“I’ve been training.”
“Training to what? Rule with bruises instead of your charm?”
She said nothing.
“Scare the suitors away?” His grin was teasing, but not cruel. “Ellandria, don’t you know that you could simply rule with a smile? You don’t need to bleed for your people.”
Her eyes stayed on the moonlit orchids crawling up the bark of a tree across the field.
He sat beside her, close enough to touch. “You’re different now. You feel…heavier. Like a storm cloud ready to break.”
“I’ve been thinking about the crown. I don’t know if I was meant to rule, Caelen. And I’m not sure that I want to,” she said.
“Sure you do. Why else would you hide so much of yourself?” he said, voice dipping. “You think I don’t see it?”
He moved closer, brushing a speck of invisible dust from his sleeve. “You could have everything, Ellandria. Power. Allegiance. Me. You don’t have to make yourself a weapon.”
She looked away. “That’s not what I want.”
“Sure it is. Everyone wants power. And if we were to unite our bloodlines through the mating ceremony, we could force the fractured provinces to fall in line. Bring the rest ofthe kingdoms to heel. Make the North pay for the siege they started, once and for all?—”
“Stop,” she said.
He blinked. “What?”
“That’s not me. I want to find my fated mate. And besides, that’s not what I was taught. The point of power is to protect, not punish. My parents believe?—”
“Your parents are cowards.”
The air stilled.
Ella turned away from him, but he was already reaching for her hand. He didn’t notice her flinch. She pulled away farther.
“Ellandria, it is time to stop being naïve and start thinking about our future.” He reached for her hand once more. “I see what you’re becoming. You think you’re just fire? You think your power stops there? There’s more. There’s always been more.”
She yanked her hand away, with force this time and a matching scowl.
“You’re hiding something,” he whispered, eyes narrowing. “Maybe you don’t even know it. But I feel it. When you walk in, the whole room shifts. Like it’s bracing.”
Her voice cracked. “Caelen?—”
“Come on,” he whispered. “Show me.”
“Caelen, please drop it. I said no.”
“Burn me.”
“No!”
His hand closed around her wrist, too tight. Then the magic broke loose. Not with flame or fury, but ripe with instinct.
It knocked them both back. The sound he made was strangled.
Ella stumbled forward, panting, hand on the wall. Not magic this time, but memory. Just as painful. She hadn’t meant to hurthim. He’d been right, in his way. She wasn’t just fire, maybe she was something else, and it terrified her more than anything Bryn could ever say.
With no other choice but to keep moving, she turned the corner too fast and slammed into someone.
Jakobav didn’t flinch.
