Page 106 of Boundless

“The Midnight King. Now is the time to start putting some distance between the two of you,” Maera repeated.

My heart fell to my heels before I even asked the next question, like my body already knew. “Why would I do that?”

She raised her thick brows for a moment. “You don’t know.” The look in her yellow eyes turned softer within the second.

“Knowwhat?” she made me ask.

“No king and queen from different courts can be together. It is forbidden by the stars. Two fae courts cannot be joined, Nilah. That is a law that cannot be broken.”

The memory of the last time we spoke to the Seer of Shadows came back to me slowly. Hadn’t she said something similar before Rune promised me it was nothing to worry about?

No, it can’t be.I shook my head as my stomach turned. “We’re not going tojoinanything—we’re just going to be together.”

She moved her horse closer to me. “How? You will be ruling the Frozen Court, and he the Midnight. How will you be together? You cannot be married. You cannotlivetogether. Neither palace would allow the other to live under its roof.”

“Then we won’t. We’ll findanotherplace to live,” I said through gritted teeth as tears gathered in my eyes and made a mess out of the image of her face.

My God, this hurt. Had the world suddenly run out of air? Because it fucking hurt to breathe.

A hand on mine. Maera’s warmth did nothing to calm the racing of my heart. “You cannot rule from another place, Nilah. And if you plan to try anyway, you might as well go back now because the curse will still be there if you step down from the throne. Ifanyof you steps down from your thrones.” A black cloud that was invisible to the whole world was hovering over my head, sucking life out of me—and Maera wasn’t even done yet.

“If that is what you truly want, then you should consider walking away together with Rune right now, live however many years Verenthia has left together.” I blinked, and the tears slid down my cheeks so fast it all felt like a dream to me. “But first, answer yourself this: will you be able to live like that, knowing all that you know?”

I didn’t see anything from the tears, just a little orange light bending here and there, and I was glad for it. I didn’t want to see. I didn’t want to know.

But I heard the footsteps of Maera’s horse as it moved forward. She left me alone—for a moment, I figured, to ask myself the silliest question in the world.

No, Icouldn’tlive like that. Rune couldn’t live like that. Of course, we couldn’t.

Just like that, the saving of the world became my doom just as much as the ending of it.

Not thinkingabout everything Maera and I talked about when Rune left to get supplies was surprisingly easy. Possibly because my sanity depended on it. Who wants to think about the very thing that would most likely tear them apart in every aspect, anyway? I certainly didn’t, and my brain was happy to pretend with me. I’d unconsciously decided that I’d keep at it until I couldn’t anymore.

That’s how we traveled on horseback for almost two whole days, sometimes running, sometimes walking, even stopping for breaks when the horses needed it.

Rune had gotten everything we needed from the Unseelies. We had food and water and blankets to lay on during breaks, and even spare clothes for each of us. We did make good use of them when we stopped to rest near a river just into Blackwater territory, and we decided to bathe. Maera went first, and then she watched the woods surrounding us while Rune and I went in.

We lost ourselves to each other in perfect silence that night, and I didn’t think for a single second that Iwouldn’thave him at any point in any timeline, any realm. I didn’t think at all—I just consumed him like he was my fuel, and I felt more alive afterward. The moon kept us company, and the water was perfectly cold, and it reminded me of the first time we were together in that lake in front of Raja’s house.

Much too soon, it was time to get back on the road.

Sometimes we talked, shared stories with one another—three people from such very different worlds come together. It fascinated me every time Maera spoke about her upbringing, and every time Rune told us about how the Midnight Court was supposed to be ruled now that he was king. I even found it exciting to tell them the most boring stuff from Earth, then watch them find it so damn fascinating, like it was the most interesting thing they’d ever hear.

Sometimes we were silent and let the sounds of the horses’ footsteps try to relax us. During those times I liked to pretend I was riding with Rune on the same horse like that time, and I was sleeping in his arms. I got so used to the whole thing, it surprised me. I wascomfortable,not afraid in the least, because I wasn’t alone. The woods in Mysthaven had felt familiar, and Blackwater felt perfectly safe to be in without turning to watch my back every second—because Rune was there. Maera was there. I could go on like this forever.

But we arrived at Ashfall Keep before sunrise on the third day.

thirty-two

It wasunlike anything I could have imagined.

When Rune said it was built in a gorge, I didn’t think it would be a hundred feet below the ground.

“Holy fuck, that’s far,” I breathed when we came out of the tree line and went near the cliff, on our horses still.

“That’s Ashfall,” Rune said in wonder.

“It looked much smaller in drawings,” said Maera from my other side, and for a good moment after, we were all silent as we took in the view in front of us.