The Wish Granter (Ravenspire #2)(81)
She was going to ruin Teague, no matter what it cost her. She’d enlist Sebastian to get what she needed. She’d poison Teague’s food every day with iron and bloodflower. She’d study the contract she’d stolen and find something she could use as a loophole. She’d get her hands on the Book of the Fae and read every single page. She’d unlock the meaning behind the poem in Magic in the Moonlight. And she’d find an ally on Llorenyae who could uncover the reason behind Teague’s exile.
He had a weakness. He had secrets. And he’d done enough damage to her people.
By the time she was finished with him, Teague was going to regret ever setting foot in her kingdom.
THIRTY-FIVE
LIVING UNDER THE same roof as the princess and Teague was an exhausting balancing act. Sebastian was caught between being the ruthless, violent person who collected debts for Teague, the messenger who brought news of Ari’s well-being to Thad’s trusted palace guards and gave them information Thad might find helpful as he worked to find a way to rescue his sister, and the boy who longed to just sit beside Ari and memorize her smiles.
Two months ago, all he’d wanted was enough coin to buy a solitary life far from Kosim Thalas and the memories it held.
Two months ago, he’d been willing to break his promise to his brother for a chance to avoid another confrontation with his father. To avoid discovering just how like his father he really was inside.
He still wanted his cottage on a sea cliff. He still wanted to avoid his father.
But now he wanted Ari’s safety more.
Figuring out how to protect her kept him up at night, tossing and turning in his little room in the far corner of Teague’s villa while he ran various scenarios that always ended with the same conclusion.
If Teague wanted her dead, there was nothing Sebastian could do to stop him.
He didn’t have magic. He didn’t have weapons that could work against the fae. He had brute strength and fighting skills, but none of that mattered when your enemy had only to speak a single word to tear your world apart.
What Sebastian did have, however, was the princess herself. She was smart, resourceful, courageous, and determined—not to mention sneaky when she had to be. Maybe Sebastian couldn’t stop Teague the way he could stop challengers in east Kosim Thalas, but the princess didn’t rely on traditional weapons and situational awareness. She didn’t approach problems as if the right fighting stance would decide the outcome.
Ari gathered information from every source she could find and trusted herself to reach the right conclusions. She made multiple plans of attack. She acted decisively, but could brazen it out if a plan went sideways. And it never occurred to her that failure might be an option.
She’d warned him when they first met that she was relentless.
She’d been telling the truth.
Sebastian had no idea how they were going to ruin Teague; but he had confidence in his princess, and when she needed his strength and his skills, he’d give them to her.
Rising after another night of restless sleep and half-remembered nightmares, Sebastian washed, dressed, and followed the scent of cinnamon bread and frying bacon to the kitchen. Maarit was sitting at the table, slicing an apple into thin pieces, her fingers fumbling to hold the fruit steady. The princess hovered over a skillet of bacon on the stove, and Sebastian paused in the doorway just to look at her.
She wore a plain blue dress today, and the way it traced her curves did strange, dizzying things to his head. Her cheeks were flushed from the heat on the stove, and her hair was piled on top of her head in a messy bun that looked in danger of coming undone.
He wanted it to come undone.
He wanted her thick, gorgeous hair to fall down her back. He wanted her to give him that shy, secret smile she got when he stood close to her. And, stars help him, he wanted to touch her.
He wanted to see if he could hold her without bracing for pain. If the scars on his back would ache, or if the crashing sea of panic inside him that seemed to gentle when she was near would subside completely. But mostly he wanted to touch her because being with her felt like finding the answer to a question he’d been asking all his life.
“Well, look who finally decided to join us,” Maarit said as she clumsily popped an apple slice into her mouth.
Ari turned, her face lighting up in welcome when her eyes met his. His heart beat faster, and he ignored Maarit as he joined the princess.
“Are you hungry?” she asked as she flipped the bacon and then turned to cut thick slices off a loaf of bread with a cinnamon-sugar crust.
“Very,” he said, looking at the tendrils of hair that had escaped the bun and were clinging to the back of her neck.
“I’ve made bacon, poached eggs, and cinnamon bread, but I can whip up something else if you’d rather.” She turned to face him, her cheeks still flushed. “What would you like?”
His gaze slid from her eyes to her lips, and he was in danger of saying something incredibly stupid like you, but Maarit snapped, “Just put food on a plate and eat it already. The boss has a list of things for you to do today, boy.”
“Your mood would greatly improve if you’d eat some of this bread,” Ari said, pointing the bread knife at Maarit before turning back to dish up the food.
Maarit ignored her. “The trade summit starts tomorrow. The boss will be gone all day. Maybe into the night if some of the new debtors he gains tomorrow want to take a look at the goods he can ship to their kingdoms. He’s out checking the warehouse inventory now. He wants you”—she pointed one shaky finger at Sebastian—“to collect everything the street bosses have in storage from this week and bring it to the south warehouse.”