Page 22 of Vale of Dreams

“Avalon Tower doesn’t know you’re here. And now you want to stay and search for a portal key, putting your life at risk? One of Avalon Tower’s only Sentinels?”

Frustration simmers. “Well, I don’t have to do it now, but you need to hide until I can get it. I can work it out with Vivianne, if that makes you feel better, but I can’t exactly go to Wrythe or any of the other Pendragons. They don’t trust any of us demi-Fey right now. Do you have any idea where you can hide in the kingdom until I can return?”

I touch his back over the soldier’s coat.

His silver eyes gleam. “There are a few old assets here that I think I can connect with. As long as I’m out of the dungeon, I’ll be fine on my own.” He takes a deep breath. “But I’m not going back with you. I’m going to find Ysolde first, and it might take a while.”

My breath catches. “Did you hear something about your sister?”

“I was in a cell with a few criminals before they separated me. They said they believe there’s a dungeon here just for demi-Fey. A fortress of some kind. Not for spies like me, but the civilian demi-Fey they captured long ago. The guy just didn’t have any idea where it is. But if she’s alive here, that’s where she’d be.”

There are dark circles beneath his eyes. I so badly want to bring him home with me and give him a warm bath and feed him.

“Okay. Maybe we can bring her back with us,” I say. “I’ll work with Nivene and Viviane on that, too. We’ll figure something out. The assets you mentioned, maybe. Just stay safe for now, and I’ll get you out later.” I stare into his beautiful silver eyes. “I can’t stomach what they did to you in the dungeons. I want to find the royal family and batter their faces in right now.”

“Nia, when you go back to Avalon Tower, I need you to work with them,” he says. “You can’t go rogue. This is the whole problem.”

“You keep talking about a problem…” The feeling in the pit of my stomach is like watching a storm roll in on the horizon, the sky darkening, clouds roiling—a tempest that’s going to drown me. “What is the problem?”

“You shouldn’t have come here alone for me. You shouldn’t be letting emotions drive your decisions,” he says quietly, a sigh in his voice. He rests his forehead against mine again.

“It worked, though, didn’t it? I got you out.” With a feather-light touch, I brush my fingertips over his jaw, where a bruise darkens his skin. I wish I had his healing powers.

He closes his eyes. “Yes. And I would have done the same for you. And then I’d probably hunt down Auberon for revenge. I’d make the worst, rashest decisions that could get a lot of people killed. I would do that for you, and my emotions would get the better of me.”

I feel the world going cold. “What are you saying?”

He pulls away from me again. With a wistful look, he brushes the back of his knuckles over my cheekbones. “This isn’t easy for me, Nia. You were all I thought about in there. You, and the last moments before I was captured.”

My stomach drops as I feel the storm approaching. “Why don’t you just say what you need to say?”

His expression is agonized, and he tears his gaze away from mine. “I can see another world where we’re together, and there’s no war and no Auberon. Where our lives spread out before us like sunlight over a vineyard, where we don’t have to risk our lives and look over our shoulders. Where no one will break our bones to wrench every last secret from us. But that’s another world, Nia. Not this one.”

My chest splinters open. “Just say it.”

His eyes shine with sorrow, his brow furrowed. “We can’t be together. We never should have been. Back in Dover, when I thought you might be captured, I would have sacrificed all of Avalon Tower for you. And here you are, on a mission by yourself, talking about hunting down the king or searching for portal keys. You could have been captured. And then what? One of our only two Sentinels, an Avalon Steel agent, would be in their dungeons. And Nia, you don’t know what it’s like…I’m lucky I didn’t break. We have to be thinking as clearly as possible in this war. We can’t have our decisions clouded by love. I don’t want you risking your life for me, Sentinel or not.”

“But I made the right decision to get you out of there.”

A line etches between his eyebrows. “You came here alone.” A ragged edge tinges his voice. “And believe me, I would have done the same if I thought it was the best way to get you out. Love drives us to make the most reckless decisions, but that’s not what the world needs from us. The world needs us to be thinking clearly, rationally. I appreciate that you came here for me, but I hate it, too, because you never should have risked your life. I need you to go back now, and I need us to think like trained spies again, not like lovers. We never should have broken the rules in the first place. Because…I kept replaying that day in my mind over and over, the day I was captured. Every time they were beating me or torturing me, it looped in my mind. Every stupid misstep I made. The ways I could have made a better decision. I don’t for a second regret giving myself up to save you. I regret that I wasn’t thinking rationally and clearly that day, because half my mind was on you the entire time, and the fear of losing you was like nothing I’d known before. I kept making bad decisions. And that’s what will happen to you if we let this go on. This ends with you dead, and it will be my fault. I can’t do this. I can’t…”

He stares into my eyes like he’s searching for absolution.

I swallow hard. “You don’t know that it ends with one of us dead.”

His eyes mist, and he looks lost for words for a few moments.

My heart breaks for him, for me.

“Nia…” He struggles to compose his thoughts, and right now, I have few coherent thoughts of my own.

“I get it.”

“I think Alix died because she was in love, because her mind was off the mission, because all she could think about was Rein. It ended with them both dead. Everyone knew how she felt about him. I’m not letting that happen to us. I’m not letting that happen to you.”

Pain twists in my chest. My eyes sting, and I shake my head. “I still need to get you out of here, Raphael. One way or another.”

“With Avalon Tower. I’ll find the assets, look for my sister. I’ll get myself out of here with their help. If you come back here, it should only be because Avalon Tower sent you. Don’t come on your own, and don’t come without them knowing you’re here. Promise?”

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