Page 67 of To Touch A Silent Fury (The Bride of Eavenfold #1)

Tani

H e knew?

He knew.

Hanindred rubbed his cheek against my neck. What he know?

Of course, he would never have married me, then. How much of an idiot was I?

“How long?” I asked, needing to know how stupid I had been. “How long have you known?”

Lang stared at me, looking uncomfortable. He leaned further back, giving me more space but also letting the sun fall against his chest. If he had brought me out here to seduce me, he had made a mistake by his admission. “From the start.”

I clapped my hand over my mouth, letting Hanindred move how he wanted. There was no point hiding him now.

From our first meeting back in the forest… he had known. He had let me lie to him for weeks . By my blood, the embarrassment coursed through me faster than a swift river current.

“How could I forget a face like yours?” he asked. “Your beauty has haunted me for years. Did you think I would not know you in a breath, in a moment, at a glance?”

My heart skipped. “Why did you never—?”

“I destroyed your life. I wasn’t going to destroy your chance to rebuild it. It was the lie you needed to tell. As it still is.”

He said it so matter of fact. So plain. I destroyed your life.

My beauty had haunted him, he said. Did he know how his final look had haunted me? How the thought of his face as he appraised me from the arena had tormented me, driven me, fuelled me for years to come? How it still did, even as my traitorous heart had warmed to his unfathomable kindness?

Now, his kindness was understandable. It was nothing more than guilt. Some relief filled me, in that he must still believe me Broken, for he looked at me as if he knew he had smashed some irretrievable part of me.

Everything fell into place now. His strange remarks, his familiarity, his generosity. It was all to attempt to pay back his actions a span ago.

I must have imagined it was anything more.

“Why did you do it?”

Long had I wanted to ask him, and I thought I would never get the chance. Why did you Break me? Why was I such a problem? I didn’t even want my Fate, and still, I wasn’t allowed it. Why me?

Hanindred pushed against me again, and his attempt to console me only made me sadder.

But I would not cry. I stared at Langnathin with all the rage of years of struggle.

He did not flinch. “To save you.”

“No.”

He didn’t get to do that.

He flinched. “It was the only way I could save your life—”

“You lie,” I spat.

Fuck you. Fuck you, fuck you.

How dare he suggest he pulled the rug from my only chance of a life to help me? His rigid self-importance had me fighting not to slap him. My toes curled, my body tensed, every part of me lit with anger.

Langnathin only breathed, watching me like I was a wolf in the woods.

“My aunt tried to kill you once, in the market. She was there, at the arena, to try again. If I had not Broken your Fate that day, you would have died that night, I can promise you that. She wouldn’t have miscalculated a second time. ”

No. No.

That Princess Derynallis had been the one to organise the market attempt didn’t shock me. But I thought he had been part of it. That his plan, to destroy me when I did not die like they wanted, had entirely succeeded.

His words from the ball floated in my head, the same words powering my anger for years, now twisted in my memory, foggier and unclear.

You shouldn’t be here, he had said.

I’m so sorry your plan failed, I had replied.

Leave now, then, before the next one succeeds.

What if he wasn’t threatening me?

What if he was warning me?

My world turned, my stomach coiling. None of it made any sense. He had killed people; he had tried to destroy my Fate.

I shook my head, not allowing myself to believe him. “You burned four men alive to save me.” The words sounded even more ridiculous spoken aloud. To speak of such horrors when we floated on a sunlit canal like lovers, it was overwhelming. “Why? Why would you do that? ”

He glanced down at his feet, and took a wearied breath. “You were innocent. You still are. I couldn’t let something so perfect die.”

I shook my head, tears filling my eyes again. I felt more Broken then, than I ever had. “You are a monster.”

“Yes,” he said, without hesitation. Then he glanced back up, studying my face with such a wave of emotions that it was like staring into the sun. “I know you will never forgive me. But I cannot bring myself to regret my actions that day.”

The heat was suddenly too much, his words too much to process. I hated that I believed him. I hated that I could hear the sincerity in his tone. What I hated the most was my need to touch him. Part of me wanted to do it to verify he was not deceiving me, but it wasn’t the only reason.

He had known me and not said a word. I was a thing he had Broken and was determined to fix.

His kindness over the last weeks had burnt away half my hatred of him, and try as I might, I could not claw back the rage.

His decisions had been horrible and selfish, and yet, he acted from what he thought was right. To protect me.

Who was I? At that moment, I did not rightly feel I knew myself. I was a woman about to run from yet another home. This time, with no hopes of ever gaining her power back, nor much of even surviving at all.

Langnathin swallowed. “My father will not stop Banrillen’s mission. You will be married in three days.”

Defeat echoed in my head, clanging like distant bells. He knew who I was, he had already told me to run. I did not care to hide this from him now. “I will run. The night before.”

“Good,” he said. “Septillis aids you.”

I stiffened. He said it like a known factor, and I realised then that if he had known me, he must have remembered how Seth knew me. He knew we had a kinship on the island; he had seen us together embraced on the boat as he flew away. He had guessed Seth knew me just as easily as he apparently had.

I hated to be thus seen through, and yet, I couldn’t help the small gratitude. He had not given either of us away.

I nodded. “Yes.”

He nodded back, and forced a smile. “I am glad of it.”

I couldn’t look at him.

A light breeze touched the back of my neck, and I untied the straps holding Hanindred to me, knowing my back was damp with sweat.

