“No, please, Noth. I can't fail again.”
Noth’s hold turned into a hug. “We can’t win like this, Maggie. We have to end this before Brad does. Yaya will go into hiding. Jax will embed with the rest of the humans. Severin reached out again but will only help as much as it gains him. We won’t be alone, but you and I will have to finish this. I need you. We can’t fight him if we stay on this bridge.”
When the hells did he start making sense? He cradled my face in his large hands, brushing thumbs over my cheeks, searching my eyes for something.
“I’m sorry I left you in there.”
“You had to,” I said quickly.
“I was too focused on getting revenge. I abandoned the most importantthing.”
Was that me? My heart beat double time, surging past the adrenaline of the fight.
“That was your bodyguard, right? I would have tried to kill her too, given the opportunity. Brad sent too many soldiers against you. You did the smart thing.”
“And now you have to too,” he said with a gentleness I didn’t think he was capable of.
I gritted my teeth, baring them at him and then set my face to stone. My legs wobbled like jelly as Noth helped me mount the salamander. Arrows followed us to the tree line but Noth shielded us with his shadows. There were no jokes, no banter, just the weight of what we had to do between us.
Eventually,I realized we were not going to Yaya’s cottage. The forest looked too dense, the land too untouched by Elven hands, to be the way back. Nothing else in the territory looked this lush and wild. Magic sculpted every bush and tree in the palace garden. Beautiful but controlled enchantment.
When I asked, Noth replied, “The Sinchester Wilds is what’s left of the Elves’ original magic. We leave it alone if we want to keep it. Further to the northeast is unknown country, but no one goes there. Old Magic still lives there. And it’s butt-ass cold.”
“Everything’s a bit bigger here.” I trailed my hand along the towering fern above our heads.
“It’s the Old Magic. It makes everything grander. See?”
Noth’s hard dick rubbed the seam of my ass and it was sexy, it was, but it was also unexpectedly comforting. I didn’t even laugh, just leaned back into him, wanting to feel his outrageousness against my skin. The sharp edge of our fights had melted into something like home.
“I don’t know. It still feels a little small to me. I’ll have to check again.”
His hand cupped between my legs to cinch me tight against him so that the entire ride rubbed me against his cock. We were so close together I counted his piercings through my clothes. Light filtered through the tall trees and now that the danger had passed, the journey was as enjoyable as an escape into the wood could be. Noth offered me food from his pack and got crumbs in my hair as he ate the rest of the bread above me. When I elbowed him in the gut for it, he unbraided my tresses and produced a silver comb–because of course he did–and brushed them all out. The gentle tugs, his still-raging hardon, lulled me into a pleasant haze until we came to a clearing. I didn’t see anything that said we had arrived, but Noth stopped the salamander and dismounted. I re-braided my hair to keep it out of my face.
“No one knows about this place. It should be safe.”
Noth called out a word of power to the surrounding plants. “Occultata Plantae.”
The forest shivered around us, shifting and opening a doorway. I got down to touch the living plants that made up the gate. Wide enough for us to walk side by side, Noth pulled the salamander behind us. Inside, a canopy of strangely colored and fantastically shaped flowers dangled down to touch us. I couldn’t say I was thrilled with having them brush against me after the encounter with the Devil’s Bells but it was beautiful. The delicate archway ended in a door covered in finely wrought silver. It gleamed with the reflected light of the glowing flowers.
Noth hesitated as he set a hand on it. “I’ve never brought anyone here.”
I smiled at the way he said it and the slight blush on his cheeks. “Anyone?” I asked.
“A woman. I’ve never brought a woman here.”
My chin quivered trying to contain my smile. He was actually shy about it. I had been too close to death an hour ago. All I had left in me was sincerity. “I’m ready to be wowed.”
Noth’s smile, neither too toothy nor a smirk, made everything flutter inside me. His earnestness was ten times deadlier than his Nightmare.
He pushed open the door with a dramatic turn of his wrist on the handle and revealed a cavernous space that stood absolutely ruined.
Grasses scorched to the ground. We stepped in and Itouched broken stems hanging limply in the dust-filled breeze. Scars of turned earth sat exposed to the stillness. Flower petals plastered against the wooden boxes marked Sumus Machina. Shattered panes of glass littered the ground. Only Brad would turn this beautiful greenhouse into a storage closet.
“Is that Gertrude?” I asked. Why did my voice wobble?
Noth knelt down to touch the few magenta leaves spared from the destruction. “I propagated her here a few times. I couldn’t bear to lose her too if something happened.”
He looked up at me so soulfully, I burst into tears.
