Page 20

Astra sighed, her suspicions confirmed once again.

“They must be down. Fuck.” She fussed with the bag of cards on the bookshelf, unable to look at the commander as she thought back to that arrow on her way into Lunaria.

Her fingers drifted toward the scar on her arm, healed over now but still visible against her lighter skin.

“When you say ‘we’ thought I wouldn’t notice… the king knows about your lineage?”

Luxuros nodded. “I am loyal to my king and court, Princess. I am a Mercurian above anything else.” His face fell as he recalled something painful, something she’d expect to have a flare of bruised purples or reds associated, but there was nothing.

“I have no memories from before The Flare. I was just a child.”

“I’m sorry,” Astra said, knowing how deeply embedded the trauma of The Flare was in anyone who survived it. “Your chest,” she continued, pointing to the black box beneath his leather. “How are you so tightly guarded from me?”

He tilted his head sideways, a slow smirk crawling across his lips. “You Lunarian women are so addicted to your intuition, you hate having to use your human sides.”

“I’m not complaining. I’ve no interest in your emotions, Commander. Merely curious how you manage it.”

“Decades of practice. Lunarians don’t have a monopoly on magic. I’ve been in and out of all nine Living Courts. I’ve had to protect myself.”

Astra’s heart squeezed at the thought that she wasn’t alone in this world, that perhaps there were others suffering with her same affliction. She’d always assumed she was singular in her curse. She turned toward him, forcing herself to stare at his face despite the heat’s irritation to her eyes.

“You have to get your head above the heat or you’ll never be able to stand me.”

“Can my will also supersede your personality?” She muttered.

This drew a surprised laugh from the commander, his shoulders shrugging with the sudden force of it. He winced and reached for the injury she’d caused.

“How bad is it?”

“The wound to my shoulder or my pride?” Luxuros stretched, grimacing against the pain.

“I don’t much care about your pride.”

“It’s not good,” he said. “I was unaware of the… the flames.” He wiggled his fingers between them.

“I have something that will help,” she mumbled as she slipped through the door to the right of her bookshelves, directly attached to her bed chambers. She darted across the darkened room and into the vanity, searching through the drawers for the salve Ameera made.

When the fire first started, she was just a child, unable to maintain her control of the embers. They’d often scorch her fingertips or thighs as she sat in lessons. She took in a gulp of cool air, unaffected by the commander’s heritage through the wall.

“Ah,” she exclaimed as her hand found the cool jar at the back of the drawer. She moved quickly back into the study, where Luxuros had abandoned his perch, and moved closer to the painting above her desk, examining it.

“My father’s work,” Astra said quietly as she unscrewed the lid from the jar.

“It’s incredible.”

Astra glanced up, used to Nayson’s talent, but always thrilled to hear someone else acknowledge it. The commander touched his chin, taking in the ruddy canyon as a brilliant sunrise popped over the horizon.“It’s an Earthen canyon?”

“Yes, my father’s home village.”

“What’s in the—oh! Is that a dragon?”

Astra smirked as she scooped a generous amount of the salve onto her fingers, steeling herself as she approached him.

“ My dragon.”

“You ride?”

“Not as often as I’d like.”

“How many princesses ride dragons?”

Astra shrugged, gesturing for him to sit down in her chair. “Plenty, I’m sure. They just aren’t allowed to brag about it.”

The commander leaned away from her outstretched fingers. “You don’t have to do that?—”

“Don’t get too excited, Commander. I’m mostly curious about what the damage looks like. I typically only burn myself.”

Luxuros stared at her, unsure if he was willing to be that vulnerable with the person who caused the injury in the first place. He straightened his back, setting his mouth in a hard line. “Typically?”

Her lips fell into a frown. “Typically.”

He straightened his shoulders but made no move to let her get closer. Astra was out of patience at so late an hour. She scraped the salve from her fingers back into the jar and tightened the lid, shoving it into his hands.

“Morning and night. If it starts to look worse, let a maiden know. You’ll need a healer quickly.”

“You’ll destroy our court,” Luxuros said, tucking the salve into a pocket. “If you don’t get it under control.”

A ruby rage flooded her lungs. “Seems a little unfair to gauge my level of restraint from an unexpected attack by someone who, for all I knew, was my sworn enemy. The fact I didn’t kill you should tell you everything you need to know about my restraint, Commander.”

“And it would, if that’s all I was speaking of. There are rumors about you, Fire Queen. You’re reckless.”

“You don’t know anything about me, Commander.”

“I know you didn’t spend three years in Celene out of the goodness of your heart?—”

“Do not speak of them. I may not have left here on my own accord but that city is home to me and you’ll watch your tongue.” The rage simmered into a boiling ache as she willed it back down. “You may leave.”

Luxuros stood, the heat in the room rising. “You have to get your head above it, Princess, or we’re all fucked.”

“Good evening,” she forced as his hand hit the door handle. His arrogance was bad enough, but his flippant willingness to throw around Celene had her steaming. “And Commander?”

His head snapped left, one eye peering over his shoulder at her.

“If you find yourself on the edge of my blade again, know that I will not hesitate a second time.”

His lips twisted into something like a grin, an unbelievable coolness to his stare, considering his sweltering presence.

“If you had any grit to your fighting stance, I might just take you seriously.”

He closed the door quietly behind him, leaving her to seethe for the better part of the night.

* * *

“Don’t get excited, Commander. I only want to see the damage.”

Astra’s study was much less suffocating on this plane. The walls rippled as she approached the commander. The salve against her palm was cooling but not nearly as effective as it was in reality.

Luxuros held her stare once again, but here, in the dream version of him, there were fewer reservations.

He sat at her desk, untying the laces of his leathers and letting his chest piece fall away to the floor, revealing a soft linen shirt stained with whatever concoction he’d gotten from the infirmary.

He pulled the collar of his shirt to the side, revealing a fist-sized wound at the top of his shoulder, tangled with golden ink that ran under his shirt and disappeared.

He hissed as she reached for it, pulling away. “Those hands cooled off?”

Astra rolled her eyes, pushing a leather cord around his neck to the side to make sure she fully covered the wound. He flinched as she worked, the faint heat between them popping and sizzling.

She touched the edges of the golden tattoo, tracing one of the lines. “Chains?”

“Don’t touch them,” he said softly. “They’ll only trap you.”

Astra woke sweating, her fingers tingling with the heat of his blood.