Frostblood (Frostblood Saga #1)(90)

“I understand,” I said. “I care about the monks, too.”

He sat back and stroked my hair with his hand, then lifted my chin until my eyes met his. “Ruby, I want you to know I’d changed my mind. I was going to tell Brother Thistle we had to find another way. But then…” His hand convulsed. “I was in agony when I returned to the abbey and found that you’d been taken. I followed, but you were too far ahead. Once you reached the castle, I needed a strong force to fight Rasmus’s soldiers.”

“And you did it. You won.”

“Things looked bleak until the champions declared they were for me.”

My affection for Braka grew tenfold. “Good.”

“They have been released from any servitude under my rule, Ruby. They are free men and women now.”

I beamed up at him, bursting with pride for the new king. Arcus smiled back and my heart kicked up a fuss at the glorious sight.

“I thought you would like that,” he said, his hands sliding around mine.

I screwed up my courage and told Arcus how the Minax had called me its “true vessel.” His hand tightened on mine as I spoke.

“We will not let it take you,” he said, his voice rough with feeling. “I won’t let it, Ruby. I swear.”

I squeezed his hand because he meant to comfort me. But how could we fight something as ephemeral as darkness?

“You look tired,” he said more softly. “I should let you rest.”

Reluctantly, I let his hand go. “You need to prepare for your coronation. I wish I could come.”

He shook his head, his look stern. “You’re too ill. When your fever comes down, you can do what you like. Until then, no visitors and no leaving this room.”

I remembered telling him once that he could never control me, which he’d find out to his detriment if he tried. But he wasn’t like his brother, exerting control over people for the pleasure of it. Arcus was imperious, but it came from the need to protect. And just then, tired and battered as I was, I didn’t mind.

“You are very kingly when you give commands,” I said, unable to keep my lips from twitching. “It makes me want to defy you, just for the sake of it.”

He eyes danced. “And risk the charge of treason? Do you want to end up back in a cell, Lady Firebrand?”

I mocked his stern look with one of my own. “That is nothing to jest about.”

He grinned and put a hand to his chest. “Your eyes scorch me. I wish I were half as frightening as you when I get angry, my little inferno.”

“You’re plenty frightening when you want to be.”

His grin softened. “Not to you, I hope.”

My pulse reacted to the tenderness in his eyes. “Only when I thought you were going to sacrifice yourself for me. How could you?” I looked down, then back up, fighting shyness. “It would kill me never to see your handsome face again.”

Suddenly, he was crushing me to him, his chest rising and falling on a deep breath, before he put me gently back against the pillows. The once-cold blue eyes simmered as they met mine.

“Thank you, Lady Firebrand,” he said, and his voice sounded as if it were coated with rust. “I will take those words to bed with me every night to comfort me.”

Images of his bare chest covered by a sheet brought heat to my cheeks. He planted a kiss on my forehead and started to rise.

“Arcus,” I said, still keeping one of his hands captive. “Someone told me that affairs between fire and frost never end well.” I didn’t say more, but he seemed to understand the question I wanted to ask. Would our end be as tragic as that of the Frost King who married a Fireblood queen?

He paused, and my heart stuttered. But then he sat back on the bed next to me, looking more thoughtful than concerned.

“I doubt our kind have been together often enough to answer that question. I’m convinced the throne had a hand in the death of the Fireblood queen. I don’t fear your heat and you don’t fear my frost. And besides…”

As he leaned in, I slid closer and lifted my chin. He dipped his head and pressed a kiss so blistering in intensity to my lips that his cold burned hotter than fire.

It didn’t hurt, but it did burn, and not in a way I minded. My blood woke up and my fever spiked and my mouth went bone-dry. Little shivers ran from my lips down to every part of my body.

He was gentle but unrestrained at the same time, as if he were showing me something, giving me something of himself. It made me feel raw and new and precious. I gave myself back, showing him with my lips and my hands on his cheeks and in his hair and on his beautiful scars that I needed him in ways I was no longer afraid to share with him.

When we were both breathless, he broke away and smiled. I smiled back. And then he put his lips gently back to mine, his fingertips under my chin.

“When it comes to you,” he whispered, “I like to be burned.”