Page 40 of The Prince's Mage

But instead, she stepped into his room. She blinked and she was sitting on the bed beside him, slowly taking his arm and pulling it away. As she did so, he looked up at her with such awe that she could not stop the heat flooding her cheeks.

Before she could come to her senses, he had his hands on hers, running up her arms, over her shoulders, then down her sides before brushing her hair back and cradling her face. She was grateful at least for the darkness so he would not be able to tell how vividly red her face was even as he examined it. He whispered, his accent thicker than usual, “Alive. Safe. Stay. Live. Please.”

She nodded into his palms.

Whatever force had been holding him up before vanished as he collapsed, and Marcella caught him as he clutched her shoulders. She wrapped her arms around his waist loosely, and somehow of its own accord, one hand was running through his hair.

She really shouldn’t be doing any of this. Letting him get closer to her and remain in his overwhelming affection for her. She didn’t want to hurt him, but that was inevitable.

She was always going to disappoint him one way or another. It was in the very nature of her being with everyone she had ever encountered.

Unless she could get her hands on Nikias. Then at least she wouldn’t disappoint Hypatia.

But she wasn’t sure when she was going to get the chance. She was still struggling to muster up the strength to walk without stumbling after casting simultaneous runes. Her faked weakness in front of Gavril and Aimilia wasn’t as fake as she wished. Her time was always spent with Gavril and Aimilia in the library or in her room. She didn’t know her way around the palace well or even where Nikias could be found. And she couldn’t just ask Gavril or he would be immediately suspicious as to why she’d want to see Nikias.

Not to mention from the way he held onto her after he woke up from his own nightmares and would whisper not to her but to himself that she was safe and with him, she doubted he would even let her go anywhere near Nikias.

She wondered what he had nightmares about other than her. At least she assumed he was having nightmares of some kind about her in danger or dead. It made sense from his reactions. It was the same way she always—more subtly in her case—checked Gavril over when he came rushing to her to make sure he wasn’t actually dead on the ground in front of the table.

But she needed a plan and fast.

Partially because Hypatia was building an army and marching, but mostly because Marcella needed to untangle herself from this mess before she was in so deep that it would destroy her too.

Some nights when Gavril held her and would whisper in her ear, some small, useless little story about himself while tracing a rune in his language somewhere on her skin, she had the sinking feeling it was too late for that.

Chapter15

GAVRIL

Gavril didn’t know what was worse: the fact that he was grateful that comforting Marcella after her nightmares meant he was spared his own, or that his heart swelled every time she clung to him. Of course he hated that she was still suffering, but it was also the only way she let him close.

He was too weak and desperate for any hint she might actually return his affection to let it go.

Besides, holding her, his fingers sliding to her pulse and feeling the thrum of her beating heart, kept him sane. In his nightmares, she never had a heartbeat.

Not even when she spoke.

His nightmares were usually the same, him rushing into that room, Marcella on the table, a horrific mangled mess that had him retching. But this time she didn’t make any noise. He couldn’t see the rise and fall of her back as she breathed. Her eyes were open and unblinking. And instead of trashing the room, he ran right to her, dropping to his knees and calling out her name.

She didn’t blink. She didn’t respond.

“Marcella?” With a shaking hand, he reached out and brushed his fingertips against her cheek, but he felt no breath from her. He slid his fingers to her neck, searching for a pulse, and never finding one. His voice cracked as he begged, “My hope, my wife, Marcella, wake up—live—please, don’t be—you can’t be—please…”

He was too late.

Marcella was dead.

He held her limp head in his hands as his throat closed and his vision blurred with water. She was gone. There was no miracle bringing her back to life. He never should have left. His forehead hit the edge of the table, and he was unable to stop his own trembling. His body shook as he couldn’t stop the painful keening rising up his throat.

“It’s your fault.”

Her voice always caught him by surprise. Or maybe it was the perfect way she spoke his language.

He still couldn’t feel her pulse. But he looked up anyway and her dead, empty eyes were staring right at him.

“All of this is your fault.”

It was.

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