Page 21

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

JORGE

T he crowd erupted, their voices a thunderous roar. Blood pounded in my ears as it ran from Kael Drakos' empty chest. I turned to see Charlotte, unsure of what I was expecting to see. I'd just killed her hero.

Her dagger gleamed in the sunlight. The metal was dim in comparison to the brilliance of the smile she arrowed directly to my heart. She stepped over the disgraced warrior to get to me.

The cameras were trained on us, the crystal screens broadcasting every moment. I didn’t care. Let them watch. I pulled her close and kissed her.

We'd done it. We'd won. We were finally free: free to be ourselves, together.

Her lips were soft, but her kiss was fire—hot, desperate, claiming. The crowd’s cheers reached a fever pitch. All I could hear was her sigh against my mouth, the faint hitch in her breath as she kissed me back. She was mine, and I was hers, and nothing else mattered.

We broke apart, our foreheads touching as we fought for breath.

The announcer’s voice boomed over the loudspeakers, declaring us the champions of the Sun and Moon Gauntlet.

The crowd screamed our names in a hypnotic chant.

It matched the beat of my heart, which had always whispered her name deep inside of me.

We turned to face the crowd, our hands clasped, waving as the cameras zoomed in on us. The crystal screens would be plastered with this moment, the kiss, the victory. They’d turn us into a story, a romance for the ages.

It was as we reached the edge of the stage that the reality crashed back in.

“Jorge? Is that…?”

I had known from the beginning that this wouldn’t end well. I'd dared again to taste heaven. Once again, I'd been caught .

At night, my dreams were a fifty-fifty chance. Half the time I dreamt of Charlotte, holding her to me, kissing her wherever I could get my mouth on her. The other times, my lips split wide as I screamed while another woman took my hand.

Outside of the gates stood waiting the woman who had made me scream.

My mechanical fingers wrapped around Charlotte's.

The fingers holding hers weren't real, but my brain, my heart, processed it as real.

I was so in tune with Charlotte that I sensed the sweat in her palms, the increase of her pulse as we looked at the mage who had torn us apart three years ago.

Unlike three years ago, Charlotte and I had a choice to make. The Convergence Games were held on sacred lands. Many countries warred on Lunaterra. But on this spot, even after the games were fought, any and all conflicts were null.

If we left, the mage had every right to take me into custody. I was in the army, the property of the crown.

If we stayed, then we both became the property of the Games and would have to fight again at the next event three years hence.

Three years.

Three years of nights with Charlotte in my arms.

Three years where no one and nothing could take her from me.

“Jorge, former second-in-command of the royal army, you are hereby charged with deserting your post and making an attempt on the future queen’s life.”

“What?” Charlotte stepped forward, placing herself between me and the advancing guards. “That’s absurd! I’m the future queen of Solmane. I am Princess Charlotte of Evergrove.”

“A likely story, ma'am. The princess is safely in the care of the Prince Adom.”

The look the mage gave Charlotte let the three of us know she knew exactly who Charlotte was. Instead of cutting off my hand this time, she was wrenching my heart from my body.

"Go, I will find you."

"No," Charlotte protested, holding me close. "Jorge, please. Please don't leave me again."

I pulled Charlotte to me and kissed her forehead. I only dared kiss the space between her head because I needed my wits about me. Anytime I tasted her breath or that sweet nectar between her thighs, I forgot I was mortal.

"Any parting between us is temporary," I swore.

"Don't you dare ask me to bear another second without you."

She slashed out with her blade. I would not have let her go. She could've gutted me in that moment and I would've asked if the cut was to her liking. But she pushed me away .

Her blade arced toward the guards, catching the first two who had advanced on us. Charlotte slashed again, her movements so fast, so fluid she had a clear shot at the mage.

The mage stepped back, but not before catching the tip of the blade on her forearm.

I stepped between Charlotte and the three advancing guards, letting the blade taste my skin.

With my body between Charlotte's and the guards, the men grabbed for me.

The only reason they got me was because I let them.

I let them wrench my arms behind my back. I let them remove the blade at my side. I let them disarm me of my prosthetic.

"No!" Charlotte's scream tore through the air. The sound of it was sharp and biting, like a blade slicing through my chest.

One of the guards lunged for her.

Time slowed.

The prosthetic, still gripped in the hands of the guard who’d taken it, sprang to life.

It twisted violently out of his grasp and launched itself at the throat of the guard advancing on Charlotte.

The man staggered back, his hands clawing at his neck.

Blood trickled where the edge of the blade had pressed against his skin.

“Touch her and die.”

The guards froze, their gazes snapping to me. The prosthetic hovered midair for a heartbeat longer before retreating, its blade retracting as it dropped politely back into the guard’s hand. The man trembled, nearly dropping the appendage.

I turned to the mage, still holding her bloodied arm. My voice was steady and cold as ice. “I’ll go quietly. But if anyone so much as lays a finger on a hair of her head—I will gut and quarter them. Do we understand each other?”

The mage said nothing but nodded her head.

The guards moved in, grabbing my arms and forcing me to my knees. The cold bite of steel shackles snapped around my wrists, the weight of them dragging against the phantom ache where my hand had once been.

I didn't feel a thing. Not in my arm. Not in my whole body.