The aspen did not speak right away, as it became preternaturally still.“They creep forward. They will arrive in one day’s time, if the folk stop to rest.”
“This is good news.”
“You’ll want to know about your enemies. There are stirrings of armies throughout the land. The king of fear does not retreat like winters past. Hisfae ravages the woods like wild wolves on a deer,”the tree said, shuddering under its own words.
That couldn’t be. Savine and Jasper had agreed that Jasper would not harm the trees. Not after he had destroyed so much of the forest near Orofine to lure Savine back to the city. “He and his army are attacking the trees?”
“Worse than the early years. My brethren are chopped down and left behind. Evil magic infiltrates those that stand. Communications are cut down.”
“Where are they?” Savine asked. He would have to fight them. Push them back over the pass before Jasper got a stronghold on this side of the pass. Goddess damn them for attacking the forest when his army was spread thin!
“They are two day’s ride from Bayberry. They will take Bayberry if they can before winter traps them on this side of the pass.”
“Abyss damn them all!” Savine would lose the war if he lost Bayberry. He would also jeopardize the safety of hundreds of peaceful folk who had opened their homes to him. Riggins and Po, and all the Bayberries allied with him before it made sense to ally with him. He couldn’t let Jasper and his army reach the quiet, tranquil community. Savine looked out beyond the forest and toward the lake. Bits of light glittering on the lake, like diamonds glittering in a dish. A boat floated by, and two Bayberry men were on the water, enjoying a quiet afternoon.
This place gave him hope during the darkest times of this war. Knowing that there was still a land where a child laughed and played under the filtered light of a flower bed while her mother made the day’s bread in a comfortable kitchen. It was for these folks’ freedom and the freedom that he would bring to Orofine that kept him fighting.
“When will we know if they will try to breach our army and attack Bayberry?” Savine asked.
“They are seeking allies. We do not know the comings and goings of the towers, but their wings stir on our limbs. Wings that have not touched our limbs in decades. The king of fear grows weary of your rebellion. He knows you have the girl. He knows, and he wants her.”
Savine flinched, withdrawing his hands tighter into himself. He said, “He seeks Avery?”
“He knows the human is in Bayberry. He will not rest until the loyalists take her. The power you hold over him is too great.”
Chapter twenty-nine
Kyla
The hard bang on the door couldn’t have been from Avery, who had just left to go clean up. There was only one fae who would interject himself in this brusque manner. “Come in, Savine,” Kyla said. Her voice sounded more weary than she intended, but then again, she was bone-achingly tired.
Savine walked into Garnel’s sick room. His powerful presence seemed to dwarf everything in the room, including Garnel’s sleeping form. Typically, Garnel made Savine look small when they stood near each other, but not now. Not when Garnel's golden brown skin still appeared washed out in a pallid yellow. Savine meant no harm, but Kyla couldn’t stop her instinctual need to protect her mate from a threat. She stepped between Savine and Garnel’s sleeping body, placing her hands on Savine’s shoulders.
Rage, pure and hot, poured from Savine’s emotions. It took all that was in Kyla to not pull her hands back in shock. Coming in here, angry, while Garnel had just been through Abyss and back, wasn’t acceptable. She washed her own emotions into him, reminding her brother that her soulmate’s life had been hanging in the balance. Bittersweet joy and fear washed over Savine, and his hardened features softened.
“Oh, Kyla. Will he recover?” Savine said, low and deep.
“Thanks to Hyacinth and Avery, he will survive. Hyacinth told me he was one of the few cases of the folk surviving helmsbane. He was so near to leaving me, Savine,” Kyla said.
Tears crept into her eyes. Knowing how close she came to losing Garnel nearly broke her. She was so used to having full control of her emotions and the emotions of those around her. There was no way that she would have survived without him. It’s not uncommon, after all, for a soulmate to leave this world and join their other half in Arcadia at death.
“Leaving us, Kyla,” Savine said, wrapping her into his arms. Her brother washuggingher? If she hadn’t seen the changes in him over the past few weeks, she would have jumped away and demanded who hid under a glamour of her brother. Henevertouched another fae. While he had kept his experience private, Kyla knew her brother had suffered mental and emotional trauma during his imprisonment that left him forever changed. She felt it in the changing of his emotions from before his captivity to after. There was also no denying the raised scars that invisibly ran across his back.
“Savine… Of course.Wealmost lost him.” She leaned her head against her brother and let herself be more vulnerable with him than she’d been since she was a child.
Her soulmate bond with Garnel had changed all three of their relationships forever. How could it not? They forever altered his closest relationships with the only two folk he ever truly trusted. But it couldn’t be helped. Over the decades, she’d tried to share with him how the bond happened. She tried to help him see how much she and Garnel still loved and cared for him, but he wouldn’t talk about it. He never wanted to even hear about their bond and how they realized theywere soulmates. She'd struggled to get through the lonely days as she thought about her brother trapped in the Tower of Teeth. The way she found comfort in Garnel’s body, only to be inextricably bound to his soul forever. It wasn’t even what she’d expected when she sought sex from Garnel that first time. If she was honest, it had been this need to bury the pain and guilt that ravaged her.
Savine pulled back and left her side, moving to Garnel. His face was tight, like he felt Garnel’s pain. Which was impossible. The empathic powers that Kyla possessed weren’t something within Savine’s control. Rather, she had often wondered if her greater connection to others’ feelings had left him somehow void of noticing others’ emotions. Like she took up all the space for empathy in their group, so he had no reason to practice the skill himself. Of course, that was harsh, but her brother tended to think only of himself and the well-being of his people as a whole, not always as individuals.
“To lose one’s soulmate is to lose an irretrievable part of yourself. I may never know that pain, but I would not wish it on our greatest enemy,” Savine muttered as he brushed a finger against Garnel’s arm.
He continued to lightly touch Garnel. It gave Kyla a strange shiver down her spine, like she wanted to pull him back and tell him not to touch her soulmate. But she didn’t speak. Savine would never hurt Garnel, even if her natural need to protect her mate was screaming for her to remove Savine’s perceived threat. “When we were very young, we always thought that the Goddess would not bless either of us with a soulmate. That we would be destined to be the closest bond for each other. Brothers who had no one else. How could we not? When he was always there by my side through my pain. And then you came along. The Goddess would bond my closest friend to my sister. After all, you’re the prettier version of me. He loved me more than anyone until my imprisonment. It’s good that she gave you to him. He neededyou to help him be strong. And him to you. You, with your big heart, deserve his love and devotion.”
Kyla’s eyes widened at Savine’s words. This was the closest he’d ever come to talking about what happened during his imprisonment and how Kyla and Garnel’s bond had hurt him. Was this Avery’s influence on her brother?
“Why are you saying this, Savine? You deserve his love and devotion, too. Youhaveit! What do you think all these years fighting for the rebellion have been for? If not out of devotion to you?”
Savine’s blue eyes turned icy. His anger grew again, and she couldn’t help but place her hand on top of his and pull him away from her sleeping mate. Savine pulled her hand from his and turned his back on her. “I assumed and hoped you both fought not for me, but for the cause. For freeing the people of Latiah from a tyrant. Am I wrong? I don’t want your devotion to me to be the reason for either of you to kill our kinsmen. I cannot be the only reason for you fighting this cause.”
