Evander smiled wanly. “If I lose my temper, I’ll probably fall over dead.”
“I imagine holding it in is worse.”
His gaze flicked toward her and then returned to Hera, and he chuckled. “I’m not sure you’re the one to give advice on managing anger.”
Valenna bristled. “I was managing aptly until I stumbled upon you again. When I’m around you, I fall apart. I forget about my father, and finding my sister, and I become a simpering, love-sick fool!” Glistening vines wreathed her, and she took a step away from him, afraid they might touch him and burn his skin. “I am knotted up inside. I don’t know up from down, but I know that I love you, and I always have, and I’m horribly afraid that I always will.”
Evander didn’t reply at first, and Valenna’s magic bubbled inside her like swamp water. The vines twined her arms, scratching.
“You need to understand,” Evander began.
Valenna inhaled like she’d been sliced with a sword. “I’m sorry,” she interrupted. “I’m sorry, I’m not trying to pressure you …”
“No, no, listen.” He crossed the space between them and caught her hands in his, unwinding the thorns from her wrists, then her forearms. They pricked him; he didn’t notice. “You need to understand that what Haldir wants to do tomorrow is very, very dangerous. Hera loves me, but if she is frightened, that won’t stop her from crushing me along with anyone else who gets in her way.” He took a pen knife from his pocket and cut her free. “Go back to Largotia, Val. Return to your occupation, forget about your father, and be happy …”
“Stop trying to tell me what to do.”
“Alright then, I’m not telling you. I’m begging you. Please, Val, please forget you saw me here. Go and be happy and complete without me.”
“I don’t think I can be happy and complete without you.”Her throat burned. She wasn’t used to tears, and their sting surprised her. She risked a quick look at Evander, and her heart stuttered.She thought she caught the glimmer of tears in his eyes as well, but he composed himself so quickly, Valenna wondered if she’d imagined it.
“Val, you are a brilliant, beautiful woman with a promising career. I was ever in awe of your love for me. You deserve the best, and I can’t ask you to put up with me anymore. It’s unfair.”
“Come with me to Largotia! They have positions there. We could be together again!”
He shook his head. “They know about my condition. One episode like I had on the plains, and I’ll be at a desk. I can’t live like that; I’ll go mad. Besides, I have something I need to take care of.”
“What?”
He rubbed his jaw. “I’m not sure where to begin.”
She was being overbearing, and she knew it. Perhaps he didn’t love her anymore—not like he had before, but that was his right. If she didn’t want him to control her, she couldn’t attempt to control him either. Though she couldn’t bring herself to believe that he didn’t want her as much as she wanted him. There must be an impediment—a secret tucked behind his wall of reserve.
“So we just forget we ever saw one another?” she asked.
“It’s not what either of us wants, but I think it’s what we need to do.”
“I agree.” She did not agree. “We had a lovely little fling, but this is the sensible thing.”
“I’m afraid it is. Have a safe journey to Largotia.”
They stood in silence for a moment, but she couldn’t unlock her gaze from his. She thought the ground might pitch beneath their feet and plunge them into one another like two colors of paintmixing. Evander overcame it first, and with a painful tightening of his mouth, he walked down the path. He glanced over his shoulder at her once before he was obscured by the budding branches. She forced a wan smile, a tear slipping down her cheek.
A pricking sensation spread through her body as though her skin was charged with electricity, and a circle of bluebells jumped up around her feet — not thistles or poisonous mushrooms, but lovely little bluebells. With a shout of surprise, she stumbled backward and struck a tree.
Valenna began to wonder if she was losing her mind.
Chapter nineteen
Evander
Valenna still loved him. She’d said so, and he had rejected her.
This woman, who had been the steady hand on his back when his world was cracking apart, the woman who had saved wyvern bone powder when she could have sold it for a thousand kibs, the woman he wanted more than he wanted oxygen, and he turned her away.
But Evander couldn’t tell her he loved her and then disappear again. His last betrayal broke her; what would a second one do? He promised himself he would write to her as soon as he reached his destination, so she wouldn’t worry. At least he’d made a clean break with her—what he should have done in the first place—and it somewhat placated his guilt.He was no less miserable and heartsick, but his conscience was clear.
He unscrewed the lid of his last tin of wyvern bone powder. After the ordeal on the plains, he was finally and definitely out. Now, time was against him. He needed to leave tonight, before the paddocking, or he would be dead by the end of the month.
