Page 144 of Moonmarked

God, she laughed like she’d just heard the funniest thing in her whole life, and I was going to demand she tell me exactly what the hell she was talking about, demand it again and again, until she answered, when?—

“Mother.”

Her laughter cut abruptly. Lyall walked in through the doorway, looking as put together as always, not a hair out of place. And the queen smiled.

“Oh, my boy. I was just keeping your guest entertained.” She rushed to his side, moving like she truly was a fairy like I’d seen in movies back home, her dress floating about her with each step.

She put her hands on Lyall’s chest and kissed his cheek. “Don’t take long.”

The queen turned to me and I was stuck in my disbelief, wanting to scream at her face and run away until I disappeared at the same time. My voice failed me so I couldn’t manage to even stop her when she disappeared beyond the doorway like her feet glided over the floor—and then Lyall was in front of me.

He put something around my shoulders. “Here. I brought you this.”

A cloak, thick and warm and red.

“You fell in the pool when the life bond broke, but you’re okay. It’s over now.”

I blinked a million times before I was able to focus onhis face. “Your…your mother…” Damn my traitorous voice that always failed me when I risked choking on emotions.

“Don’t mind my mother. She’s just looking forward to retiring, that’s all. Come. Let me take you to get warmed up.”

I looked at him again, really looked at him, saw how pale he was. How the circles under his eyes looked like bruises all of a sudden.

“I…I have to go,” I thought I said, completely disoriented. “I have to go, Lyall.”

“You have to rest first,” he said, but when I stepped back, he didn’t stop me. “You lost a lot of energy. I did, too—I could barely keep standing. You need to rest first, Nilah.”

I could have sworn that it was a fucking threat.

My freezing heart picked up the beating and I forced myself to raise my chin.No more of this weakness.No more cowering back.

“The only thing I need is to walk away from this palace. The life bond is no more. We’re both free.”

I held his eyes for a long moment, not daring to even blink. This was the moment of truth. Here, Lyall would show me what he really was made of. Here, I would finally figure out whether he ever intended to let me walk away after the unbinding ceremony or not.

My heart pounded. My limbs felt numb, both from the cold and from how tightly I was clenching my every muscle.

Then…

“Of course,” Lyall whispered. “You’re free to leave whenever you like.”

It took all of me to stop the sigh of relief that wanted to rip out of me. He was going to let me go, after all. I was free to leave right this second, and I would. As soon as I walkedout of this room, I would keep going until I was out of this palace, but…

I never got the chance to say a word or take a step before we heard someone coming through the dark corridor that had led me here.

Both Lyall and I turned to see who it was, and I never in a billion years could have ever predicted or imagined the next moment, not even in my wildest dreams.

But Rune stepped into the lights, stopped in the middle of the doorway, clothes half torn, hair all over the place, skin covered in blood and grime.

Rune was right there.

That my knees didn’t give was a damn miracle, but I thought they were just too frozen, locked too tightly to budge.

My eyes were open, and I was looking at Rune, alive and a mess and standing on his own.

The silence in the room lasted an entire eternity. Even Lyall didn’t move a single inch, and I could have sworn he was just asshockedto see Rune there as I was.

He’d thought Rune was dead.

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