Page 92 of Ocean of Silver

“They won’t,” he interrupted. “I teleported here and made sure I wasn’t followed.” He paused as he assessed me, and I forgot how mesmerizing his gaze was, how intense it felt to have all his attention focused on me. “I missed you.”

“You should have thought about that before you sent me away,” I sneered. Anger rose in me instantly. He didn’t get to miss me, not when he was the reason I was gone. I didn’t know how I would feel seeing him again but being alone with him brought out too many raw emotions. Mostly rage and confusion.

“I didn’t have a choice, Scotlind. I had to send you to Lux. If I hadn’t, they would have forced me to kill you. I wanted to explain everything earlier. I had planned to tell you when I came for the meeting, but when I saw you in Lux, you were wearing Alluse, and you were all overhim.”

“I spent a month in the Tennebrisian dungeons before I was sent to Lux. I wasn’t wearing an Alluse necklace then. You could have entered my mind and told me everything then, but you didn’t. You kept me in the dark, Sie. I trusted you. I opened up to you. I told you everything about my past.” A sob broke from me. “Then, the next day, your father came to the lake, and I woke up in a cell—had been left in a cell for two months afterward, and you did absolutelynothing.”

“I know. Shit. Scotlind. I’m sorry. I fucked up. Don’t you think I know that? It broke me to send you to Lux. I didn’t know what else to do. I didn’t know how to handle it. I can see now that it was the wrong move.”

He stopped speaking and assessed me. It was unsettling, the intensity, the sudden silence, the stillness in which he was watching me. I stepped back as Sie walked toward me with a gleam in his eyes. “What are you doing?

“You look beautiful,” he breathed as he cupped my cheek. His other hand reached out and found mine. His finger ran over my palm. Then he froze. “What the fuck is this?” he asked as he turned my wrist over, exposing the scabbed cut next to his old one.

“It’s nothing,” I said as I whipped my hand back.

Sie’s nostrils flared. “Did you bond with him?”

I didn’t answer. I didn’t know what to say, but my silence was answer enough.

“I thought… I thought you were acting. That you were forced to be fawning over him. I kept telling myself not to be jealous. That it meant nothing—”

“Fawning over him?” I seethed, confusion and shock bubbling through me. “You have no right to be jealous. You are the one who’s remarrying. You are the one who sent me away to begin with.”

“Did he force you to do that?” He pointed to my hand in disgust. His tone lowered, going deathly serious.

“What?” I asked, more in shock.

“You and the Luxian Prince. Did he force that on you?”

I didn’t answer. I just stared back at him in disbelief. He pushed his fingers through his dark hair again, the long waves tangling. “I just… you can’t be with him,” he added, his voice pained.

“You don’t get to tell me what I can and can’t do,” I seethed. “You left me. You annulled our marriage. You sent me to Lux to be their prisoner. Do you know what that was like? What they did to me? They kept me in a dungeon and tortured me every single day.” My hand idling traced the small scars from the tallies on my forearm before I covered them with my palm. “I was starved and beaten, and Tezya brought me back. He helped me. So you don’t get to tell me that I can’t be with him when he was only picking up the piecesyoubroke.”

Everything Tezya did these past couple of months came crashing into me. How he protected me before he even knew me. How he trained me to overcome my fears. I clutched my palm with my other hand as if I could protect the scar he gave me, as if it could protect what we had. And Sie was here, having the audacity to blame me, to accuse me.

“Why did you even come here, Sie? Why are you in my room if all you want to do is yell at me? You criticize my choices when I barely had any. When all I was trying to do was survive.” I choked back tears. I was not about to cry, not that I was ever adept at controlling my emotions.

“Fuck. I’m sorry. I don’t want to yell at you, Scotlind. I want to be with you.” He took a hesitant step forward, reaching for my hand again. “I’ll forgive you—whatever you two did. We can both forget about everything. Please…” His voice cracked, “Please, just be with me. Tell me that you want to be with me… not him.” His other hand cupped the back of my neck as he bent his head down. “Fuck,” he cursed, but it seemed like he was speaking to himself now rather than me. “I need you to want to be with me. You’re the only thing in my life that—“

“Sie, don’t,” I interrupted. I couldn’t have him finish that sentence. I couldn’t stomach to hear it.

Confusion crossed his beautiful face. “I thought you wanted to be with me. You said you were forced to be with the Fire Prince. When you talked to me earlier and told me that you missed me, I thought you meant…”

“What are you talking about? I never said that, Sie.”

He took a step back, his legs faltering, causing him to almost trip. “What do you mean? You found me. I left as soon as I saw your mouth all over him at the party, but you came running after me. We talked and…”

“Sie. Tezya walked me back to my room. I didn’t go anywhere else tonight. We never talked. Other than you dancing with me, but that was it.”

His eyes widened before he turned away from me, running his hands through his hair again. “Fuck…” A long pause, then. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.” He pulled a piece of paper out from his pocket. It was crumbled and looked like it’d been read a hundred times. “You didn’t write this? You never gave this to me?”

A tear rolled down my cheek that I was unable to stop at the same time as chills ran up my body. Confusion and some weird form of grief I couldn’t quite place was taking over my anger. “No, Sie.”

“I thought… You told me to meet you in your chambers—” he cut himself off. He started pacing the length of the room before he began speaking again. “They sent an illusion user. I thought I was talking to you. They made me believe that you wanted to…” He stopped and turned to look at me. Sadness filled his eyes. Longing and sadness and regret.

I took a step back, dread filling me as I realized what was about to happen. That it was breaking my heart. I was still furious with Sie, but seeing him break, seeing him so vulnerable, and having him tell me how much he wanted to be with me. It was all I wanted to hear from him before. For him to be open and honest, to get to know therealhim, not the person who put on a performance for everyone. But seeing him in pain… I had no idea how I felt anymore. “Sie, listen to me. You need to leave right now. This is a setup.”

He closed the distance between us, reaching for my hands. “Leave with me, Scotlind. Run away with me.”

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