Page 67 of Sworn to the Shadow Throne

She was giving me a family heirloom?

No…considering the steel in her eyes, she was giving me a clean ending. The kindness in that felt far crueler than simply being told to get out. Fuck.

She’d given me a truth sharp enough to slice me open, tearing out my identity along with my heart. But the realization that I hadn’t earned her presence was the real jagged edge. Even so, I accepted both from her hands with thanks.

I inclined my head. I kept it formal, controlled, safe—for her as much as for me.

“I won’t leave men here,” I said. “You’re right. It would endanger more than it protects. I know you’ll take care of your village.”

Her chin lifted slightly, a gesture that might’ve been showing relief or hiding sorrow. Though maybe I was just hoping for the last.

“Thank you,” she said eventually.

I nodded once. It felt like tearing a hole in my chest and squeezing my heart until it stopped, but I forced out the truth: “Lunette, you’re always welcome in Tir Larethia, no matter what happens. No matter what.”

And then there was nothing left to say. If I spoke again, I would break. I didn’t understand why leaving felt like dying. I’d lost battles before. I’d lost men.

This was one woman in a mountain village I’d known for less than a fortnight. The math didn’t add up, and some quiet, frightened part of me knew it. The rest of me didn’t care.

The rest of me already knew I’d be measuring the rest of my life against my short time with her.

I turned toward the door. Each step away from her felt measured in loss. I hesitated—just long enough to be human, not long enough to be weak.

Right on time, two of my men came in carrying a newly fashioned door. It looked as if it had been made out of parts of the wagon Isca rode in on. I walked out the threshold, still limping, closer to death than I’d been when I nearly bled out.

I’d spent decades being exactly who was required of me. For one week, I’d been something else entirely. I’d had someone who’d looked at me like I was worth the trouble. And it was already over.

Leaves crunched underfoot as I stepped away from the threshold. Behind me, the smell of baking spices, citrus, and one territorial, yet loveable, little veska faded. Wood thudded into place where my life had crashed into hers.

The last sounds I heard before returning to my old life were the sluggish pounding of my heart and the hammering of new hinges sealing the space I would always regret leaving.

Chapter 20

Lunette

As I walked back to the table, my legs betrayed me, and I collapsed onto the chair. My mind went blank in the way irrevocably broken things tend to become empty. I sat there, barely breathing as soldiers from Darreth hammered the final nails into the doorframe while others worked on attaching hastily crafted shingles to the roof. Each strike was a rancorous punctuation mark on the choice I’d made and now couldn’t undo.

I counted every thud. Each one was an opportunity I could’ve called out for him to wait. For a few ragged breaths, I allowed myself to imagine doing it. Scrambling to my feet, throwing open the half-mended door and calling his name in a voice that broke. I imagined his head turning. His shadows stilling. That careful, wounded mask he’d worn would crumble and I would be in his arms again.

But my body remained where it was, frozen and lifeless, while the final nails drove themselves between the life I had chosen to stay in and the one I had just rejected.

The rough clearing of a throat roused me from my dissociation. “Lady Lunette,” Nisien said, voice surprisingly deferential.

The golden prince stood just outside the threshold, helmet tucked beneath his arm, eyes holding mine with understanding and far too much sympathy. He was handsome up close—too handsome to be covered in mail that looked like it had seen true battle. The new door creaked when he pushed it open further, the hinges still stiff from fresh hanging.

Without saying a word, his gauntleted hands held out a leather pouch and a handwritten note stacked on top of writing supplies.

Payment.

I stood on shaky legs and took the stack. Muffled inside the pouch, the coins clinked dully against one another with the brisk, indifferent cheerfulness of commerce. I felt dirtier the longer I held them. It was habit that made me open my hand, but cowardice that made me keep it full. The exact same cowardice that had kept me pinned to the floorboards when every instinct screamed at me to run outside, to throw pride away, and see if I could still leave with Owain.

For the first time, endurance felt less like virtue, and more like a prison I had locked myself in. The thought was too large, too dangerous to examine closely. If I looked at it directly, I’d have to examine the list of lies I told myself, and right now, they were the only things keeping me standing.

When Nisien spoke, all of the brightness that had been in his voice before faded.

“The pouch also holds one of Isca’s seals,” he said, the words falling gently into the silence. “She would be here now to tell you herself if we didn’t have to move her wagon out to move our troops. If you can, she wants you to write to her. The Crown will pay the postage.”

Duty complete, I expected to see Nisien’s shoulders relax as his boots hurried away across the wooden floorboards, but the prince took a measured breath instead. Then said, “I look forward to getting to know you better when we next meet.”