Page 167 of What Lies Within Masks & Shadows

He breathed sharply as he leaned back against the tree, pulling from her palms and resting his head on the bark. “Magnelis’s mind is protected against my powers. I cannot anticipate his intentions. Knowing Nevilier would retrieve me and not knowing my fate … I preferred a night away from camp if it were to be my last outside the walls of Galdheir.”

“You thought Magnelis knew of our treason?”

“I have been meticulously ruthless in securing our secret in ways I cannot share. But with my powers null against him, I did not know what to think. If I would never see the sky again … I wanted to fly amongst the stars. I wanted to take you there because … perhaps you needed it, too.” His gaze fell to the dirt, and he roughly said, “A memory I could hold on to if … if they had me again. Something I could remember when the pain became too much.”

She remembered what Thalon said about the Mystic whose baby he was merciful toward, and what Magnelis did to him after.

Tears brimmed her burning eyes. It was unimaginable what Garrik had thought might happen to him. Of what kind of suffering Magnelis would inflict on him in the discovery of high treason. But Garrik was willing to allow his capture—to goquietly—for the sake of one last night of peace. One last night of freedom that he spent with her.

“I could not speak to you that morning because I knew if you smiled at me like you did the night before … if you touched me like that again … I would have found a way to stay. And Magnelis would have unleashed his wrath on my Dragons, and I could not allow that to happen.”

Alora’s heart was breaking for him. The stranger she met a few short months ago, the Savage Prince she’d heard so much about. Her enemy in Telldaira. Her friend after the explosion in the arena. The male who flew her in his arms when he thought he was going to suffer by the High King’s hand.

Garrik … this powerful,beautiful, selfless male who would sacrifice himself just to make certain the world didn’t fall to ruin.

An entire world.

An entire world.

“When you’re out saving Elysian,” she started, “remember to save yourself, too.”

“Maybe I am not worth saving.”

“Yes … mighty prince, you are.” She pulled herself beside him, leaning against the tree in silence. Taking in the scent of his washed hair—lavender and rose, lemon mixed with a hint of vanilla and oak on his breath.

Garrik exhaled deeply, and she thought it was more beautiful than an enchanting melody listening to him breathe. Listening to that precious, lovely sound.

They sat in that peace for what seemed like an hour of slow, healing breaths.

Then Garrik’s hand lightly brushed hers on the dirt between them. “I recall you promising to doanythingshould I wake.”

She stiffened, unprepared to hear his request. But Garrik’s voice was so soft, she imagined it like a feathered touch. Andbefore he spoke, she swore she could glimpse stars gleaming in his silver eyes.

“Tell me about your days while I was gone. What made you smile? I want to know everything.”

Alora loosened a breath and began to grin.

He did, too.

“I killed a reike yesterday.”

“Alora! Come inside for dinner. Your father will be home any moment.”

A bouncy, white curly-haired faeling stumbled barefoot across a dirt lane in one of Telldaira’s northern communities. Adorned in a white summer dress with silver stitching and a delicate lace of snowflakes her father had bought for her. Shrubbery and bushes lined the street andyielded exquisite shades of fuchsia, violet, and pearl flowers as she followed the call of her mother.

Arms stretched out wide, Nadeleine whispered, “Come here, my precious lion cub.” She knelt low as Alora jumped into them, clutching her white lion trinket.

A tear dropped down Alora’s cheek when her eyes opened. Her mother’s voice still caressed her mind.

Sleep. She didn’t remember when it had come. Through the glistening stars and burning out torches, Garrik’s warm voice had whispered long into the night. The soothing sounds and melodies from their distant camp quieted at one point, as if they had calmly faded away into a whisper on a cool wind.

When the warm morning sun kissed her face and an unusually pleasant chill against her head stirred her, she realized that she was still in the annulus. Covered by a green, woolen blanket that Garrik must have dawned and draped around her, her head comfortably rested against his shoulder.

Alora pressed her cheek further against his chest. The scent of him was soothing. Warm lemon, a calm invitation of lavender and rose, and laced within, his usual leather and metal scent offered a flutter of safety.

Garrik’s arm was toweled around her upper arm, tracing lazy circles against the blanket where her death mark was hidden. The sensation only added to the protection she felt.

His silver gaze stretched out into the evergreen trees ahead. As if in loose thought, his head relaxed against the bark and a tender smile rested on his face, which mirrored the calmness of the morning. The grass gently swayed in the imperceptible breeze, the trickling of a nearby stream against pebbles, soft steps of mother animals and their young treading through the fields beyond. Glowing silver glistened against the shards of sunlight, and perhaps they pretended the past few days were nothing but a distant echo.

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