With the way she’d treated me when we met, how could he? “Living among humans is dangerous for us. The more people know, the higher the risk of discovery.”
Her brows drew together. “Dangerous foryou? But you have magic.”
“Magic isn’t always enough to save us.” Iron chains neutralized magic. Iron-lined cells kept us from evanescing. Curses made us weak. The emerald dagger glistening from beside her boots could send us to the underworld forever.
“All it takes is one human to make a false accusation. Airren law always rules in a human’s favor.”Always. “If Padraig had been caught using a glamour to conceal his identity, he would’ve been hanged.” And if he hadn’t used a glamour, finding honest work outside of Tearmann would’ve been nearly impossible.
“If it was so dangerous, why did he stay?”
I told her what Padraig had told me. That he’d stayed for her.
She stared into the flames, tears streaming down sunken cheeks, looking impossibly young and so, so devastated. She dropped her head as if hiding her face from me, sobbing into her hands. “It hurts. It hurts too much.”
I felt her pain. My parents had been slaughtered. I’d lost friends and family and citizens day in, day out for centuries. You could never get used to death. You could only come to terms with it.
I crawled forward, slipping a hand around her waist, drawing her close. Inhaling her rain-kissed scent. I wanted to help but didn’t know how.
My gaze landed on the dagger.
I could let her stab me with it and bring back her sister. It’s what one of her storybook heroes would do. Sacrifice himself for the greater good.
But I was no hero.
I was a villain sentenced to lifelong punishment for my sins. And I could think of only one thing that would take her mind off what had happened.
“I can make it go away,” I whispered against her ear, relishing the way she shivered. “Say the word, and I’ll make the whole world go away.” Not forever. Just for tonight.
“Please,” she cried. “I don’t want to hurt anymore.”
The column of her throat tasted like lavender; the pulse at her neck thrummed beneath my tongue. Her head fell to my shoulder, thrusting her chest forward. Her nipples strained against the white shirt. When I saw my emerald ring hanging from the chain around her neck, resting between her breasts, an idea sparked in my mind.
“Put on the ring,” I said.
“What?”
“Put it on.” I needed to taste her lips. To know what it would be like to feel her tongue tangling with mine. To swallow her moans without losing her.
She fumbled for the chain, unfastening the clasp with trembling hands. The moment it settled on her finger, I could feel the thrum of its magic where we touched. I needed to know for sure that her curse was neutralized. Needed to know for sure what I wanted to do wouldn’t compromise her in any way.
I needed her to lie.
Losing my fingers in her luxurious waves, still damp at the roots from the rain, I whispered, “Tell me you love me.”
Her body stiffened.
“But . . . I don’t.”
Feck’s sake, woman. Rip my heart out while you’re at it. “Lie.”
“I . . . I love you.”
It wasn’t true. I knew it wasn’t. And yet her lips tasted that bit sweeter for the lie when my mouth met hers. I hadn’t kissed a woman properly since Fiadh. I’d forgotten how intimate it felt, being connected like this. And there was no one on this island I’d rather be experiencing it with than this hateful, beautiful wasp.
“Say it again,” I begged.
“I love you.”
The lie seeped into the darkest parts of me, warming and filling and breathing life into my barren heart. The words weren’t real, but the woman was. Her mouth. Her tongue. The shirt she wore. The shirt I lifted over her head. The stockings and flushed skin.