“My horse.” Her voice cracked, because though Dippy had been sent back to Harendell, she feared for his fate.
James made a noise of sympathy, and she knew he had the same thoughts about Maven.
Ahnna bit the insides of her cheeks, listening to the sound of the waves slapping against the hull, adjusting the rudder as the wind shifted. Words sat on the tip of her tongue, wanting to be unleashed into the silent tension between them, but this want still felt forbidden. “You. I want you.”
James gripped the rudder with one hand, then pulled her left hand free of it.
“James, what are you doing? You’re going to lose the wind and…” She trailed off as he lifted her left hand to his lips, gently kissing her scraped and scarred skin.
“Our future looks bleak.” He brushed his thumb over her knuckles. “The chances of us surviving this war are not good, and even if we do, I’m not sure what our futures will hold. But no matter where life takes us, I want to be at your side every minute of it until my heart ceases to beat. I love you, Your Highness. I love you in a way that will never be eclipsed by another emotion, and I want you to be my wife.”
The world seemed to stand still. As though it too were taking a breath. The ship and the sea and the wind all fell away so there was nothing but her hand in James’s, a question she’d never dreamed he would ask on his lips. Never dreamed of, because those who served the crown as she and James did were not given the opportunity to choose. Especially not to choose the enemy.
But God help her, Ahnna wanted to say yes. Wanted to be his, because she loved him in a way that made her heart burn like the sun.
Even if her own hand was not something she could give.
“It’s not my choice,” she finally managed to say. “My brother. You’d have to ask his permission, and I don’t think—”
“I don’t care what your brother has to say on the matter,” James interrupted. “The only answer that matters is yours. And if you say yes, there is no crown or power in this world or the next that will keep me from wedding you, Ahnna.”
Her whole body was shaking, because her soul wanted this. Yet to say yes would be the purest form of selfishness, because as Ithicana’s princess, her hand held value. Even with her name tarnished by Alexandra’s false accusations, Aren could use her to secure other alliances now that everything had fallen apart with Harendell. For her to take that opportunity away from him, after the hell she’d put Ithicana through, was not right. Even if doing so would cut out her heart and leave her a shadow of the woman that she was, for Ithicana, she’d do it.
A tear trickled down her cheek. “Every part of my heart says yes.”
James tilted his head, his amber eyes narrowing slightly. “For anyone but you, I’d say that is all that matters, but you’re unwilling to give your heart anything that might have consequences for Ithicana.”
“I know it doesn’t feel like it, but we are on opposite sides of this, James.”Opposite sides, yet the idea of pulling my hand from yours is the worst thing I can imagine.“Ithicana and Harendell are enemies now.”
“No.” He gave a slow shake of his head. “The enemy is Alexandra and those who support her schemes. The people of Harendell are as much a victim of her manipulation as we are. They’ve been tricked into supporting a war they never asked for and never wanted, and if they can be made to understand the truth, they will turn on her and this war will be over.”
Keeping a firm grip on the rudder and their course straight as an arrow shot, James stood. His fingers trailed up the inside of her arm, the sensation sending sparks of lightning through her body. “We are on the same side in this, Ahnna. Alexandra arranged for the murder of both my parents, and then tried to trick me into murdering you. She’s torn apart my family and embroiled my people in a war theydidn’t want, and I think it won’t be long until she turns on my family in Cardiff. You and I are allies in every possible way, and I will have your back in this fight, in every fight, until we take our place in the stars.”
He so rarely invoked Cardiff’s mythology around her, and it made her heart race because it was proof of how deeply he trusted her. That around her, the walls all came down and he gave her, and only her, his true self.
Maybe protocol demanded her fate be controlled by Ithicana’s crown, but it wasn’t just her heart that screamed he was the one for her. Her mind also screamed that there was no man in this world who would be a better ally to Ithicana than James Ashford. “My answer is yes.”
The world was still trembling from the chaos they’d left behind, but in James’s arms, Ahnna found something solid—something she could choose. Her breath hitched as he cupped her face, not with urgency, but reverence, like she was something sacred, and when his lips met hers, the ache in her chest finally broke. The kiss was trembling and fierce, threaded with the weight of everything they’d survived and everything they still might lose. “I will be your wife.”
No sooner did the words exit her lips than the wind gusted, tearing at her salt-crusted hair, and gooseflesh rose on Ahnna’s arms. Turning in James’s embrace so that her back was pressed against his chest, she looked up into the clear skies.
“What is it?” James asked. “What do you see?”
Fear pooled in her stomach, and Ahnna swallowed hard. “Tie everything down. It looks like the tempests will go to war against Ithicana’s enemies tonight, and we are going to get caught in the salvo.”
56
James
How Ahnna had known whatwas coming, James couldn’t have said, because the skies seemed clear and the seas obliging. The perfect sailing conditions.
Right up until the moment they weren’t.
As dusk fell, the skies blackened with something far more ominous than the loss of the sun. The brisk breeze shifted into violent gusts, and the swells deepened as lightning danced across the swirling clouds.
“The Amaridians will have to fight this storm too,” he shouted over the noise. “With luck, the storm will sink them.”
“They are big ships, and the Amaridians are excellent sailors,” Ahnna shouted back, her hair whipping across her face. “Whereas this is a fucking pleasure craft and my only sailor isyou.”
