“I feel good. Really good.”
“You look a thousand times better. Mar’s blood worked almost instantly.”
“I’m guessing it was pretty bad?”
His grimace confirms. “You don’t want to know.”
I shudder and move to the mirror. My skin looks amazing, and my irises are an even brighter shade of purple.
Who knew blue blood was Solterre’s best-kept beauty secret? They should put this shit in creams.
I turn back to Zadyn. “I want to go for a walk.”
His brows lift. “A walk?”
“To clear my head. There’s just been a lot thrown at us, and I need some time to just…process.”
Zadyn stands to his full height and stretches, his head nearly touching the angled ceiling. “I’ll go with you.”
I sigh. “Zadyn, really, I just want to be alone.”
“Being alone while we’re being hunted by Kylian is the worst thing you could do right now.” Grabbing his jacket off the armrest, he holds it out for me. “I won’t say a word. You can pretend I’m not there.”
I want to argue, but he has a valid point.
“Fine. I’ll allow it.” I slide my arms through the jacket and lift the collar to my nose to inhale. Zadyn clocks the move as he holds the door open for me.
“What? I like the way you smell.” I shrug.
He presses his lips together, stifling a smile as I duck under his arm.
The port townis small and charming, centered around a busy square. Zadyn and I walk the cobbled streets, passing shops and bakeries, peering in windows and keeping a leisurely pace. The silence is a welcome change after the week we’ve had.
“Are we ever going to talk about what Arden said to you?”
Welp. Spoke too soon.
I swing my head in his direction. “Oh, Zadyn. The key to a peaceful walk isignoringyour problems.”
“You can’t run from them forever. She called you a queen.”
“I’ve been called worse.”
He slides me a reproachful look. “Are you taking this seriously at all?”
“Not really.”
“Serena.”
“What? Nothing she said made any sense. All that stuff about me and Kylian ruling together? It’s insane.”
Zadyn’s jaw clenches. “The part about you being queen I can buy. There’s not a person alive who wouldn’t follow you to the ends of the earth.” I glance at him, surprised. “The other part—not so much.”
I decide not to tell him about the vision I saw of Kylian and me, happily married with children. Or that I would have died to prevent that from happening—from risking my friends’ lives.
“Say we did believe her—what are our options? Either let Kylian take over the world or get ourselves killed trying to stop him?”
Shaking his head, he says, “We can’t let him get any more powerful. We’ll find a way. No one is getting themselves killed.”
