“Esme,” I repeat, burning the name into my memory. “Does she look like you?”
“Every part. My eyes and my hair. My smile. All of it.”
“Then I will recognize her.” I take his hand. “But Robin, Atrea…” A smile cuts across my face, unsteady, a touch of madness sending a treacherous shock of hope into me. “They’re warriors. What could defeat them? Victora? On Atrean soil? No. Never.” I press a kiss to his lips. “No. After you were taken… were they still fighting?”
“They were fighting till the end. Until I was knocked out.”
“Then there you have it. My father would have led them, kept them fighting. He’d never have let a hand touch your sister if she was out of the way until after the battle. And they could never have taken him. He’s a fearsome fighter. The bravest. My mother too. And my brother…” A vision of the boy I left behind. “He must have grown into a strong man.”
“He did,” Robin says softly. “Tall and strong. Just like you.”
The words fill me with more warmth than I’ve felt in so long. I blink back the pain in my eyes. “Then there you have it. I’ll look for her, but don’t be surprised or let down when I can’t find any trace of her. Take heart.” I kiss him once again. “All you need to do is fight and survive, and you will find your way home to her. If I get there first, I’ll keep her safe until you do. I swear it to you.”
Hishand strokes slowly down my cheek, thumb running over my cheekbone, and the way he looks at me… I wonder if that’s the way I look at him. Like he’s a mirage about to slip from me before I can close my hand around him. Like this is all too fleeting and too fragile… and too good to be true.
“You’ll stay with me,” I tell him. “You’ll sleep in my bed. I’ll have them return you before the sun rises.”
Robin’s movements halt. He blinks, taking so long to react that my stomach curls in on itself.
“Sleep here?” he finally breathes out. “With you?”
With me.
In my bed.
‘Remember this moment the next time your emperor is fucking you.’
My hand shoots out, grasping my discarded, crushed robe. My words follow, as sharp as my actions. “It’s sleep. You have to train well between now and the match or you’ll die. Do you want to get back to Atrea or not?”
“Marco…”
I hate the tone of his voice, like he can see the mark he’s stabbed into me. Like he’d stick his finger in it.
“I can have the guards take you now if you’d prefer. It just seemed safer at dawn, when you can explain why you’re awake and walking around the dungeon if someone catches you returning.”
Robin’s fingertips land on my cheek. I brush them away. So he gathers both my hands into his, pulling them from the silk robe’s fastenings, taking them to his lips, where he kisses my knuckles, speaking between each press of his lips. “I won’t forget tonight. No matter what you say to me tomorrow in training, no matter what you do, I won’t forget. I understand now. It all finally makes sense.” Then he pulls my hands to his heart. “Tell me you forgive me.”
“There’s nothing to forgive.” It comes out more curt than I’d meant it to. “I almost killed you.”
“Because you want me strong.”
The truth of the words, something I could never have articulated, hits me like a punch.
His understanding of me. That he’s seen through it all in a way even I haven’t.
It sends my mind into a scramble, and it’s all I can do to take his hand and lead him away, into my bedchamber.
Robin has slept through the night curled around me. When he stirs, it’s just long enough to press a kiss to my shoulder, then he drifts off again.
I have nightmares every night, tonight included. But Robin seems calm. Steady. He hasn’t been here for as long as I have, I suppose. Or maybe my presence is some sort of comfort to him.
But he’s no comfort to me.
With every hour that ticks by, the horror of his coming death slips between us, a dark shadow, but a living, tactile thing that separates us, makes it all feel like tonight never happened.
I’m going to kill him.
If someone else doesn’t do it first, I’m going to kill him.
