I was met with large ocean-blue eyes, but I felt nothing but gratitude through our bond.
Zara’s mouth hung slightly open, her knees pulled tight to her chest as she lowered her gaze to the mutilated scum behind me. I stalked toward her, my gait predatory. Stopping in front of her, my shadow cast across her face.
“Let's go,” I said softly, offering my hand. Zara looked at it, then back at Atticus. Her hand found mine, and I helped herup. She stumbled forward and ran towards Atticus's body, screaming as she kicked him square in the face.
Stepping up behind her I pulled her back before she could do it again and she spun to face me, her eyes shimmering with tears. My blood heated, my chest tightening as I pulled her into my chest. She didn't push me away but instead wrapped her arms around me, letting out a shaky exhale.
“He didn't deserve you,” I murmured, my lips brushing the crown of her head.
She didn't respond, and there was no need. She pulled away, and I sighed, turning to gesture for her to follow. We walked in silence as I led us to a stream to wash up. We didn't speak, and Zara kept her back to me the entire time we bathed. I summoned fresh clothing for the both of us, and after we were clothed and no longer covered in blood, I nodded at her to follow again.
The sun had already set, leaving only a dim glow on the horizon to light our way up the sloping path. Zara stilled behind me, and I turned my head toward her, my brow raising in a silent question. Her throat bobbed, but she cleared her throat, nodding at me to continue. We broke through a thick patch of trees, and the dirt turned to stone underneath our feet as we stepped out onto a cliff. The same cliff I had brought her to when we first met. The one I came to countless times throughout my life, the only place I felt free from the burdens of running a kingdom, of the curse that plagued these lands. A place where the rest of the world and its troubles melted away, and it was just me and the vast sky above.
I knew this place meant something to her too, which only made this place mean so much more. We could have kept flying, or even shadowed to the camp, but I wanted to come here one last time, with her.
Stepping out onto the cliff, I walked and sat on the boulder that overlooked the glittering sky. I shivered as the memory of the Fates' void came to mind, and I watched as the moon slowly rose. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched as Zara approached, her gaze burning the side of my face. I didn’t look at her, though, just waited until she sat onto the boulder.
She was too far away, and I desperately wanted to move closer, to feel her beside me, but I suppressed the urge and remained in my spot. My stomach churned with the realization of how fucked up everything was.
With a deep breath, I squeezed my eyes shut, only for them to fly open when something made contact with my thigh. I looked down to find Zara’s head now resting on it, her body lying horizontally across the rock. Her cheek pressed against me as she looked out across the cliff's edge into the night sky. Shivers raked my body, my muscles tightening as I watched a small smile line her lips, and fates did that not ruin me entirely.
It took everything in me not to lean down and kiss her, to pull her so that I was straddling her, to take her right here under these stars.
Zara turned her head to look at me. “Thank you for what you did back there.” Her words came out as a whisper, and I hummed low in my throat, my hand smoothing the chestnut strands that clung to her away from her face.
“You have nothing to thank me for. He deserved what he got.”
I shifted my gaze skyward again, not wanting to see the emotions stirring in her eyes, but continued to rake my fingers through her hair. Her wintery scent enveloped me, and I breathed it in, letting it fill my lungs, my soul. I felt her gaze still lingering on me, and I smiled.
“Do you remember when I brought you here?” The question tore from me, and I glanced down briefly, my hair falling over my face. She smiled, a hand lifting to push back the strand that had fallen over my eyes. The white strand only slumped forward again, and I adjusted my neck so that it wouldn’t obscure my vision of her.
“I do,” she said sadly, and a wrinkle formed between my brow.
Zara moved, my fingers tightening in her hair to try to keep her there, but as she continued to rise, I released her. She moved so that we were at least now next to each other, the heat of our bodies nearly touching as I turned to look at her. My thighs feeling the absence of her warmth and wishing she had stayed.
“What made you want to bring me to this place?” she asked, her eyes scanning the sky.
“I’ve been coming here since I was a kid.” I shrugged. “Flynn had to travel a lot after—” I paused, grief filling my chest. “After what happened with my parents,” I said, clearing my throat. “We had a fight, a big one, and I ran away from him, from the camp we had set up. My uncle had come after me, but I was too fast,” I chuckled, a small smile forming. “I remember it getting dark. I realized I had been stupid to run off. Every noise made me flinch, and I was afraid that a monster would find me, a daka or one of the creatures my mother told me about at bedtime.”
“Like the Vorrack?” Zara said softly, and I nodded and huffed out my next words.
“My magic awoke then.”
I turned toward Zara, and her gaze was already on me, her eyes wide, curiosity swimming in their glacial depths.
“Shadows started to move and follow me, and I panicked as they began to wrap around my body. I was too scared to feel their comfort or understand what was happening.”
“The almighty King, admitting he was afraid?”
“We are all afraid of something, Zara.”
Her face became serious, thoughtful.
“I kept wishing to be somewhere safe. Screaming it in my head. I had curled up on the forest floor, hoping my uncle would find me.” I turned to face the night sky again. “My stomach twisted, and it felt like I had stopped breathing. And then light shone on my face, the suffocating darkness ebbing away. I opened my eyes and found myself here.”
My hand patted the boulder underneath us, and Zara’s brows shot to her hairline.
“My magic brought me out of the forest, and I was able to see that the forest hadn’t been swallowing me. My magic had been protecting me.” I smiled at the memory, my shadows licking around my arms just as they did that day. Swirling over my skin in fine lines, as if tattooed there.
