Page 84 of Black Sea

“I will,” he said in a mysterious tone, releasing his grip on my face with a slow caress. “Next time.”

I hated that he had ended the physical contact between us. “Was there ever a freighter for us to board? Or did you lie to me about that as well?”

“Of course there was,” he retorted. “I wasn’t sure how long it would take for the news about us to reach your kingdom, but I couldn’t endure staying in that house even a minute longer.” He dragged his gaze away from mine. “I was hoping to meet your brother at sea. Instead, he beat me to it.”

He was hoping to meet him at sea so we could spend more time together, I realized. I felt a pang as my eyes started to burn with unshed tears.

“I’m sorry for this,” I said under my breath, referring to the cell.

He studied me. “Distrust is in the nature of you elves.”

Hurt, I covered his hands with mine around the bars. “I trust you,” I declared, staring intently at him.

He gave me a sad smile and gathered my hands—his were so warm and familiar and rough and reassuring. “It couldn’t last forever,” he whispered.

My pulse leaped as I watched his pads glide over my palms, and his fingers entwine with mine with such an erotic slowness that I almost panted. “What?”

“Us.”

My eyes suddenly returned to his, and I drowned in them. The thought that I could never see him anymore, that he could never look at me with such passion again, that my father might decide to punish him—or, even worse, execute him—to send a harsh message to the King of Men, seized me fiercely, planting a seed of fear as scorching as lava.

No. I couldn’t allow it. I would never allow it.

Teary-eyed, I squeezed his hands. “Once we’re before my father, all misunderstandings between our peoples will be resolved.”

“Perhaps.” Amlach withdrew his hands, and his face darkened. “But you will never look at me like that again.”

I frowned, feeling confused and distressed.

He gave me another hint of a sad half-smile, recoiling from the bars. “Well,” he then said, in a lighthearted tone, “at least this time there’s a bed.”

He went to lie down, bringing our confrontation to an end.

I took a breath. Another one. Then I sat down on the ground next to the bed, leaning my back against the wall.

Amlach rolled onto his side and rested his cheek on his hand, propping himself up with his elbow on the pillow. “You can’t stay here, Nauriel,” he murmured, gazing at me in a way that made me weak in the knees.

I wrapped my arms around my legs, regarding him back. “I know.”

But I didn’t care. Even if Araton himself came to drag me out of here by force, I would fight to stay.

Amlach reached through the bars to grab a lock of my hair. I sighed, rested my head against the cell, and closed my eyes, allowing his touch and the gentle sway of the ship to lull me to sleep, finally feeling at peace.

Where I belonged.

With Amlach.

50

“Clap him in irons,” my brother ordered the soldiers as soon as the schooner was moored to one of the many docks branching in the bay.

“Araton,” I ground out, grabbing him by the arm before he could start toward the gangway.

He stared at my fingers as if they were poisonous vines, his hair whipping around his face in the strong, windy gusts. From the moment he had learned I’d spent the night in the hold with Amlach, he had refused to look me in the face.

“He is not a threat,” I asserted.

Especially now that we had regained our elven strength and speed. Amlach couldn’t even try to escape, let alone attack us. Why did my brother persist in treating him as if he were a danger?