Page 314 of Commanding Scythe and Sky

We needed rest to replenish our magic. My feet felt bruised from standing so long, my magic barely clinging to my bones with enough strength to hold up feeble shields, my eyes aching with the effort of staying open. The formerly infinite-feeling wells of power around me were palpably depleted—a vulnerability I didn’t care for.

Something told me the mentalist’s horrors would only worsen the deeper we went.

Rika and I laid out the bedrolls in a crescent around the fire Brody and Jason were hastily assembling. Wedged between the enchantments, there was no shortage of kindling. The shifter lit it with a spark of magic, and we settled in beneath a heavy silence, letting our protesting bodies rest.

Jason had the sense to fish rations from his bag and pass them around while the rest of us drank greedily, shoving jerky and dried fruit down our throats with shaky nods of thanks. I wasn’t sure what the others saw when their shields slipped, but going back in sounded less appealing than a root canal while someone pulled my fingernails out one by one.

Bellamy transformed into the enemy before dragging his blade across Aren’s throat.

Blythe being attacked and beaten by Renown.

Jaycee and Aideen dying.

The monsters in that alleyway tearing my sisters to shreds.

My mother, trapped in that burning room with a door I couldn’t force open.

Aren bleeding out below me, that rattle in lungs that should’ve been working and weren’t.

The images grew more gruesome—and more drawn out—every time.

I crawled onto the nearest mat, tugging the thin fabric over my shoulders as the night chill crept through my bones. Jason raised a hand and magically stoked the blaze. Bright orange flames climbed higher, sending embers drifting through the air like fireflies.

My eyes fell to the path behind camp as the others found their mats.

Trepidation had me drawing the blanket tighter, my shoulder aching where I propped my head on my arm. Aren was fine. Whole, at least. I knew exactly what it felt like to have him severed from me. But I worried for his mind more than anything. Infuriating as it was, the thicket was only the latest in a long line of stalemates.

He couldn’t violate August’s order and go after Ally himself.

He hadn’t gotten another chance to cross swords with Moros and Marlana—a fight I knew he craved.

Protect him, I begged any deity that was listening. Give him guidance and wisdom for the best path forward. With that prayer foremost in my mind, exhaustion finally bested me, each blink slowing until darkness was all that existed.

I woke to the defiant red glow of dying embers. A broad arm wrapped around my waist and tugged me back against a warm body. Unspeakable relief had me melting into Aren’s chest as he tucked me beneath his chin, chilled arms banding us together.

Like walking the long side of a blade, my mind tiptoed between relief and a soul-deep ache. He was here. His little touches seemed to say he still cared—if his greeting in the spring was any indication, he still wanted me despite the hell I’d put him through. But gods, how?

“Stop it,” he muttered sleepily.

“Hmm?”

“Stop thinking so hard—I can hear your brain spiraling. Rest, dove.”

“I’m not spiraling.” I twisted in his hold, maddened by the need to see his face. Aren shifted with me, propping himself on one forearm while his other hand splayed across the skin of my stomach and hip, rendering me mute.

Gods, I’d forgotten the heat of him—the way his touch broke through skin and sinew, spreading divine warmth through my very soul.

His eyes gentled, and the too-hard line of his mouth softened with them as rough fingers traced my hip bone, my ribs, my back.

Beautiful. I’d always known it, but beneath the faint glow of embers, with stars winking behind him, Aren looked almost ethereal—like one of the gods painted in Hazelharbor’s portraits. Maybe that was all they’d ever been. Maybe they weren’t so different from the Commander smiling adoringly down at me now.

“Do your gods speak to you, little dove?”

I quirked my head, reaching up to touch the space beneath his eye where a narrow scar should’ve been. He turned, pressing his lips to my palm, my wrist, my forearm, then caught my hand and held it against the side of his face, eyes closing contentedly. I was so immersed in the pleasure of such simple contact that it took me longer than it should’ve to answer—the need to bask in his touch like a song I had no choice but to sing.

“What do you mean?”

“Do they speak to you?”