Page 31 of The Prince's Mage

Notes about the Heart.

And… as she reached the end…

Marcella swallowed. It wasn’t… as horrid as she’d first thought, but she was still too fresh off the table not to feel exposed and violated by anything done to her without her knowledge. Even if it had been done with the best of intentions.

As she closed the last notebook and pushed it away, she pressed her fist to her mouth. She wasn’t angry. She wasn’t furious.

Maybe Gavril was right.

Maybe they’d cut it out of her.

But she was disappointed. And it was her own fault. She’d expected better of Gavril. She shouldn’t have.

She’d believed he was the best of the Inimicus. He was. He still was. But he was still an Inimicus. They couldn’t help themselves. It just showed how wholly incompatible their people were. Their best might love someone who was the worst of her people, but he would always see her first as something to be used.

“You said…” Marcella rasped. “The night you bonded us, that you will have peace at all costs. You meant… my reaction when I found out you were going to study me and my magic. That I would hate you and never forgive you for treating me just as much as a rat as your heretics would.”

“I did.”

“And yet…” Marcella looked up. “Now you give it to me to do with what I will, despite believing these notes hold the key to finding a way to stop fighting, despite knowing if I destroy these your father will bind you away from your magic…”

“Yes.”

“Because…” The cold marble against her legs held her in place. Or maybe it was the way Gavril was looking at her. “You no longer want peace at all costs?”

“Peace is no longer what I want most. I want it. But I want you—” Gavril took in a sharp breath. “I want your forgiveness and trust more.”

She wasn’t an idiot. But she wasn’t ready for that conversation and neither was he. They were both too fragile and surrounded by enemies on all sides to tear each other apart.

She pushed the whole stack back to him, swallowing her revulsion at the fact that they would continue to exist. “Keep them. I… If you think somewhere in them and in me is the key to bringing our people to peace… keep them. I…” She looked into his eyes and made herself as clear as she could with veiled words. It was a poor illusion, but she prayed he didn’t call her out on it. “I want peace at all costs. It is what I want most.”

Gavril’s lips pressed together as he slowly pulled the stack to him. He lowered his gaze to the floor. No wonder he favored illusions. He needed them to hide the way he wore his heart on his sleeve.

She said, “Whatever you need from me… to figure out what this is that you believe can bring peace… I will give.”

It bought her time at least. If she could figure out a way for peace, maybe Hypatia would still reward her. She could go home and back to her life and spend the rest of it trying to forget green eyes and gold hair while she rested in the arms of someone who would at least hold sacred the same things she did.

If she couldn’t fulfill Hypatia’s plan—at least if she did capture Gavril, it wouldn’t bring the results Hypatia wanted—she needed some way out of Areator and back to her people where she belonged.

Gavril belonged among his.

At least she believed it when she didn’t think too long about the fact that she’d never felt like she really belonged before. Or when she didn’t look too closely at the illusion hiding his black eye.

“Alright… I—” Gavril looked up as he picked up the notebooks. “We will start when you have enough strength to walk.”

He reached for her with his other hand, his left hand, to help her up. When she didn’t take it, he whispered, “Contumax puella, do you want to sit on the floor the rest of the day?”

She reluctantly took his hand and let him help her back to her bed. Once she was back on it, she pulled as far away from him as she could, wrapping her arms around herself and ignoring the longing spilling out of his eyes as he slowly moved to the door connecting their rooms.

She held her left wrist against her heart as she curled back into the blankets.

She wished she was angry. She knew what to do with fury.

This empty, aching disappointment was new to her.

She only had herself to blame.

Chapter12

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