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He smiled softly at her. “I’m all right. Truly. I’ll just apply some salves, and I’ll feel much better in the morning.”
Aidric wouldn’t have been under enthrallment today if Rakkley hadn’t appeared. “It’s my fault,” she whispered. “If I hadn’t used Dark Magic…I need to fix it.”
He cupped her face with his hands. “Mira, listen to me, this is not your fault. You using Dark Magic didn’t start this chain of events.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I know you’re not to blame. Rakkley is poison. He is not your problem to fix. Let others help you shoulder that weight. Let me.”
He brought his face closer until their lips met, and for a moment, everything seemed right with the world.
“You should get some rest,” she said.
At her request, they slept in separate rooms because she was worried she might attack him again in her sleep.
But she wanted nothing more than to stay in bed with him. To feel the weight of his arm around her body, to see his chest rising and falling next to her as confirmation he was alive.
“If you need anything, you know where to find me.” He kissed her on her forehead before he let her go and walked to his bedroom. She watched him go and noticed he looked paler than he ever had, and the vein by his neck was almost black.
He was always rescuing her, and now she planned on rescuing him.
38
When she woke up and wandered down the hall, the door to Aidric’s room was already open. She found him fully dressed in the kitchen.
“Good morning,” she said.
“Morning.”
He almost looked like nothing had happened. The dark circles under his eyes were gone, and his skin wasn’t quite as pale as it had been the night before.
“Help yourself to some breakfast,” he said, taking a sip from his coffee. “It’s nothing fancy, I’m afraid.”
So he was leaving. “Where are you headed off to?”
Was he going to Corvin? Would he once again be enthralled?
“I received an assignment from the council for a cell of Rakkley’s men.”
She walked to the other side of the kitchen bar, her hand trailing the cold marble of the counter. “By assignment you mean…”
His eyes held hers for a moment. “They found a spot where they might be hiding. I’m tasked to investigate it.”
“And if they are there?”
She knew the answer and yet wanted to hear him say it.
There was a beat of silence. “Then I’ll eliminate them.”
Kill was the word he seemingly couldn’t say.
“What if they have nothing to do with Rakkley?”
He put his dishes in the sink. “It’s irrelevant.”
There was going to be no trial for these Wielders. Aidric was judge, jury, and executioner. Something the council couldn’t publicly do.
“Is Corvin going to…enthrall you for this again?”
