Fuck.I needed a distraction. “Tell me something about you.”
His eyes met mine, and his beautiful smile broadened, doing nothing to curb the fire of want. “What is it you want to know?”
“How did you come to be in the lamp?”
The light in his eyes dimmed, and I cursed myself. He was as haunted by his past as I was. His silence dragged and my heart sunk. He wasn’t going to answer me.
“I made an impossible bargain and lost everything in the process.” His voice was thick with emotion, the pain in his eyes more than clear, and my chest burned. I knew he had a life before the lamp, but hadn’t truly considered what that meant. That he had loved ones, a family, people he was willing to bargain for.
I moved to the nearest shelf, taking out a book and flipping through the pages.
“Did you have someone before? A … a woman?” Jealousy soaked my veins, hot and thick, seeping into my voice. Even if he did, she would be long gone, but that didn’t stop the irrational emotion flooding me.
He didn’t reply immediately, and when I met his gaze again, there was clear amusement in his expression, a smirk tugging the corner of his mouth. “Are you jealous, Adelia?”
Gods, the way he said my name.
“No.” My reply was far too fast and defensive to be taken as anything but a lie. I returned the book to its place on the shelf, and Shade’s smirk only widened.
“Green looks good on you,” he teased, and if my body wasn’t still so weak, I would punch him. “There were women in my past, yes, but never anything serious.”
I faced the wall to hide my pleased smile, running my hands along the stone in search of something to indicate a door. Shade joined me, and we followed the wall, occasionally pulling books from the shelves or tugging at lanterns sporadically lining the wall.
“What happens after the wishes are granted?” I asked after several minutes had passed.
He returned the books to the shelf he had been inspecting before he spoke. “My purpose is complete and I shall return to the lamp again.”
I stopped, turning my full body to face him. “Forever?”
I couldn’t help the clear agony in my voice at the truth. After what he had revealed to me about his existence inside the lamp, I couldn’t fathom him returning to it.
Patterned fingers reached for my face, cupping my cheeks. There was a deep pain in the swirling silver staring back at me, one I longed to heal. “Do not worry for me, Adelia. This is the path my life has taken.”
“Would you do it different? If you could do it all over again, would you do things differently?” I asked with bated breath, searching his face for something. Not that I really understood what.
“No.” His gaze darkened, so much unspoken between us. “No, I wouldn’t.”
There was an intensity in his words I didn’t quite understand, but the look in his eyes made me think it had nothing to do with deal he made.
We returned to the library several times over the following days. I continued to learn about Shade as he revealed more of his life before the lamp, and he helped me when panic threatened to take hold. Watching over me as I slept but never touching me more than holding my hand or giving me a gentle kiss on the forehead. Whenever our conversations grew intimate, I retreated. Thankfully, Shade didn’t question me. I think if he had, my resolve might have snapped. Despite the way my body unequivocally craved it, it wouldn’t end well, for any of us.
In all our search missions, we didn’t come close to finding a secret passageway or invisible door. The room was so vast it would take some time to search it all, and we hadn’t even started in the garden.
Five days after our arrival in Prallues, I heard from the king by way of a letter. He demanded my attendance to a formal meal, to be attended without Shade, who he specifically ordered to return to the lamp.
“Are you sure you’re ready, Adelia? I can tell the king you’re still sick.” We were in front of the extravagant dresser within the bedchambers, and I caught Wista’s eye as she twisted my hair into an elegant knot atop my head, the near-black strands shining after so many days of being washed.
“I have to face him at some point, it may as well be now.” My bruises had lightened enough to be coverable by powder, the discoloration easily passed off as caused by my recent bout ofillness. Wista’s tea sped up the healing process tremendously. Without it, I would surely still be bedridden.
It had also been too long since I’d seen Eleanor, and I was beyond antsy. She had checked on me again several times, and I’d passed her a few notes through Wista, but I needed to see her with my own eyes. Hold her close and know for certain she was okay.
She’d kept her promise and hadn’t entered the city without me, her daily classes and wanderings with Harkin keeping her occupied.
“Who will be there?” I asked Wista. I wanted to be prepared, though I didn’t think I could ever be prepared enough to see the king again. Other than the letter demanding my attendance at this meal, I hadn’t heard from him since he left me bleeding on the floor.
“The lords who accompanied us from Ferveem Forest and several of the generals.”
So, the worst of them. Only Kheal and Zyome had returned to their home territory when we left the camp. Even though Prallues was located in Central Territory land, Kheal resided in Hutteran, leaving Torglea’s capital to be ruled by the king himself. Annoyingly, even General Lenek had traveled to Prallues with us, leaving another general in charge of overseeing the sentient army to Yinora. The night was bound to be a blast.Not.