We were in the middle of the water, with no one about, and nothing left to lose, only the Crook’s Spire in the distance to keep us company.

I carefully pulled the fabric out from under his rump, and he squeaked, looking at Langnathin again.

Friend? He asked me.

A tear fell into my mouth. Little late for that, Hanin. Then I looked at the Dragon Prince, and his faint smile as he looked at my dragon. My heart panged for everything that might have been, everything that made no sense to want. He won’t hurt you.

Hanindred hummed, and turned in my lap. He crawled forwards, then lost his balance on my skirted knee and tumbled into the bottom of the rowboat.

I couldn’t help but laugh. It came out more like gulps for air. Langnathin reached out and righted him as Hanindred grumbled at his interference and nipped at his hand.

Lang did not flinch; he just shook his hand in Hanindred’s weak grip. “You’re a feisty little thing, aren’t you? Going to be a big strong dragon one day.”

Hanindred played back, pouncing on his arm, and I heard the rumble of his purr. Strong together.

“His name is Hanindred,” I said.

If we were to leave, I wanted him to know it. I didn’t know why .

Lang looked up. “I’ve heard that name before,” he said.

“Not from your books,” I replied.

He tilted his head, then scratched Hanindred’s belly. “It is a good Twin Lands name. Suits him.”

By my blood, it hurt. Why did he have to be kind? Why couldn’t he be what I had made him to be? The evil prince who stole my life from me? Braxthorn’s minion.

He stared at me again, then, watching the tear track down my cheek. Once more, he reached his hand towards me. Uncertain. Nervous.

This time, I had to know.

I reached back.

The moment felt at once both simple and monumental. Fingers nervously reaching on a Tanmer day, as lovers might reach for one another that first time. Then his hand touched mine.

His warm skin against my own made me shudder, his hands calloused from his riding. We held hands then, as if shaking on a deal. His grip was firm.

I found the pity first, because it swirled on the top like debris. Below it was darkness. Grief tinged in despair. Desire to the point of need. Anger bladed in rage. Affection coiled with frustration.

His emotions fell over me, and I didn’t react, keeping my body still.

I wasn’t sure if there was any point in hiding this extra deception from him now, but if there was even the smallest chance of us—even if it was years away—he couldn’t know I wasn’t Broken.

For what I had seen in the war room. For what I needed to change.

For everyone who needed help in the five kingdoms, he could not know.

I held his emotions alongside mine, because at some point, I did not know where one stopped and the other started.

“Tanidwen,” he said. The sound of my name falling from his lips floored me just as much as it had before. “I thought when I came back, when you had the ruse of your illness… I was certain you had already left and that was a line to cover up your escape.”

I gave him a sad smile. I wished I was already gone. The thought of having to return to those same walls again for two more nights was more than I could bear.

He rubbed a thumb over my hand. “I’m happy I could see you one last time.”

Langnathin, the feared Dragon Prince, cared for me. Tanidwen, and not Vorska. Not for what my dragon represented, but for me. I could not tell if the source was entirely guilt, or something more, but I was far from immune to his desire. It swelled with mine, weaving it ever stronger.

I had done it, the man wanted me, and it was still not enough. I was about to go on the run for the rest of my life. Hanindred, who played with a piece of rope at the bottom of the boat, would never know peace. Septillis would throw his entire life away to come with me.

One last try. One last turn of the key. For them. For me. For the world at large.

I stared up at the man who once more controlled my Fate. “Am I so horrible a prospect you would not marry me yourself?”

He sucked in a sharp breath, shock rippling through him. “Tani—”

“I know I lied to you. I know I am not highborn. But can you not volunteer yourself? Spare me from your brother?”

A thrill shot through our hands. Delight, even. And then something more, something deeper, too. A sadness at a depth I could not fathom. An unworthiness as old as he was, covered up by his surprise. “You would accept me?”

I blinked, not expecting his reaction. “I trust that you do not want me dead. You would protect me and respect me, even if it is out of guilt.” I squeezed his hand. “I would accept you. ”

“If it was me, beside you. You would not run?” His voice was barely more than a breath.

Had he not suggested himself because of our history?

Because he believed I would never accept the man who destroyed my Fate?

It made sense. If he truly had Broken me, as he believed he had, I would never have plotted to come here.

I would never have left with him from Gossamir.

He must be entirely confused as to why I’d ever approached him.

“I would be running all my life,” I said, not telling him that somehow along the line I’d found I actually liked him. Not yet. “At least with you, we could find some common ground. Change a small piece of the world.”

At those last words, he tensed. Shame and anger floated to the top of his mind. I sensed his rejection before it fell as the regret steamed through him.

He hung his head with a groan. “Tani. I—”

I pulled my hand back. “It was a stupid suggestion.”

Langnathin pushed his hand through his hair, his other hand clenched at his side. “No. It’s just a lot to think about.”

I leaned forwards and scooped up Hanindred, placing him back onto my lap as I swept him into the fabric. “I get it,” I said, tying the straps. “You are a Crown Prince. I am a Broken thing.”

He growled, looking up at the sky. “That’s not how I see it.”

We stared at each other again, then. The Sightlander and the Touchlander. The Dragon Prince and the Moontouched Girl. The Prince and the Fugitive. We would always be on two different sides of this world, and I was a fool to think otherwise.

He did not speak again; he did not offer himself. He only looked guilty as anything.

That was it. The final throw of the dice, and I had lost. “I’d like to go back to my rooms now.”