Rink scoffs and Eacon sighs. They step back from one another, the blood spattered on each of them making their tunics stick together. Something about that must be hilarious to them, because they both start laughing…a lot. Trilling guffaws and cackles rent the air as Eacon and Rink collapse into each other. They lean on one another precariously, looking as though they could topple over at any moment. Blood drips from Eacon’s sword onto the deck, and I watch the drops steadily, rhythmically fall to their end while the two fae lose themselves to a fit of hysterical laughter.
My chest aches with longing as I watch Eacon and Rink cling to each other. They both have experienced such profound loss, and yet here they stand in the peals of exquisite love despite what someone tried to take from them.
What would it be like to have that?
Someone who you could kill beside one moment and lose yourself to laughter in the next? Someone who not only understood what my soul needed but reveled in those needs themselves? What could it be to have someone willing to not only rip the realms apart, but also quietly wait, wait for me if that’s what was needed? The distinct faces of three someones rise to the murky surface of my mind.
Could I have all of this with them?
Is that what I’d be choosing if I said yes to what the Scorpions are offering?
“How do you feel?” Rink asks Eacon as she plops back down next to me, pulling Eacon to her side and wrapping an arm around her shoulders.
Eacon sighs, her eyes far away for a moment as her gaze tracks the flight of a large golden sea bird who’s enjoying a smooth float through a strong current in the air. “I don’t know. I wanted him to suffer more, but it’s done, and that’s more than we thought it’d be at one point.”
Rink nods and kisses the top of Eacon’s head as she pulls her closer. Part of me feels odd lingering here among the slain, while another part dares anyone to cross the bridge from dock to deck and do anything about it. The three of us grow quiet, each of us lost to our thoughts while still being sustained by the tranquil support of the other. I think about what both Eacon and Rink have said, what they’ve taught and shown me in their way, and I know I’ll walk away from this seeing things differently. I just don’t know exactly how that will impact all of the choices I have yet to make.
“Why didn’t Tarek want me to do this?” I ask Eacon after some time, the question growing hotter and hotter on my tongue until I have no choice but to spit it out.
I recall the small argument he and Eacon had before she used her thura to steal me away. The look of fury on his face when she refused to listen is an image burnt into the back of my lids. I worry I’ll see it every time I blink for who knows how long.
“The Scorpions are the best at what they do, and this…” Eacon states while gesturing to bodies and blood dotting the deck, “is not what they do.”
“I don’t understand,” I confess.
“They stalk and silently annihilate. Fae don’t see them coming until it’s too late. Winding through a busy dock, stomping up to a ship, and then destroying everyone on deck during broad daylight is an exposure risk they felt was unnecessary. They had a different plan,” Eacon explains. “I thoughtmyapproach was better.”
Rink laughs at Eacon’s statement, and Eacon smiles. “Aye, there’s no arguing with Eacs once she’s made up her mind. I can attest to that,” Rink teases.
“But why’d you want me to come?” I press.
“If I’m being frank, I felt there wasn’t an exposure risk for you, Auset. No one knows who you are, including you.” Eacon winces as though she expects me to be offended by that, but she’s right. “Aside from that though, I truly did hope that this might help you find what you needed. I know the Scorpions want the best for you, but how they go about convincing others to see things their way can be a bit…”
“Stifling?” Rink offers.
“Arrogant and insufferable?” I pitch in too.
We all laugh and Eacon nods her head. “Yes, that,” she agrees. “They’ll be mad for a while, but they’ll get over it.”
“I’ll pound on each one of their arses if they don’t,” Rink threatens, and Eacon tilts her head up and places a soft kiss on Rink’s smiling lips.
I look away and study the blade still balancing on my knees.
“The thing I want you to know, Auset,” Eacon starts, and I glance over expecting to find Eacon’s eyes on me. Instead, her gaze is fixed to Rink’s adoring face. She brushes a strand of hair back from her mate’s cheek, her blue eyes filled with matching tenderness and veneration. “No matter what you choose after today—death, life, Scorpion or not—you deserve to be loved. You deserve to find others who make you happy. Build a life around that, Auset. I vow to you that you can never go wrong if that’s what’s at the center of your purpose.”
Eacon’s weighted stare moves from Rink’s eye to mine, and I feel the impact of her words through every fiber of my being. It’s simple advice and yet far more complicated than I ever thought anything could be.
“Let’s get you home,” Eacon offers, and with that, Rink pulls Eacon’s mouth to hers in a devouring, passionate kiss.
I push up from where I’m sitting on the deck and wander away from them, offering what little privacy I can as the wordhomefloats around in my mind. The more I think about it, the more the concept settles unexpectedly deep in my chest. I realize as it does, that I might not be as opposed to the thought as I once was. Maybehomeisn’t as far off and foreign as it used to be. Maybe.
ChapterThirty-Four
The door to the washroom flies open, slamming against the gray stone of the wall with a sonorous boom. I’m on my feet, the sword and dagger I perched on the lip of the tub now gripped firmly in each of my hands, before I register that it’s Curio in the doorway and not some other unanticipated threat.
“What are you doing in here?” he snarls, his nostrils flaring and his eyes narrowing with fury.
“What does it look like I’m doing?” I bark back, pissed that I was so relaxed that I didn’t hear Curio in our room until he was busting down the door.
