Page 107 of Elven Crown

The tension in the air thickened between them with a growing warmth of expectation. Rebecca couldn’t help thinking he wanted something from her, some oath in return, some promise.

Or maybe just for her to tell him to rise and put him out of his misery.

But then Rowan bowed his head and raised her hand toward his face to press his lips against the back of it.

It was only for a moment, nothing lingering about it in the slightest. More like a warm flutter of his lips against her skin before he released her hand and looked up to meet her gaze.

Rebecca gave him a gentle smile, which was all she could manage. Then she withdrew her hand from his grasp.

This time, he let her.

“Very convincing,” she said.

“Was it really? Excellent.” His grin returned as he pushed himself off one knee and turned to sit beside her again. “I was going for realistic.”

“Then you achieved it.”

“You think it would work on Lady Maleine?”

They both burst out laughing, and the serious moment between them was over, its purpose fulfilled. For now, Rebecca could forget about the nightmare of her life and her duty, because Rowan was here, and he was her friend.

That was all he ever would be, because there could be nothing more between them. If anything, he was more of a brother, acomfort, a safe shore where she could rest and find a moment’s peace amidst the maddening storm buffeting the ocean of her existence.

But at least she had him, for now. No matter what the Bloodshadow Court, the council, or even the clans did to her, she would always have Rowan. For years, that knowledge had kept her going, and for years, it was all she’d had. She couldn’t imagine a life without him.

That night, she couldn’t have possibly imagined what would happen to make a life without him the only choice she had left.

30

Rebecca woke with a start, gasping as her eyes flew open in the darkness of her room. Her gaze settled on the alarm clock on top of her standing dresser, its bright green numbers flashing at her.

She was in her private room at the Shade headquarters, in Chicago, Illinois, on Earth. She was Rebecca Knox, Commander of Shade.

She was here now and nothing else.

Even after the mental inventory of her present identity and all the facts that came with it, she couldn’t shake the images from her dream. The memories that had now been dredged up from her subconscious to plague her in the night.

The kind of dreams she hadn’t had in decades. The kind of dreams she’d thought had left her entirely.

She hadn’t thought of her old life in Xahar’áhsh with such startling clarity like that in longer than she could remember. Those agonizing nights of Theodil’s lessons. Her friendshipwith Rowan. Everything she’d endured, all in the name of the Bloodshadow Court and her destiny as the Bloodshadow Heir, for whom her own people had been waiting for countless centuries or more.

Not thinking about her old life wasn’t a mistake. She’d trained her mind away from these memories on purpose, and now they were flooding back in during the night, while she was asleep and off-guard.

While she had no awareness to defend against them and hold them at bay.

She’d held the memories back to protect herself, and now, all her efforts were being undone.

All because of Rowan, she was certain.

His presence here had unlocked those buried memories and brought them to the forefront of her mind. Even worse was that she still had no more information about who else knew she was here or who else might find her.

It was incredibly dangerous.

Rebecca couldn’t afford to live in the past. That was the whole point of being on Earth. But now, as Commander of Shade, with a tense truce with Maxwell, with Harkennr just on the other side of town and Azyyt Ra’al’s presence in Chicago…

No, she couldnotlet these pieces of her old life slip back into her new one. There was too much at stake.

What Rebecca needed was a refresh, something to get her head back on straight and recenter her focus. Then she could refortify her mind against the past and how vividly these memories had tried to rework the truth of events.

---