Page 119 of Bride of the Fae Prince

He bows and leaves, the sound of his footsteps vanishing as Edvear opens the door. His eyes drop to Stella in my arms. They widen. He begins barking orders, and servants spring into a flurry of activity.

I take Stella to the dining room table and set her atop it. She clings to my tunic, mewling a tiny protest, and I grit my teeth against the saucer-like eyes she turns up at me.

“I need to get the glass out of your feet,” I growl, gently prying her hands off me. “You’re bleeding.”

She tugs at her hand, and I release it. Slowly, she lifts it up toward my face. Touches my cheek. I freeze—and simultaneously a sliver of my rage thaws. Just enough to make me hold still while she traces her finger along the line of my jaw. My chest tightens. She lifts her finger, her eyes staring straight at my mouth as she brings one finger to my bottom lip.

I take her wrist, pull her hand away as something inside me cracks and a burn overtakes my cheeks. “Sit still. Your feet need attention.”

She stares up at me with those huge eyes that will forever and ever be my undoing. Clad in that scandalous garment of leaves. And she’s oblivious to it. Moving on instinct, I pull my cloak off my shoulders and wrap it around her. It’s not much, but it’s more. When I clasp it at her throat, her voice startles me.

“Ash?” she whispers.

“Stella?”

“You broke my heart.”

Every muscle in my body stops. It’s said so softly, so gently, and yet it hits me harder than one of Rahk’s blows.

“I think I’m going to run away,” she continues, almost nonchalantly, as if her words aren’t slicing into my chest, carvingup my heart, and serving it on a platter. She turns a bright smile up at me. “I think you will be happier without me.”

Edvear appears just then with a bowl of warm water, another empty bowl, bandages, and a pile of cloths. He glances between Stella and me with thinly veiled shock. Then he sets the supplies down and leaves.

I don’t stop him.

Not knowing what else to do—what in the world can I say to that?—I pull up a chair, place the bowl on it, and carefully set one bloody foot in the water. No longer under Listhra’s compulsion, she hisses in pain, but doesn’t otherwise react as the water turns bright red.

“I want to be strong enough to live in Faerieland, but I think I might just be too human,” continues Stella, her voice oscillating between sad resignation and bright optimism. “I want you to be happy, Ash. More than anything. I think you will be happier with a wife you don’t have to worry about so much.”

False.

“A fae wife would help you overthrow your father more than I can.”

False.

“You’ve been kind to me, Ash, but I think we’re not suited.”

“It doesn’t matter if we’re not suited,” I growl, unable to keep silent. “We’remarried. We stay together. We work through things.Together.”

Why am I saying this? I’m the one planning to send her away the first chance I get.

She gives a bright little laugh, which turns into another hiss when I set to work pulling out each tiny piece of glass from her tiny foot. They plink when they land in the empty bowl.

“I know.” She reaches out then, smiling at me as she threads her fingers into my hair. I try to ignore her touch as I work. It proves impossible. “But we’re not even of the same people.You’re fae. I’m human. Even if we stayed together, even if I wasn’t killed, I cannot give you an heir, right? How would you get an heir, Ash? I like you too much to not be jealous if you take a mistress.”

I squeeze my eyes shut, my lungs so tight I can hardly breathe. “I’mnottaking a mistress.”

There is no one, Stella. No one but you. There was no one before you, and there will be no one after you.

“Then there goes your line of succession!” she chirps, laughing. “It’s a little silly, I think, to fight so hard to overthrow your father without sending everything into war, only to do so a generation later.” She bends down toward me, toward where I kneel, and I look up just in time for her to bop me on the nose. “You need an heir. And it cannot come from me. Which means—”

I snatch her wrist, glaring up at her intoxicated face. How is she so reasonable, even when she’s under the influence of faerie fruit? It’s maddening. “You might be able to give me an heir. I’m not aware of any curse that would prevent a human-fae heir from sitting on the throne.”

She stares at me, blinks, and then flushes bright pink. “Oh.”

I let go and bow my own hot face back over her foot.

She chuckles again, but this time it’s more forced. “And your people would accept such a ruler?”

---