Page 149 of Fated or Knot

“I was very close to getting on a train to a sanctuary city,” I admitted.

“And even closer to returning to Osme Fen against your will,” he growled. “I would’ve followed. Your destiny was never to remain there. This is your path, part of your journey. Here, by my side.”

He’d just posed a rather terrifyingwhat-if, as Cymora would’ve pushed me straight back into Pack Ellisar’s arms had Pack Sorles not been such an incredible alternative for her schemes. Yet I felt comforted. There was never a chance that I would’ve been trapped in that fate. Niall would’ve come for me.

In my mind’s eyes, I saw him tearing through Ellisar and his brothers the next time they thought to corner me in the market. The trio of barkfolk were alphas, but they hadn’t trained for combat a moment in their lives.

“No contest,”Marius’s feral side whispered in my mind. He also weighed hunting them down anyway in a moment of outrage.“No male, past or future, will intimidate you in that way.”

“It’s in the past,”I assured him in a comforting whisper.

The kelpie shook his head to clear out the murderous thoughts. “I will always come for you,” he said.

I knew he would; he was swiftly becoming my safe haven. The close friend I wished I’d had with me all along but was more than grateful to have returned to me. “I give thanks to fate, too, for deciding that we fit together perfectly.” I squeezed his hand and admired the multicolored gleam off his fierce gaze. “I love you, and I am yours.”

My words set off a wave of possessive desire in him, a blend of alpha and feral intensity. “I have always been yours,” he replied. “And…I think you’re about to hear this far too much. I love you too.”

I practically glowed with happiness to hear him say it out loud and really hoped there was a bed waiting for us at the end of this tunnel.

He answered my thoughts again. “Better. The cutest fucking inn. Though you’ll have to wait until I let you off my knot to see it in the light of day.”

“I look forward to it,” I said dryly, assuming he was exaggerating his prowess for a male who hadn’t actually knotted me yet.

He raised an eyebrow back in challenge.Uh oh,I thought playfully.

“We’ll see,” he said, low and rasping. We’d reached the end of the tunnel, where it leveled off into a dirt path. The first stars dotted the night sky as it deepened to a velvety purple-black overhead. I huddled closer to Marius as a chill breeze whistled in from the sea.

He released my hand to draw me close for a short walk around the side of a two-story structure half hidden in the trees. If this was the inn, it was certainly secluded, as there didn’t seem to be any other buildings nearby. The windows on the second floor were dark, while a full-powered essence lamp gleamed atop a wooden porch made with fresh-smelling timbers.

Marius got the door, the hinges of which creaked mightily as he pulled it open, and I was blasted with a nice wave of hot air as I entered. Instead of having a front desk and an area for baggage right off the front foyer, it looked like we’d walked straight into someone’s living room.

It smelled like cooked seafood and aged fabrics. The floor was wooden and scuffed in places, covered by a faded area rug in the center, with a couch and loveseat set nearby, both of which had flattened cushions and knitted blankets draped across the back of them. Several wooden shelves lined the walls, especially over the hearth, all of them burdened with dusty items.

A wrinkled figure paused in a rocking chair situated close to the hearth, her knitting needles stilling as she took us in. “Henrik!” she bellowed at the top of her lungs. I startled, notexpecting such a loud voice from a little old fae like her. “Henrik! Guests!”

“What?” called an equally elderly-sounding male voice from the next room over.

The female got up with the help of a walking stick and left her knitting behind. “Deaf as a post, he is,” she muttered to herself. She was also speaking louder than necessary. Fae aged, but very slowly, so she had to have seen many centuries to earn the stoop in her back and the gray that’d leeched most of her coloring.

“Hello, honored elder. May we rent a room for a few nights?” Marius asked.

“Of course. Look at you two dears, so young and in love,” she said, shuffling right by the Unseelie prince with his distinctive scar without more than a single glance. “You just missed dinner, but I’ll cook you up something special. New couples always deserve treats.”

“Oh, no, that’s quite all right,” I said quickly, even though my belly grumbled at the reminder of how long it’d been since we’d had a light lunch. We’d be too busy fucking to eat anytime soon, though, and I didn’t want to trouble an honored elder.

“I’ll prepare something that can sit and leave it in a basket right outside your room for when you’re ready for it,” she continued as if she hadn’t heard me. Which she might not have.

She’d walked to a set of stairs and retrieved a keyring off the banister, flipping through a few of them before offering us the ring by one key dangling between her fingers. “Right up these stairs. First room on your left. I’m Illia, by the way. If you need anything, ring the bell, though it would be nice if you’d come downstairs too. These steppers don’t work like they used to.”

“We will be no trouble,” he assured her.

She smacked her lips and waved him off. “Ah! Such a little charmer. You remind me of my Henrik. Came back from the war full of fire and verve.”

Marius drew up in surprise while I struggled not to laugh.

“Did you need me?” the male in question called.

“Nay, I got it!” she called back over her shoulder.

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