I did not want to lose Andar. More than any other fae I’d known, I did not want him to die.
And that was the admission that broke me. Because he was certainly dying.
I stopped holding back the tears that I’d been fighting, letting them crash down my cheeks. The emotion behind them flooded me, and I had to gasp for air. “Andar,” I choked through sobs. “Don’t… Don’t die. I would give anything to keep you alive. My kingdom. My magic. My emotions. My vengeance. My name!”
I grabbed that thought. Maybe if he knew my name it would be enough for him to fight to stay alive. “My name is Khiona. Andar, stay alive. Call me Khiona!”
“Ah,” he sighed, his voice too soft to call a whisper. “Trouble has a name. Khiona.”
He didn’t strengthen.
But between admitting a feeling and releasing an emotion, I shattered the last fragments of magic barriers that kept me safe from decades of emotions. The power that had been woven into a crystalline lattice trembled in my chest and erupted, unleashing a torrent that poured out of me in tears that glowed with crystalmagic that dissipated as they fell from my face onto Andar. Pent up emotions swelled inside me, making my arms tremble and my chest heave. More tears flowed, as if the only expression for decades of suppressed feelings was an unrestrained deluge.
If tears could heal, I would have saved him.
But it wasn’t healing magic that poured out of me. It was restraining magic. By separating myself from my emotions, I’d tied off my power, buried it and confined it to places it couldn’t hurt me.
And when it was buried, it couldn’t help me either.
But as I shed the walls that had kept my emotions bound, more strength and power rose from the depths of my soul than I had ever realized were buried there. Suddenly, I was no longer on the brink of collapse.
I had wells of strength. In walling off my emotions, I’d walled off power. Now it flowed through me, bursting out of my heart and rushing through my soul. My hands trembled again, but it wasn’t from anger or fear or overwhelm. It was with an abundance of hope.
I focused on Andar, pouring power into him. I filled his heart with energy and nudged his body to repair his lungs and torn tissues. I was still exhausted, but the strength I found tied to my emotions fueled me with the energy to heal the one person I cared for.
His body trembled and, while we watched, new skin grew over layers of other tissues that had just rebuilt themselves. Andar took a great, gaspingbreath—as if he’d been drowning—and opened his eyes.
Those bright blue eyes filled with a fire I had never seen before. Or maybe I had, and I just couldn’t recognize it because I’d chained my own emotions. It was the energy of someone who cared.
He squeezed my hand—the one he’d been holding this whole time—and then let go and pushed himself up so he was sitting like me. “Khiona.” His voice wasn’t a whisper, but it was soft, almost reverent.
“I—” How did I explain what had happened? I brushed tears off one of my cheeks, but then froze as Andar lifted his hand and slowly wiped the rest of the moisture off my face. Maybe he already knew?
He wrapped his hand around my cheek so his fingers threaded into my hair and his thumb stroked my jaw. “I’m sorry for tying you up and leaving you. It was the worst decision I’ve ever made. I would have died ten times over to try to fix it.”
I smiled, leaning into his hand. “That’s at least the third time you’ve admitted to being wrong about something.”
He brushed his thumb under my lower lip. “And that’s the first time I’ve ever seen you relax into a smile.”
I let my smile grow even bigger and tipped my head just enough to drop a quick kiss on that thumb of his. “You’re alive. I don’t think I’ll ever stop smiling.”
He leaned forward and kissed my temple—the one he didn’t have his hand wrapped around. A warmthspread from his lips through my whole body, warming my heart and heating all those feelings and emotions that I’d kept isolated and hidden for so long.
He kept his face touching mine and whispered next to my cheek. “Did you mean what you said—would you have given up your revenge for me?”
Tears rushed to my eyes again, and I reached out for his free hand, gripping it with both of mine while nodding the truth. “I would have—to save you. I would right now if it meant—” I cut off. Could I embrace my feelings enough to say them out loud?
“If it meant what?” he whispered against my cheek.
Any resistance I had crumbled. “If it meant I could keep you,” I breathed back.
Before I had time to doubt myself, he turned my head and met my lips, pressing a sweet reassurance into my soul. He actually cared for me. He cared so much he would have died to prove it. And now, when he had the chance to walk away again, he pulled me close and held me like I was the most important thing in the world. It was even better than when he’d pretended to care.
I leaned closer, kissing him back, hoping to sear my newly freed emotions straight into his heart. I would take him and all his new ideas about right and wrong and avoiding villainy and—
A high musical note danced through the air. I didn’t even need to look to know Bummel had his luteout. Andar’s lips turned into a smile against mine. “I’d forgotten they were there,” he muttered.
I smiled too. “I could freeze them again.”
