“In giving you my hands, I give you my life, to have and to cherish until death do us part.”
Ruairi slammed his fist against the barrier. Looked like he’d changed his mind about killing me.
I loosened my grip, feeling her fingers slip through mine as she stumbled as far away as the barrier would allow. “What the hell has gotten into you? What is that?”
“That’swhat I promised when I saved your life. That ring cannot save me from this curse, but you can.”
“How does being married help you lie?”
“I don’t give a shit about lying.” I’d lied just fine for the last two centuries. “And I no longer care that death lives on my lips. Anyone foolish enough to kiss me despite the consequences deserves to die. But I am done being used. I am the Crown Prince of Tearmann, and I cannot even turn down an ancient feckin’ scullery maid looking for a ride. All a woman has to do is say she wants me, and my body, my magic, responds. I am powerless to stop it. Or at least I was powerless until I married you.”
Searching eyes scoured my face for answers. “I still don’t understand.”
Dammit. How many times did I need to repeat myself before she understood? “I bind myself to you and you alone, forsakingall others.”
Her narrowed eyes widened as her mouth fell open in an O. Her little gasp reminded me of the noise she’d made when I’d first pushed inside her. Not what I needed to be thinking about at present. “Because you made that vow to me, you’re free to make your own choices.”
Free? I almost laughed. Couldn’t she see that I was her feckin’ slave? “I will never be free. But at least I don’t have to go off with anyone else for as long as we are wed.” I may not have been paying attention to the words, but my heart had been behind every promise.
“We’re getting an annulment in two days.”
“And this is where the begging comes in,” I muttered, scraping my teeth across my cursed lips. “You know who I am. You know what I’m capable of. And yet you seem to hold me in some regard. Last night, you said you didn’t hate me. But you used to. You hated me so much I could taste it. And if you can go from hating me to caring enough to give me that ring in only a matter of days, imagine what could happen in a month—in a year. All I’m asking for is a chance, for a respite from the burdens I’ve carried for so long.”
“It doesn’t have to be me. You could marry anyone.”
I didn’t trust anyone else. I didn’tloveanyone else.
Love was what had set me free.
Putting her needs above my own. Setting my own selfishness aside. Marrying anyone else would be for the most selfish reason of all. I’d done this for her. And in doing so, I’d found the reprieve I’d craved for so long.
“And give someone else power over me? Not a feckin’ hope. There are very few people in this world I trust, and you are one of them.”
Her head started shaking the way I knew it would. And then her mouth started saying the words I knew she would say. “Tadhg . . . I’m sorry, but I cannot stay married to you.”
I’d known that would be her answer from the beginning. She was finally with the man she loved. How could I expect her to give up her life—her happiness—for me? She hadn’t done anything wrong. This wasn’t her problem.
It was mine.
I took out my dagger, studying my face in the gleaming blade. “Then I want you to kill me.” For her to know she was the one cutting out my heart. To punish her for choosing someone else.
“Are you mad? I’m not killing you.”
I gestured toward a fuming Ruairi. “I’d let him do it, but I think you’d enjoy it more.”
She insisted that no one was killing me.
“Until death do us part,Keelynn. If you want out of this marriage, one of us needs to die. And unless you’re immortal and haven’t told me, I’m the only one who can come back from the underworld.”
She took the dagger, but hesitated. “What about our annulment?”
“Apparently, my eejit brother doesn’t know the difference between a handfasting and proper wedding vows. And as we were in a bit of a rush, I didn’t take too much notice of the words at the time.” I wouldn’t put it past the bastard to have done this on purpose. Rían remembered everything. “Even if we went ahead with the annulment, it wouldn’t break the promises I made to you or the ones you made to me. We would still be married.”
The tattoos on our fingers would remain. That was one of the differences between humans and Danú: proper weddings involved magic, and magic didn’t come unraveled when a magistrate signed a piece of feckin’ paper.
“Won’t it hurt?”
It already hurt.