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Chapter fifteen

W e all ate breakfast together the next morning. Togetherness overshadowed all we had seen that previous day and allowed me to forget who I was, just for a little while. Or rather, who I had to become.

And what that meant for my heart. A heart becoming drawn to someone other than the man I was meant to marry.

A man at least ten years my senior. A man tasked with teaching me to protect myself—to kill .

A man taking me to my real father, who had likely hired him in some capacity.

A man with a wife who was gone but lingered .

The skin around my thumbnail was thin from my nervous biting as l tried not to think about it. After all, I had counted the days since we left, and I didn’t forget what day today was. I could put off the worry, just for today.

Today, I was nineteen.

I felt a brush against my heavy knit sweater and sighed as an extra layer of warmth that smelled of him engulfed me. His jacket.

So much for not thinking about him .

Gemma noticed him touching me. She looked ready to lurch over the campfire and use her momentum to mow him over, away from me. But she didn’t, because she had seen me shivering just as he had.

I looked up at him. “Aren’t you cold?”

“No.” Gavin sat down beside me. “Have you eaten something?”

“Yes.”

“Listen to you.” Gemma glowered at him over the flames. “She’s a full-grown woman. You sound pathetic.”

“Uh-oh, Tremaine,” Gavin snapped back. “You’ve mistaken me for someone who gives a shit.”

I bit my tongue to suppress a reaction. It wasn’t easy. The horrified, offended look on her face both amused and distressed me. I would have been angry at Gavin, for her sake, but she wasn’t just distrusting him. She was doubting me because I trusted him.

“Wipe that grin off your face, Ary.” Her expression was hard, but her voice softened. “And don’t come running to me when you can’t get this deranged asshole to leave you alone.”

Gavin scoffed. I shot him a disapproving look. The corner of his mouth turned up into a smile. And then my breath caught in my chest when the broody, gruff, and delectable mass of man took a swig of his canteen, winked at me, and mouthed, Happy Birthday .

I lost my balance and almost fell off my log.

“Can we all just get along?” I half-shouted, catching myself with my free hand and doing my best to take any attention away from my swooning.

“Sounds great to me!” Caz chimed in.

“ We aren’t the problem,” Ezra muttered.

“Not when he’s after my girl!”

“ Gemma ,” I hissed back at her, cheeks hot.

She shrugged and smiled, absolutely feline. “Extra attention on your birthday. ”

Caz, Ezra, and Finn looked at each other, mouths open wide with big, silly grins. They hadn’t known.

I buried my face in my hands when they started to sing.

“No!” I groaned.

Gavin refused to sing, but he laughed, the sound deep and soothing.

I endured their song and their attention.

Joy shimmered in my chest. My limbs tingled with giddiness.

An irrepressible smile drew my lips so wide I wondered if traces of it would ever fade.

On my eighteenth birthday, my mother and I had been mourning.

I couldn’t remember any birthday before that.

Today was going to be a good day.

We arrived just outside of Tovick after a few hours of walking.

It was the largest village I’d ever seen.

We stood atop a grassy hill overlooking cobblestone streets lined with wood-frame buildings of varying heights.

Townsfolk bustled about, dressed warmly to fend off the crisp air. But happy and energized.

A grandiose house of worship, complete with a towering steeple surrounded by twelve equal points—one for each of the twelve gods of Nyrida—sat at the center of town. Dazzling stained-glass windows, bold with color, wrapped all the way around the captivating structure.

It was an effort to believe this place could exist so close to the dilapidated hell we had seen yesterday.

Gavin’s friend was not at the tavern he owned on the east side of Tovick.

It was closed, so we decided to camp just outside the town until his friend returned.

He was due to return on the fourth of this month, so we only had one day to wait.

We found a small clearing within a forest of oak trees and made camp.

After our midday meal, Gavin revealed he had a surprise for me.

Gemma objected, but he promised to steal me for only an hour.

I followed him toward the sprawl of shops and houses and people.

I started to tuck my hair in a messy bun beneath my green-and-gold knit hat.

But he took my hand and lowered it. The feel of his skin touching mine heated my blood.

“Leave it.”

“Aren’t you worried they’ll recognize me here?” I frowned. “We’re farther south. Finn says it’s more dangerous the closer we get to more Insidions.”

He assessed me quietly. “On our first day of training, I said you have nothing to hide. I meant it.” He gave a surrendering shake of his head. “I don’t want you living in fear.”

