”

“Same, my queen.” His face reveals a jumble of emotions, but he lowers himself onto one knee and bows his head, and I feel

it like a knife dragging through my gut.

The silence is so tense, it thrums through the room.

“Please stand, Hale,” Crissa says softly. “You never need to bow to me. The oracle named you as my equal.”

The way I spin and rush from the room is probably rude. It’s definitely unfair. But I’m going to be sick if I observe another

second of this reunion.

Half an hour later, Kendrick finds me on the back porch, looking out toward the swaying fields of wheat.

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs. “I had no idea. I...”

I wrap my arms tighter around my chest, as if putting pressure on my aching heart might stop the hemorrhaging. “You don’t

owe me an apology.”

He brushes my shoulder. I flinch, and he jerks his hand away. “She and I talked. I explained our plans to visit the oracle.”

“We planned that when we thought she was missing. The fact that she’s not is something to celebrate.”

“I agree, but it doesn’t change anything between us.”

I can’t look at him. Not if I want any chance of holding myself together. “You’re not mine, Kendrick. I’ve always known you

weren’t mine.”

He takes me by the shoulders and slowly turns me to face him. I stare at his chest, afraid I might break if I look into those

blue eyes. “But I am,” he says. His hands slide down my arms and he steps closer until I surrender and lean against him. He

threads his fingers into my hair, pressing a kiss to the top of my head. “What you think you know is irrelevant. I am wholly

and completely yours and no matter what the oracle says, no matter what is or isn’t tattooed on my skin, that will be true

until I draw my last breath, and it will still be true when I roam the lonely fields of the Twilight waiting for the moment

my soul meets yours again.”

I can feel Crissa’s eyes on me as I move through the room, preparing for bed. I pretend I don’t notice, finish my nightly

routine, light a small candle beside my bed to burn through the night, and slip between the covers. “Just turn down the lantern

when you’re ready to sleep,” I say, forcing myself to give her a smile. She certainly deserves more than a little gratitude

from me.

“You are in love with him, with Kendrick the Chosen.”

I hate that title. Every time I hear it, I’m reminded of who he is and who I’m not. He’s not mine and I can’t be his. “It

doesn’t matter,” I say.

She douses the lantern between our beds and sits on the edge of hers. “If there is a world where love does not matter, I hope I never have to live in it.”

I roll to my back and stare at the ceiling, focusing on the shadows my candle’s flame has dancing there. “Kendrick is going

to be a great king and you will be a great queen. I can love him and not want to interfere with that. This is about something

bigger than me. And besides”—I swallow—“he will make a good husband and you deserve that.”

Sighing, she maneuvers under the covers. “You don’t need to be jealous of me. What Kendrick and I have been chosen to share—it’s

nothing like what you two have. I am going to grow old and my king will stay young until long after I’m gone. This is the

way it was always done before the Seven came into power. It is the best way to keep a human queen protected. It isn’t any

kind of marriage I would choose. We can’t have children. We won’t grow old together. And he’ll never look at me the way he

looks at you.”

I shouldn’t ask, but I’m too broken to resist. “And how does he look at me?”

“Like he would climb into the sky and rearrange the stars on your behalf.”

My heart twists painfully in my chest as I remember the advice Remme once gave me. Then you go find yourself a world with a whole new night sky. I swallow hard. “Why is it like that? A fae king, a human queen?”

“Every tradition from the old times was about protecting the queen. She was to be human so that she would best understand and therefore protect the weakest in the realm, and he was to be fae so he could guard her with his own immortality. He was to marry her so he would always be closer to her than anyone else.”

“He will make an amazing king,” I whisper. “Elorans deserve the pair of you to lead them into a better era.”

“It wouldn’t bother me if you wanted to stay—if you remained his lover, even after our marriage.”

She doesn’t mean to be cruel. It’s probably the best offer I could ask for. But I’m not the same girl I was during those years

I hid inside my sister’s palace. I know my worth now. If I am lucky enough to see a life beyond my eighteenth birthday, I

won’t disgrace that gift by living in the shadows. I deserve a life in the sun. “I’m not interested in that arrangement,”

I say as gently as possible, “but there is another way you can help me.”

She perks up. “Anything. Tell me.”

“Tell me how to reach the oracle.”