Ambrosia (Frost and Nectar, #2)(28)

After a few minutes, I poured myself a hot bath and slipped into it, breathing in the scent of basil and lavender. With the fire crackling next to me, my mind started to drift, my vision going hazy. For a moment, it almost looked like the vines were crawling over the stone, writhing like a living thing. My breath caught, and I sat up straight in the bath.

As I blinked, the vision slid away again.

I tightened my jaw. The stress was getting to me. I stepped out of the bath, water dripping off my naked body in little rivulets. The humid breeze swept into the room, raising goosebumps on my skin.

I snatched up a towel, leaving wet footprints on the flagstones as I crossed to the dresser. When I pulled open the drawers, I found neatly folded white nightgowns. I pulled one on and snuffed out the candles in the room.

As I crawled into bed, a shadow’s movement on the balcony caught my eye, and I sat up, clutching the sheets to my chest. A silhouette loomed outside my window. Within the next heartbeat, I recognized the athletic shape, the ice-blue eyes that pierced the shadows. He wore a shirt now, crisp and white.

Torin.

My pulse roared. Had he lost his mind? With his eyes on mine, he prowled into the room, a finger on his lips.

I flung off the covers and tiptoed closer to him, closing the distance between us until I could feel the heat radiating off him. He brushed my hair behind my ear, leaning down to whisper, “I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow, Ava, and I don’t know if it will be possible. But if we have a chance to escape, we must take it. We must use our swords to free ourselves.” He brushed his thumb over my cheek. “I don’t know how. For the first time in my life, I honestly have no idea what to do.”

My heart tightened. “So, I guess you didn’t see the Veiled One?”

He shook his head. “The castle seemed empty, as far as I could tell. ”

I sucked in a deep breath. “What about a little stab? I have this feeling that she is very particular in how she chooses her words. She didn’t say we had to kill each other, did she? What about a little piercing, somewhere harmless? One of us could go free and get help.”

He nodded. “Good. Stab me, then.”

I shook my head. It made more sense for him to leave, I thought. He was the king. But we didn’t really have time to argue about it. “Did you hear what she said she was going to do if she caught you in here?”

He brushed his knuckles against my cheekbones. “I do hope to avoid that fate, changeling. But I had to see you.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want to be without you any more than I have to.” Instead of leaving, he leaned in and pressed his lips against mine. He kissed me lightly, but when I ran my hands over his white shirt, feeling the hard muscle beneath, his kiss deepened. I melted into the slow, bittersweet kiss. Right now, I wasn’t worrying about the duel or his kingdom, or thinking of anything else in the world except him and the feel of his tongue sweeping against mine, his hands sliding down my nightgown, pressing me close to him.

The rest of the world faded away, the Seelie and Unseelie, and it was just the two of us lighting each other up. It was dawn breaking from within.

I couldn’t get enough of him, and I wasn’t sure it would ever be enough.

A shout pierced the door, and his muscles tensed. My body froze, panic climbing up my spine .

“Torin,” I whispered through heavy breath, “you have to go. Now.”

He leaned in close, whispering, “In Faerie, I will freeze anyone that I love, Ava. I will kill anyone that I love. That’s what Queen Mab cursed me with. And that’s why you can’t come with me, my changeling.”

His words took the breath from my lungs, and as he stepped away, his mournful blue eyes gleamed in the dark. “Part of the curse meant I couldn’t tell a soul. Only Orla ever knew. I killed someone that I loved, Ava. I won’t ever let it happen again.”

He turned and slipped into the shadows, blending into the night.

I stood still, feeling my heart cracking. I hardly heard the sound of the lock sliding on the door, or the hinges creaking open.

By the time Morgant sauntered into the room, Torin had disappeared.

He frowned at me. “I felt your heart racing. You should go to sleep, Ava.”

But my heart still pounded like a hunted animal, and I wasn’t sure anything would help me sleep.





17





AVA




Morgant led me through a corridor with mossy vaults that soared hundreds of feet high. My footfalls echoed off the stone walls.

This morning, I’d been up at dawn and dressed in simple black clothes for the duel. I wasn’t sure if I’d slept at all, but my mind could not stop obsessively raking over whether I’d discovered a loophole.

Skewering, not killing…I’d been running the words in my mind all night.

“Morgant,” I said, “the queen seems very precise with her language.”

He turned back to me, nodding once. “Just focus on killing the Seelie king.”

I wasn’t in a fit state for a duel. My mind felt foggy and muted, my nerves crackling with exhaustion and panic.

Morgant led me into a room with towering stone columns on either side and aisles full of Unseelie spectators. Amber beams of morning sunlight streamed in through narrow, towering windows, gilding the crowd of fae with antlers, hooves, and long tails. They were clad in green garments, some of the females wearing gossamer dresses spun like spiderwebs. All eyes locked on me, and whispers rippled throughout the hall. For a few breaths, I let my gaze roam around, taking in the strange beauty of this place.