Page 32 of Lies That Blemish (The Ember War #3)

Aisling

Kohen was right. The very next day we proposed a peace treaty between all of our nations and showed that Kohen and I had been legitimately married before Maxim forced me and that they had no claim to my lands. The Luskin leadership signed the peace treaty without hesitation, and the day officially marked the end of the war. Peace Day.

My people made their way back home to Amersea, grateful to find it still standing, and Kohen and I began to talk about plans to spend the summers in Amersea and the winters in Imbria.

We decided to build a new house in each place that would fit our five siblings and future children. Arjun and Tej got along well with my sisters. We were one big, happy family. A little too happy, maybe, as I caught Arjun kissing Valor, and then we had to have a talk about rules and living under the same roof during puberty.

Two weeks after the peace treaty was signed, I was in the kitchen of Kohen’s home in Imbria when I felt Liana pull at my attention.

‘It’s time,’ she said, and a full-body chill broke out on my skin. I’d told Kohen about Liana’s past, her daughters, the fire sky, and my fear that when I was settled, she might leave.

‘No,’ I told her. I dropped the knife I’d been holding and went outside.

Kohen just watched me but said nothing, which meant Onyx had already told him what was happening.

I went outside, and Liana was waiting.

‘Time for what?’ I asked, hoping I was just being paranoid.

‘Come, let’s take a flight. Our last flight.’

‘No…’ I sank to the ground, my heart shattering into a thousand pieces. She walked over to me, nuzzling my neck, and I clung to her like a small child would. ‘Please don’t do this. I need you. I still need you.’

‘You don’t. Not as much as my other girls do. It’s time.’

This wasn’t happening. But I knew that if I didn’t go with her, she’d just leave without me, and I didn’t want that. I slipped onto her back and leaned forward, hugging her neck. ‘What if they aren’t alive anymore, or their life is fine and they don’t need you, or you don’t even make it?’

I felt so selfish at that moment.

‘What if it was Victory, Valor, and Virtue?’ she asked.

That won the argument. She was right. These were her children, her grandmother, her whole world she’d left behind.

‘I’m sorry. I don’t want to be without you.’

‘I know, young one. But we are bonded. No amount of distance can separate us.’

I didn’t want to tell her this, but she didn’t understand what this would do to me as empress to be creatureless. I’d have to succeed to Valor. But I would if it was what Liana wanted.

‘You will not be creatureless,’ she told me as she flew fast and hard for the Wilds.

‘I know, but you won’t be here, so people will see me as such.’

‘I don’t mean me. You will bond another. A dragon.’

‘No. I don’t want another! I want you.’

‘You have me. Always. But you will have her, too.’

‘Wait, how do you know I will bond another? Kohen had a vision?’

‘Yes. He didn’t know how to tell you I was leaving. He loves you too much to see you live in sadness.’

Oh, he would hear from me later about that!

‘Maybe I can go with you. I can survive fire and be reborn. What if your world needs help? We can come back together with your daughters.’

‘You cannot come, Aisling.’

‘Why? We could try. Worst case, I am reborn, right?’ I was frantically trying to think up ways not to lose her.

‘Because you are pregnant.’

Her words nearly knocked me off her back.

‘Did Kohen tell you that?’

‘No. I see life energy, remember? I’ve known for a week. The baby would not survive rebirth, and my world has never seen a human. You would probably be killed. I’m sorry, Aisling, but this is the end of my time with you. And what a blessing it has been to be by your side.’

Pregnant? I placed my hand on my belly and couldn’t help but grin. An heir of both Imbria and Amersea… it would be the first.

Before I knew it, Liana was descending over the Wilds. When she landed, she set me down on the forest floor, and I looked up into the fiery sky.

I hated goodbyes. I hated this. I slid off her back and clung to her neck.

‘My life was made better because of you,’ I told her.

‘And mine because of you,’ she replied.

I wiped away a stray tear and stepped back as movement at my back caused my head to turn that way.

Kohen was waiting off to the side with Onyx.

All the people who loved her and truly knew her were here to say goodbye.

“I hope you make it. I hope you find them. I’ll never stop thinking about you,” I said.

‘I’ll never forget when I had to explain to you that my eggs weren’t fertilized,’ she responded.

‘Hey, we said we would never speak of that again! ’ I smiled, glad she was leaving on a lighthearted note.

‘Goodbye, Aisling.’

‘Goodbye,’ I managed as my throat tightened with emotion.

Kohen came up behind me and wrapped his arms around me as we both watched her kick off the ground and shoot upwards like a fireball. We’d flown over and under the fire sky plenty of times but never through it. Watching Liana get closer and closer to the orange and pink fiery glow had my heart in my throat.

Come on, make it , I cheered in my head, holding Kohen’s arms around me. Then it happened. She breached the fire; there was a flash of light, and then nothing, like she’d been sucked into space. She was gone.

I nodded, turning around in Kohen’s arms. “You knew? And didn’t tell me?”

He frowned. “I couldn’t bear it. I’m sorry.”

I nodded. “That’s okay. I know something you don’t know now, too.” I grinned.

He cocked his head to the side. “What do you mean?”

I shrugged nonchalantly. “Oh, nothing. You will have to wait and see.”

“Aisling, what is it?” He jabbed me with one finger in the ribs, and I laughed. “You’ll see.”

Pulling me into his arms, he peered down at me. “Marry me again?”

“What?” I laughed.

“Marry me in front of the entire country in the biggest wedding our people have ever seen.”

I grinned. “Say it again.”

“Marry me.”

“No, say our people.”

Leaning down, he kissed my mouth. “Our people.”

It felt like the entire time I’d known Kohen, he’d been working to get me to see that the Imbrians and Amerseans were equals, united and better together, and I’d finally reached that place. I would die for Imbria, just as I would for Amersea, and I knew we still had some kinks to work out, but I was proud to call these people my own.