“You didn’t want to lie just then, did you?” I asked.
“No.”
I couldn’t take much more of her silent treatment. “Ashlyn, for the love of my sanity, can you please tell me what’s happening? Are you mad at me?” Female guessing games were never my forte.
“Why would you ask that?” Water collected under her eyes.
“You’re not yourself.” I finally said it.
“I am not.”
“Stars above. At least we agree on one thing.”
Her eyes slipped closed as her hand clutched onto my arm.
“I mean this in the kindest way possible, but if you’re not distraught or angry with me, then there’s something terribly wrong with you right now.”
Her explosion should have erupted in mere moments, but when she opened her eyes she stared at a bush instead. “Maybe.”
“Were you like this when you woke up this morning?”
“No.” A tear fell down her cheek.
“Okay. And you’re not choosing this?” It took everything for me to take her hand in mine.
“No.”
She was acting as if she had been altered. Maybe her magic could have, but I had never seen anything like this.
There were other things that distorted people—some that could take a life. Ashlyn was too important to them. They’d never poison her. They needed her alive. “Did you eat or drink something different this morning?”
Her left eye twitched at the corner. “Yes.”
“Okay.” I desperately wished for something that could end this arrangement so I could take her back with me.
If they had done something to her, if they would continue to—what I wanted didn’t matter anymore. All that mattered was that she was whole.
“Maybe don’t eat that thing again.”
“Okay.” Her tears hadn’t stopped.
“I’m here with you,” I whispered to her.
“Stay,” she said only a single word, but it broke my heart.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
ASHLYN
Rage hit before the calm I couldn’t control.
It overwhelmed me until every word I uttered seemed too difficult, or my magic resisted it.
Fyn stayed.
He followed me everywhere until night came, and then he made sure I was safely back inside my chambers. I had never seen him so broken before. He didn’t know how much I matched him on the inside.
When I awoke the next morning, the feeling had lifted. My mind and words flowed freely as they had the day before.