I smiled and let my waves of silver flow down my back like a cape, unafraid.

“Besides,” Gavin continued, eyes lingering on my hair and neck, “Tovick is safe beneath Simeon’s wards.”

With his hand on my lower back, he led me into a stable filled with a half dozen horses. It was roughly the size of the house in Warrich, covered with a straw-thatched roof and fully open on opposite sides—no doors—for the horses to easily move in and out.

“Why is it just the towns that have wards?” I asked, brow furrowed. “Why not other villages, like that village yesterday?”

“Simeon prioritizes places, people, things he deems vital to his cause—stopping and destroying Molochai.”

“And what do you think of that?” I asked. “Why should he get to decide who gets to be protected?”

Gavin sighed. “I can hardly fault him. I would let the whole world suffer if it meant seeing you safe and free.”

My mouth opened in shock. He was wrong to say such a thing, but the honesty in his eyes and clarity in his voice stole my ability to say so. And before I could—

“Have you ridden a horse before?” he asked me.

“Not that I—”

“Remember,” he muttered wearily, reminded of the burden of my lost memories. “Well, you’ll learn today.”

“These are your horses?” I watched him stride confidently toward a stall on the left side of the stable.

“A friend’s,” he replied over his shoulder. I wondered if it was the same friend who owned the tavern. How many friends did a man like Gavin Smyth have?

“Is this my birthday present?” I ran to catch up to him.

“No.”

I blushed, embarrassed I had mentioned a birthday present. I expected nothing. Why would he bother? Why would anyone bother, when there were so many important and grave concerns in this world?

Gavin stopped before a sleek black mare with a gray-speckled crest and tail.

He opened the door to her stall, gave her a sturdy pat on the neck, dropped the bag he had slung over his shoulder, and fixed her with a saddle.

He did the same with another horse before guiding them both out of the stable and into the open air.

I smiled at the mare. “She’s beautiful.”

“Yes.” He looked at me. “She’s always been my favorite.” Gavin enveloped my left hand in his calloused one and guided it down the mare’s neck, stopping at the reins. “Grab the mane with your left hand.”

I obeyed, and then instinctively lifted my left boot into the stirrup and kicked my right leg over the horse’s back.

“Yes.” Gavin smiled proudly and rested his hand on my knee. My eyes lingered on his touch, but he kept it there. “I knew you’d be a natural.”

The mare’s ebony coat was sleek and fine, flexible beneath my fingers.

“Wait for me.” Gavin started to turn toward his own chestnut-brown stallion but paused to ensure I would obey. My attention was fixed forward on the well-trodden trail before me. “Ella,” he warned, but I let the leather dig into my skin. It felt right.

I grinned, collected the reins, squeezed my heels into the horse’s side, and leaned into her movements like I’d been doing it my whole life. “You’ll catch up.”

He cursed and faded behind me as the horse’s trot climbed to a gallop.

She ran with a yearning for freedom I felt deep in my bones.

Her graceful bounds, synchronized with my racing pulse, made me feel like I was flying.

My body felt light, not weak or hungry like I’d been in Warrich.

The powerful mare carried me faster than my worries as her brilliant black shimmered in the winter sun.

She carried me faster than my burdens. She ran through fields of harvested wheat.

For a little while, we left the heaviness behind.

I steered her in a circle to go back the way we came and threw my head back in carefree laughter when I saw even mighty Gavin Smyth and his stallion were struggling to keep up with us. We rode for minutes, but I could have gone for hours. I smiled and laughed all the way back to the stables.

Instinct was the only way I could explain how I knew to sit back, relax my hips, and sink my weight into the saddle to slow the mare down to a trot and then, when Gavin caught up to us, a complete stop.

With my bottom lip between my teeth, I braved his heated glare to gauge the amount of trouble I was in.

His dark hair was disheveled from the wind and the muscles of his arms were straining the sleeves of his jacket. His strong, pulsing jaw was clenched tight, and while fury burned in his gaze, relief washed over the flames.

“You really did chase me.” I grinned, breathless. “All the way there and back. And you only look a little mad. ”

“I will chase you to the ends of the earth, Aryella.” A hint of distress darkened his deep timbre. He dismounted his horse and added, “Though I’d prefer you not make me.”

Once more, I threw my head back and laughed, if only to keep my giddiness—at his voice, at those words—from giving me away.