Page 124 of Crownless King

He fisted his hands in the handcuffs. “When they told me Sova was dead and you were gone, I thought the world ended. And for me, it did. I didn’t really live since that day. I breathed, ate, talked, functioned, but I did notlive.”

“Wait…” My mind latched onto something he’d just said. “Who told you her name was Sova?”

“I knew her well. I met Sova a long time ago. She found me on a battlefield once when I’d been shot and stabbed too many times to follow the army as they retreated. She healed my wounds and let me recover in her wagon where I saw that giant serpent of Lorsan that you brought as a festival gift for me.” He smiled. “She was the one who brought Magnus back to life, too. I owed her for so many favors already, but I asked her for one more—”

“You!” I gasped, my body shaking at the realization. “You sent her to the bridge that day?”

“She didn’t tell you?” He watched me intently as if wishing to pierce my mind to search through my thoughts. “You didn’t know?”

I scraped both hands down my face, releasing a long, tortured groan.

“She had no chance to tell me anything. We hadn’t even made it to her wagon when…”

He shifted higher up the headboard, sitting up.

“Sparrow, please tell me you didn’t think all this time that Iintendedto get rid of you.”

I stared at him through a film of tears welling in my eyes.

“But that was exactly what I thought…” I whispered.

“Fuck.” He rotated his wrist, breaking the fuzzy manacle.

“There must be a key somewhere,” I mumbled through a sob, but he already snapped the second one off, too.

“Come here, little bird.”

And I did. I shamelessly came to him for comfort that I’d just denied to him myself. I fell against his chest, letting him wrap his arms around me. Relief flooded my veins with lightness. It purged the shadows from my heart. And I cried.

He stroked my back, kissed my hair, and murmured sweet words of comfort that felt like drops of lifegiving water falling on the dry desert floor.

“I may not have fully realized what you were to me back then, Sparrow. But I knew from the moment I saw you that you and I have to be in the same world. With you, I laughed for the first time in decades. Without you, there was nothing but blizzards and storms. I couldn’t part from you. I never intended for you to leave, but I had to make the lords believe that I did. Your life was in danger. They had tried to kill you once, and I knew no matter how far away I’d hide you, they would try again if they knew you were in Nerifir.”

They had tried to kill him, too. Life had been volatile in Elaros, and my presence would not have helped the situation.

“God… Voron,” I sobbed. “I’m so sorry.” I was sorry for the time we had lost. We would never get those months back, but it didn’t happen because of him. “There was no betrayal. Just a mistake.”

He cupped my face.

“Sweetheart, your trust is my most precious gift. I would never break it. Even before I realized how desperately in love I am with you, I knew I couldn’t be without you. There wasn’t much time to plan that day. I had to decide quickly. I knew Sova had the skill, experience, and enough magic to snatch you from the guards and to trick them into believing you gone. While the High Lords pledged their loyalty to me in the Throne Room, I sent Alcon and Magnus to Sova with the plea to take you. She was supposed to keep you for a day or two. The Sky Palace was a wasps’ nest back then, buzzing with danger. I planned to bring you back to Vensari and hide you until it was safe for me to return you to court in Elaros.”

“It was a solid plan,” I agreed.

“Except that when they told me Sova was dead, killed in some foolish hunting accident, I thought it happened before she had a chance to take you. No one saw you. The guards swore you fell…” A shudder ran through his body, and he pressed me to him again.

I felt his anguish, his loneliness, and his pain. But there was no more darkness of betrayal festering inside me.

“I’m so sorry, Voron. Sorry, I doubted you for so long.”

I kissed his chest, tracing with my lips the first letter of my name etched in his skin.

“There was no betrayal, Sparrow. Yet I failed you. I should’ve had a better plan. I could’ve stood up to the court and kept you with me. I—”

I pressed a finger to his lips, trying to stop the hurricane of guilt that clearly threatened to overtake him.

“It was an accident, my love,” I told him. “Neither of us could’ve predicted or prevented it.” His erection pressed against my hip. I straddled his thighs, getting closer. “All we can do now is to keep on living.” I kissed the column of his throat when it bobbed with a swallow.

He gripped my hips as I slid my core along his hard length. Nothing held my lust back now. The desire for him burned unimpeded, consuming me.

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