Dominic merely nodded, deep understanding in his eyes.
“And I promised that I would make it my life’s mission to destroy any tyrants like the ones that caused us so much pain. That I would tear this world apart, piece by piece, if it meant ridding it of all the selfishly harmful people there are. That I would never take an innocent life.” Adara blinked against thetears threatening to pour down her face once again, willing them to disappear.
His thumb brushed across her cheek, wiping away a tear. Adara focused everything on that touch, gentle and reassuring.
Calloused hands from a boy with a callous soul, but they were so soft around her. “I won't leave you,” he said. Dominic extended his right hand—the one with the scar from their blood oath—and raised his pinky finger toward her. “You will not fight alone,” he swore.
Adara sniffed, blinked away the tears. She didn’t care if it was all an act. She needed him right now, needed to know that Dominic—a soul that was a mirror to hers—was with her. That she had found someone in this world who understood why she’d done what she’d done. Someone who saw the monster she’d become and did not balk. Someone who promised she was not alone.
Something jolted inside her, like her fractured heart had been shocked back to life, finally beginning to mend. Adara returned the favor, locking her pinky around his with a nod, and added, “Till death and beyond.”
Dominic smiled, so bright and beautiful that it competed with the dazzling stars for her attention. He reached for her hand, thumb running over all those ragged scars. “Do it again,” he said.
Adara’s brows furrowed in confusion.
“The butterflies,” he said.
She grinned at the absolute lack of fear in those eyes filled with awe. Fire sparked in her palms. A flaming butterfly sprouted from her hands and fluttered through the air. More and more followed until they were surrounded by dozens of little blue butterflies fluttering about. The fire swirled and crackled with each flap of their wings, leaving shadows and light to dance along the sharp angles of Dominic’s face as his eyes followed them in awe.
He raised a hand, his magic thrumming to life at his fingers. Rivulets of water delicately flowed through the air, carefully winding around the butterflies, never extinguishing their flames. Verdant leaves materialized above them, falling gently through the air. A few butterflies landed on the leaves mid-fall, igniting the kindling, burning them to ash that scattered on the wind.
Adara could have stayed there forever as they lay on the roof. Their fingers were laced together as their magic danced before the backdrop of stars glittering above, reflecting off the dark waters below so that it looked like they were nothing but shadows of souls trapped between the heavens, encased in the midst of the universe.
Chapter 32
Hot,humidsweatdrippeddown Adara’s face, her damp hair plastered to her cheeks beneath the scarf wrapped around her head and the lower half of her face. The extra fabric only made the heat more unbearable, but she’d rather not have the scorching sun burn her skin as they trudged across the desert. Her entire body ached from prolonged hours of riding on horseback, but it was better than having to walk across the rolling sand dunes that stretched for miles and miles.
The morning after Livisian, the Andreilians had quickly reconvened and hiked to Yersva, where Dominic tortured a maninto creating proper documentation to present to the guards before they were allowed on the ship to cross the Narphin River into Tarin territory. Then they’d made their way to Senarim—a city located on the outskirts of the desert that stretched across the continent—and had stolen horses and a caravan.
On the white mare beside her, Asher tugged down his brown headwrap and lifted a canteen to his dry lips, sipping lightly. “Remind me again why we’re doing this,” he panted, pulling the scarf back over his face and wiping sweat from his brow.
“Yeah, how much longer until we reach the Ruins?” Caleb asked from Asher’s other side, gently stroking his horse’s mane.
Adara shook her head, glancing forward at Dominic leading their group with such determined ease. He seemed to know exactly where they were going, but Adara figured he wouldn’t appreciate their complaining and refrained from asking. Ace, Tyson, and Desmond rode ahead with Dominic. The rest of the Andreilians were crammed into the caravan while Adara, Asher, and Caleb brought up the rear, with the horses trudging along.
“I can’t breathe in this stupid thing,” Caleb muttered, wrestling his face free of the scarf that had once been white but was now stained with dust.
“What did you and Dominic do after everyone split up again?” Asher asked.
Conversation made her throat ache and her lips crack, but Adara stifled the desire for water and spoke anyway, desperate to get her mind off the exhaustion weighing on her.
She shrugged nonchalantly, trying to suppress the smile that threatened to break out across her face as she imagined Dominic lying on the roof with her, with their elemental magic entwined as tightly as their fingers, pointing out the constellations and telling their stories. She recalled the rose he’d tucked behind her ear, beneath the circlet of flowers already adorning her head, as they walked back to the inn, with her new book in hand. Sheprayed her gifts and dress would stay undamaged, tucked into her pack beneath her cloak to provide some protection from the sun’s rays and windswept sand.
“Just stayed out late, wandering the city, talking,” she answered.
Caleb shot her a wry grin, arching his brows. He rolled his blue tunic sleeves to his biceps, trying to stay cool in the blazing air. Adara did the same, sleeves rolled to her elbows, gloves discarded in her rucksack. Her hair was tied back at the top of her head, but the long strands still clung to the back of her neck. She removed her headscarf, if only for a few minutes to let some fresh air caress her skin.
“Right,” he droned, snickering. “Talking. So, while you talked—” he said, fingers forming quotation marks in the air, “with him, there was no touching at all?”
Adara hesitated, pulling the black scarf up once more to hide the blush rising to her cheeks as she recalled Dominic’s arms around her, his body pressed against her back when she woke again this morning. Her fingers tingled, sparks igniting beneath her skin as if her own magic remembered his hand in hers last night on the roof.
“None,” she said straight-faced, tugging down her sleeves again before the exposure to the sun could redden her skin.
Asher’s stare burned holes in her. “You’re lying,” he concluded, eyes crinkling with a smug smile.
She glared right back with the same simmering intensity. “Whose side are you on?”
“Are you . . .blushing?” It was Caleb this time who tortured her with more questions.
