Page 55

Chapter Thirty-Five

L unelle and Mirquios waited at the edge of the Mercurian Gate, now filled with courtiers and their daily travel plans.

Most of them politely pretended not to know who they were, but a few stopped and stared, leafy green curiosity ruffling their chests. It had been thirty years since a Lunarian Princess was spotted outside of the Lunar Court, and now here they both were.

Fire and Ice.

“You’re confident Mother doesn’t suspect your affiliation?”

Lunelle nodded. “Yes. And I intend to keep it that way. It will make things easier when I take the throne.” Astra hesitated to say what she wanted, causing her eyebrow to arch.

“What is it?”

“What if Mother is part of whatever Selenia did? What if she helped her set Leona up?”

Lunelle turned this over in her mind. “I don’t know.

I can’t imagine them in leagues with one another.

When you were first born, Selenia and Mother frequently fought about you.

I was little and didn’t understand most of what was going on, but it always felt tense.

She doesn’t seem to have much affection for her mother. ”

Astra wasn’t sure exactly what to make of that information. “She doesn’t seem to have much affection for anyone.”

She winced. “You’re not wrong. What exactly did Ivonne say?”

“She didn’t, we stole some documents and notes from her office. I’ll take you through them tomorrow. Maybe Ameera and I missed something.”

“What does the commander think?”

“He’s suspicious as well but seems to be on Oestera’s side more than not. I think he knows more than he lets on about her and Leona. We’ve compared notes on The Flare, and I have to say, I don’t think we know even the beginnings of the truth.”

She glanced across the courtyard where Lux and Mirquios spoke in low tones.

“Mirquios and I have had similar conversations. I know you and Mother have a very different relationship than we do, but I don’t think she’s the enemy.

Selenia, however… something was always off there, don’t you think?

The rebels have eyewitness accounts that she was present in Solaris before The Flare. ”

She nodded. A group of courtiers edged closer to them as they waited to jump.

You and Luxuros , Lunelle mused in her mind. You two seem to have gotten past your differences.

He’s a stubborn bastard, but I suppose we have. Astra tried not to scream internally for fear Lunelle would hear it. The differences that had developed in her absence were insurmountable.

Lunelle’s eyes fixed on the men. They laughed about something at the edge of the gate with several guards—two brothers reunited. What’s up with how hot he is?

“I wouldn’t say hot,” Astra sputtered aloud. “I’m sure some women would find him to be quite handsome, but with his attitude?—”

Lunelle cut her off with a giggle. “I meant his temperature. It’s insufferable.”

Her heart raced, was Lunelle more sensitive than she’d thought?

“You feel that?”

Her nose scrunched. “Do you not?”

“Remind me to teach you a trick to stop it when we get home.”

“Are you ladies ready?” Mirquios asked, crossing the platform as he offered his hand to Lunelle, who only winked as she let him pull her into the Rift. No hesitation. No fear as she took to his side.

Lux watched them disappear into the mist, his eyes far away. “One last dance, Sol’ah ?”

She crossed her arms, ignoring his outstretched hand. “Is that Mercurian for ‘pain in the ass?’”

“Solar Elvish.” He leaned forward, brushing a finger across the bridge of Astra’s nose. “Something like stardust. It’s what they call freckles.”

“You do not fight fair,” she groaned. She didn’t have time to stew, he wrapped one arm around her waist as he pushed them off the platform and into the swirling river.

They tumbled for a second, Lux working to steady them as colored threads tickled her face.

“Find the Lunar thread,” he rumbled against the top of her head. She watched for a silver strand, glinting above her head, and reached for it. Her fingers clasped around the tendril, colder than she’d anticipated, and away they went.

Lux leaned his head down to her—getting closer to her ear, she realized—as other bodies flew by them.

“When you get to the gate, imagine yourself landing upright in your mind like you do when you’re igniting things. It’ll help you stick the landing.”

“Got it,” she said, watching as other gates raced by, gleaming moonstone coming into view ahead.

As they came up to the gate, the silver thread faded out of the mist. She did exactly as he said.

Her feet collided with moonstone pavers in the palace garden, only faltering for a heartbeat before she steadied them.

She hit her hands against his chest. “See? That would have been a useful instruction the first time. Imagine what I can accomplish with the right information.”

