Inkmistress (Of Fire and Stars 0.5)(79)

We dispelled the enchantments while the king chatted amicably with Eywin until the two departed for a council meeting with the king’s bodyguard trailing after them. The moment they exited the room, I sat down and slumped over the workbench and laid my face on my hands, trying to breathe as I sank further and further into a pit of despair. He’d refused to help me. The equinox was too far away.

“What am I going to do?” I asked.

Hal walked up and gave my shoulder a gentle squeeze.

“Are you sure finding the Fatestone is the only solution?” he asked, his voice soft.

“The only other choice is to continue this.” I gestured around the workshop. “Help the king. Let him kill Ina.”

“But that’s not what you want,” Hal said, a little wariness in his voice.

“I don’t want anyone to die. I’m responsible for enough death. And even if things aren’t quite right with you and Nismae, I don’t want to watch you lose a sister, too.” There was no way the king would let her live if he defeated Ina, and she couldn’t possibly escape Corovja quickly enough to escape him.

“So rewriting the past is truly the only way we can avoid something horrible from coming to pass,” he said.

I turned and gazed up at him, even though it made my heart ache to see the pain and worry in his eyes. I couldn’t promise him that things would be all right, but there was one promise I could make—one I had been thinking about since he’d first noted that changing the past meant we’d lose each other.

“With the Fatestone, there’s no limit to what I can reshape, or the number of words I can use. I can make sure the kingdom stays safe and preserved.” The amount of detail it would take to write all of it out made me nervous, but it seemed like a sacrifice worth making. If I had the Fatestone and didn’t have to worry about aging, I would be able to much more carefully dictate the changes to prevent any other collateral damage. I paused, considering my next words, weighing the promise I was about to make. “When I change the past, I can try to make sure I still meet you.”

“Why would you do that?” he asked. “Not the part about the kingdom. The part about me.” Hope gleamed in his eyes.

I stared back at him, weighing honesty and vulnerability against each other.

“Because I don’t want to lose you.” I caressed his cheek. In some other version of the present, the future ahead of us might be amazing.

“But if you created a past in which Nismae never left the crown and you never left your mountain, I might have been a messenger for the king instead of my sister’s hunting dog. How would we have met then? There would have been no search for the Fatestone or the only living bloodscribe.” He sounded like he had it all mapped out better than I did.

Then I realized what he’d just said.

“Wait. What do you mean, a search for the only living bloodscribe?” I asked.

“I meant the Fatestone. Nismae’s research. Veric.” He fumbled the words.

He was lying to me.

Everything started to snap into place.

His willingness to stay with me when we first met even though we’d been complete strangers.

How easygoing he’d been about leading me back to his sister, who was otherwise incredibly secretive about everything she did.

The knowing look in his eyes when I’d channeled Leozoar’s magic to heal the Tamer huntress.

The way he’d stopped fighting back when Nismae stabbed me.

“You knew what I was all along,” I said, my voice shaking. “Did she send you to look for me? Is that what really happened?”

Hal winced and looked at me with anguish in his eyes. “I didn’t know,” he whispered.

“You didn’t know what?” My anger surged. “Because you had to know she intended to hurt me.” I held up my left hand, demonstrating the feeble way the fingers moved.

“I didn’t know I would fall in love with you,” he said, and hung his head.

For the briefest moment, my heart soared, only to come crashing back to earth seconds later.

I stared at him, reeling. How could he tell me he was in love with me? Was that supposed to make up for leading me to Nismae? Were lies and deception his idea of love? All his actions had ultimately been for his family—something I couldn’t understand because I’d never had one. Nismae could still be behind all this, waiting for a chance to strike as part of a master plan I’d been too naive to see. Maybe that was what they’d been talking about in the meadow.

No one had ever loved me. Not my parents, not Ina, and not Hal.

I had never known love.

“I’m so sorry, Asra. I wanted to tell you, but there was never a good time. . . .” He trailed off, looking as stricken as I felt.

“So what’s your secret mission now? To seduce me so I’ll be distracted from what I’m supposed to do? To kill me before I can get the Fatestone? To let me get it, only to turn it over to Nismae?” The fury made my veins feel like they ran with fire instead of blood. New possibilities of his ulterior motives sprang up like weeds, choking the tender feelings I had for him.

“There’s no secret mission,” he said firmly. “I betrayed Nismae when I set you free. I meant it when I said I would always choose you.” He looked me in the eyes.

“I can’t . . .” I didn’t even know if I could believe what he was saying. How could I, with all the lies between us I’d never known about until now? There were no words. The pain was too great, too complete, too unbearable.