When I caught her eye, I cocked my head to the side. It would be safer for her to stay away tomorrow if Archer was planning totake the fall. Something in the pit of my stomach didn’t trust him not to suddenly change his mind and save himself. Lying to the Gods would only get him so far. They’d want an answer to who took out Hunter even if they realised he wasn’t all he portrayed himself to be. Justice still had some meaning up here.
Gray nodded at them both, but not before I saw Larkin mouth the words,Trust me. His body obscured them from view and I looked up at him, trying to wipe the panic from my features.
“Are you ready to go home?” Gray asked, tucking strands of hair behind my ears.
Two-tone eyes stared down at me so intensely that I had to look away. “Yes,” I told him.
The world around us faded away as his aura cocooned us, and I wished it could stay like that for the rest of eternity.
Quentin was created in the wrong time period. As she laid in the bath, water flowing over her curves, eyes closed and breathing steadily, I couldn’t help but think how she would have been a muse for sculptures. Instead, she was perfection crafted specifically for me. Quentin was my salvation. The only reason that I was standing here now.
As we sat there in silence, her in the tub and me leaning against the counter, our bond thrummed loudly between us. She looked at peace, but the anxiety was rampant. Every part of her journey of being and accepting the fact she was a demigoddess had been a baptism by fire. There was no easing her into all of this. No baby steps.
There were times when I underestimated Quentin, back when we first met, but the more I got to know her, the more I fed into her beliefs that she was capable of taking on anything. She armoured against her vulnerability in such a way that I forgot the truth was, she buried it all. Pushed it all away in order to function. That was how she navigated life. Admirable but unnecessary now.
“Are you finished?” I asked.
Quentin’s eyes fluttered open, and she turned her head towards me. Her hair was piled in a complicated knot atop her head and her cheeks were flushed red.
“I think so,” she replied.
Carefully, she rose from the gold tub, droplets of water rolling off her skin. I swiped the robe from beside me and stalked towards her.
“Can you not control yourself?” Quentin asked as I offered her my hand. “We’ve spent most of the night…” She trailed off.
“Around you? I have no intention of control.”
She placed her hand in mine and I kissed the back of it as she stepped out of the water. I wrapped the robe around her body, begrudgingly shielding it from my view.
“We have a trial to think about, Gray.”
“As if I could forget.”
Quentin snorted. “I don’t think there’s much else on your mind aside from sex.”
I glimpsed my reflection in the mirror. My irises had turned black, and small wisps of my aura pulsed lazily in the air.Oh, my golden girl, it was sinful to ask me to control myself around you.
Following her into the bedroom, I watched again as she stopped by the window, staring out onto the grounds of our property. The sun was rising over Elysia, casting an orange-pink glow over everything. The storm had passed, and the streets were being rebuilt. Orchids and lilies sprouted from the ground in strange tangles, representing us both.
“What are you thinking?” I asked, walking towards her.
There was a moment of silence and I thought I would have to press her, but Quentin spoke. “I’m nervous about the trial. About what will happen.”
Wrapping my arms around her from behind, I kissed the top of her head. “We’ll show them the memories of everything that’s happened so they have their proof. As much as I’ll hate to do it, we’ll get justice.”
“And what does that justice look like?” she asked, turning in my arms.
I sniffed. “We’ll have to wait and see.”
The truth was not as simple as that. Gods were bloodthirsty beings. If oleander had been used to kill, then it would be needed for justice. But I wasn’t prepared to have that conversation with Quentin. Her friendship with Archer, although distasteful in my opinion, was something she held dear. She trusted him enough to allow him access to our home. I understood the pain of watching your loved ones be sentenced to death in front of you. I wouldn’t wish that pain on anyone, especially not my soulbound.
Just like the rest of Elysia, I would find out what happened to my brother in a few hours’ time. I regretted not being the one to end his existence, but it made sense to me that Archer would have taken pleasure in it. Perhaps he always knew what Hunter was, and it was nothing more than a long game. Maybe he’d taken my words and realised we fought for the same cause. But I’d seen the vitriol in his eyes. Archer would happily sentence me to death for a crime he was so sure I’d committed. And whereas I always thought that I would relish the opportunity to do the same, Quentin had an indescribable hold on me that was making me question that decision.
“We’ll have to wait and see,” Quentin muttered the words before breaking out of my hold. “And after that?”
She moved towards the wardrobe, opening it up before untying the robe and letting it drop to the floor.
“After that, we see what the Gods decide.”