Lux pointed at her feet, his face twisted in irritation. “Where’s the fighting stance I taught you? You’re too loose on your feet. You land like this and anyone waiting at the gate will have you on your ass before you can see straight!”

“Must you always do that?” she growled, pushing away from him with more force than needed.

“Hey,” he hissed, grabbing her arm and pulling her back to him. “I’m not going to apologize for ensuring you’re safe. Especially if I’m not going to be around to protect you.”

She rolled her eyes, yanking away from his grasp, fire sparking in her veins.

“I protected myself for thirty years without your help. I hardly need a bodyguard. You’ve seen what I’m capable of firsthand!”

Lux scoffed, “And how much progress have you made with me? You’re a completely different woman than the one I met in these very gardens. That’s because I pushed you! And don’t you dare act like you hated every second of it—you get off on proving me wrong at every turn, Princess.”

She stomped forward, seething. “Mother above, if you spent half as much energy on getting to know yourself as well as you think you know me, we wouldn’t be in such a fucked up?—”

A throat clearing stopped Astra mid-sentence.

They turned toward Mirquios and Lunelle at the same time, both of their faces perplexed. Lunelle spoke first, already settled back into her perfect princess mask.

“Do you two need a moment?”

“No,” Astra swallowed, stepping away. “The commander was just leaving.”

“Are you not staying, brother?” Mirquios asked, clearly unaware of his commander’s plans.

Luxurious did not so much as glance at his king before turning back toward the Rift. “Send word if you need me.”

Astra did not wait for either of them before stomping off to her bedroom, desperate for sleep, the Tether mocking her with each step.

* * *

“Hello?”

Astra wiggled bare feet against the soft dirt and pavers of the palace gardens, all the right elements but in all the wrong order. The moonstone pavers formed criss-crossed lines across the courtyard instead of a central square around the fountain. The hedgerows swayed gently in strange ripples.

Astra glanced at her hands, a golden glow contrasted under the moonlight.

“I know you’re there,” she called out to the ether, a dark chuckle echoing off the fountain in response. Heavy boots knocked against the pavers as Lux rounded the hedges. He stopped fifteen paces away from her, a satisfied smirk painted across his lips.

“Did you bring me here to apologize?”

Her eyes narrowed. “Even in my dreams, you’re a nightmare.”

“Is that how you really feel, Fire Queen?”

“I don’t think you want to hear how I really feel.”

“That’s probably true,” he whispered, a wave of purple guilt rising over his shoulders. He had no need to block Astra in this version of reality, she already knew too much.

“The night we met,” she started, taking a few steps forward, gesturing to the hedges. “Why engage me at all? You could have kept running.”

His jaw tightened, falling in line beside her as they strolled across the garden. “You ask as if you wouldn’t have run after me.”

“You didn’t know how stubborn I was yet,” she laughed.

“Oh, yes I did,” he countered, tucking his arms behind his back as they reached an arch in the hedges, now on opposite sides of the carved opening as they were all those months ago.

“We’d heard a great deal about the mighty Fire Queen at that point, and every report was a harrowing tale of the fierce leader who couldn’t be stopped. ”

She shook her head. “You’re avoiding my question.”

“I tried to run,” he answered, his eyes holding onto hers.

“Knew I should have. I begged at least a dozen goddesses for the strength to do it, but you were right there. I knew I was leaving that evening and I didn’t plan on returning until I’d severed the Tether or sorted it out somehow. I just wanted one moment with you.”

“And you used it to tease me?”

“I used it to scare you,” he whispered, his words harsh. “I used it to make you hypervigilant of your enemy. If I was going to leave you, I’d at least ensure you had your wits about you. You saw how many Solarians I caught in the Midwood. I needed you to feel fear for once in your stubborn life.”

“How did you walk away?” She caught his hand, leaning into his palm. “I keep telling myself that if you could do it, so can I, but here I am.” She drew a shaky breath.

Lux snorted. “Is this what walking away looks like? I made it a few days at most. I came back over and over again to check on you. You almost caught me a few times.”

She pressed her lips together. “Everything aside—our bloodlines, your beliefs about them at least, the war… if I was just me, and you were just you, and we ran into each other somewhere…” She smiled, despite the pain in her chest. “If our hands both reached for the same cup of coffee in a village market and the Tether connected us before you could stop it…”

He frowned. “If everything about our circumstances were completely different, what would I have done? Is that what you’re asking?”

