“Is it because you physically cannot speak?” Talitha asked, her voice softening.
Scarlett stood frozen beside me. Not even she knew why I couldn’t speak, so I understood she was dying for answers to something that had been considered my greatest mystery. Before now, if anyone had discovered the truth, it would’ve endangered their lives. But presently, it seemed like a moot point.
I nodded to Talitha, then, bracing myself, opened my mouth to reveal my severed tongue.
Chapter Three
Gray
Iwaded in and out of sleep, a constant state of wakefulness and dreams that left me more confused than rested. I hated when I couldn’t tell the difference between dreams and reality. Sometimes, my dreams were simply memories that had been twisted into a more hellish nightmare than the real event, like when Chrome had urged Cotton to take Scarlett through the portal we’d made for them. Instead of simply disappearing through the shimmering veil as they had, in my dreams, they caught aflame and were swallowed by a vicious airborne being before I could step in to help.
Or when Blaize died. In my dream, I was there, watching an Elemental sword sever his head from his neck as he held my gaze in his final moments, all of the blame falling onto me for failing him. But I couldn’t move. I was frozen to the spot, unable to save him, left to watch the life flicker from his fiery eyes, leaving a look of betrayal forever etched on his face.
Some queen I was.
Blackness lured me under its blanket, taking me away from the real world once again. For once, I dreamt of nothing.
Until…
“Little savage…”
I jolted awake, my eyes snapping open to see the shadowed wood rafters on the ceiling, adrenaline coursing through my chest. “Chrome?” I gasped.
“I’m here…” That voice. Even if just a whisper, I swore it was real. I refused to believe I was simply dreaming.
Turning my head to the edge of Chrome’s bed, I found his hooded silhouette beside me. “Are you really here?”
“I’m always with you, Princess. Never left.”
I searched the darkness, trying to place his eyes. If the quicksilver that normally swirled in them still existed, then…I didn’t know what that meant. But I hoped against all odds I’d find it there.
It just so happened that the shadows cast by the late morning sun, combined with his hood splayed across his face in just the right way, hid them.
“You did.” My voice was barely audible, and I was sure that I was dreaming at this point. “You left me. You walked away.” I broke on the last word as I choked on my emotions.
The only sound in the room was his deep inhale through his nose.
“Come home,” I pleaded. “I’m trying to find a way to?—”
“No. I can’t, my love.”
Warmth drifted down my cheek, but his thumb quickly met my skin to chase it away.
“I miss you. I can’t—” I cut myself off, not sure what I even wanted to say or where to start. My emotions were so congested and muddled that my thoughts went blank.
“I miss you, too. But you can,” Chrome murmured. And just hearing the low timber of his voice reached a place deep in my chest that made me briefly believe that everything was right again in the world. “You’re a queen now.Myqueen. I’ll find you again.”
I sat up in his bed, throwing the cover off my chest. “Wait. No. Don’t leave.”
“I have to, Gray. I’ll come for you again. I know you feel the bondstill. You felt it earlier. You’ll know when I call for you,” he said, rising to his feet. “Stay strong.”
“You were summoning me last night?” I asked, my face contorting in confusion.
“Yes. At least until Shadowshowed up.” Chrome’s voice turned acidic and vicious. I’d never heard him carry that tone before.
I angled my head. “Who was he to you?”
“No one,” he growled. I opened my mouth to speak again, but he cut me off once more, this time with his lips pressing to mine. He ran his fingers through my hair, and I melted into him, starved for his touch. “Go back to sleep. You haven’t been sleeping well. You need rest.”