She nodded. His fingers twitched, hard lines carving into the edges of his mouth.

“If absolutely everything were different,” he sighed, a hand skimming her jaw as he held her cheek. “I’d have introduced myself, first of all.”

“Good start,” she breathed, lost in the scent of the leather cuff on his wrist.

“And then I would have done one of these.” He pointed to his chest and then hers, eyebrows arched, a wry smile on his lips before silently mouthing, ‘Did you feel that?’

Astra laughed, so unused to this lighter version of Lux, his head finally over the water her presence drowned him under on this astral plane.

“And then, you would have wounded me with a biting remark that secretly only made me want to impress you all the more.” He grinned, the magic of it shoving her off a cliff she’d never recover from.

“I’d play it off like I wasn’t affected by your cutting words, but really, I’d think about them that night, in my bed, about the delicious way your lips curl around insults…

well. A man can’t help but think about the way they’d curl around other things. ”

He backed her into the trellis, the length of his body fitting against hers like two broken shards of the same crystal. She watched his eyes drink her in, taking his time.

Even here, in a plane that numbed the heat between them, she suffocated in his shadow. Her fingers traced lines in his chest, slipping under the band around his waist. Scarlet lust filled her lungs, begging to spill over.

He shook his head, pushing her hands away. “It’ll only make this more difficult.”

“I’m not afraid of difficult,” she insisted. “I can handle difficult. What I can’t handle is never knowing.”

“You’re not missing much. I’m nothing special.” Lux laughed, sliding his hand from her face to her shoulder, his fingertips fussing with the ruffled neckline of the white nightgown she’d pulled on before falling to sleep.

“Surely you don’t believe that,” she whispered.

“I used to, before you started looking at me like that.” He dropped his hand to her hip, settling into the curve. “You have to stop looking at me like that.”

“Would you prefer a withering glare?”

“No. That’ll only make me want you more.” He stepped back, a rush of cool air filling the void. Lux took her hand and strolled with her once again. “I’ll never forgive myself for what I’ve done to you.”

“Me either,” she chuckled. “I’ll stop torturing you for tonight, then. We haven’t really talked about Oestera yet.”

“I was wondering if you’d spoken with your sister about her thoughts.”

“Lunelle doesn’t think she’s involved with Selenia, or at least doesn’t believe she’d do anything to defend her. They’ve always had a strained relationship.”

“I think you should talk to her,” he said, stopping as they met the gnarled trees of the Midwood, sparkling in silver moondust on this plane.

“And ask what? ‘By the by, is your mother actually evil? And are you covering it up?’ Didn’t seem to go well for Ivonne.”

Lux snorted. “I trust you can be more tactful than Ivonne.”

“Ah yes, that’s what they call me. The Tact Queen.”

This earned her a laugh from his chest, a sound she’d give anything to be the reason for again and again and again.

He leaned his forehead against hers, the red haze within him fading into a gentle rose pink—a feeling she was hesitant to name.

He pushed a soft kiss against her temple, catching his breath.

“Maeve knows someone in Venus who can sever a Tether safely. We’re visiting tomorrow to see what all it entails. ”

Her heart stopped for a moment, the hollow space in her chest where she should have felt a tugging empty.

“And there’s no convincing you to find a market coffee stall somewhere?”

He frowned. “Run away together?” His eyes held a million futures, none of them theirs. She made a mental note to find Daria when this was all over and flog herself at her feet.

“Just for tonight, I want to hold you like I wish I had on the Equinox. Before.”

“Before?”

He nodded, pulling her backward, the garden around them swirling into a blur of greens and purples. They fell onto a soft bed, a lush black silk canopy falling over them, stars vibrating with a soft glow.

“Before,” he said again, beside her now, draping his arm over her hips as she curled into him. She laid a hand on his face, his eyes closed against the pressure, afraid to see where his vulnerability landed him.

Before Fate struck, damning her into an irrevocable attachment without a choice, he meant. When Astra was just her, asking just him to stay in the dark of night, no cosmic obligation.

Tomorrow, he would end it all, just as confident that he was right as she was sure he was wrong.

They lay under the canopy, neither of them speaking.

Sun and Moon, bound by Fate, broken by blood.