Page 49 of Blackwarden
“You can’t? Or you won’t?”
Confounded questions!
“I would happily take you, but my magic is limited by the queen’s desires, and she would never allow it.” I could feel her frustration building as I spoke, but I craved it. I wanted more of her emotions. Ones that weren’t fear, or pain, or loathing.
“I don’t want to be here,” she said as she pulled her hand from mine and hugged herself again. A wave of unease passed between us, and it ripped at the walls I was trying to put up around my heart.
“You’re here as part of a treaty between the Unseelie Court and the leaders of your people. Unfortunately, you have no choice.”
I hated saying the words. Having your choice stripped from you—your free will taken completely—was perhaps more difficult to cope with than pain. I knew it well. I’d been enduring it for five hundred years. She had yet to be compelled by Bevgyah to do things she would have nightmares about for the rest of her precious human life. I swallowed my anger knowing there was nothing I could do to save her from this. Much like her, I didn’t want to be here either.
A tear slipped down her cheek. I might have crumbled at the sight of it, but I managed to slam the stoic mask I was so used to wearing over my features as her sorrow swallowed me whole. I took a long breath, trying to settle my own emotions.
“Come.” I reached out my hand again.
She stared at it but didn’t move. A strange almost certainty passed through her and into me.
“I know you,” she said, a monotone quality to her voice. “You’ve guided me before, haven’t you?”
I took a breath to speak, but searing pain lanced through my head. It was the same pain every time the curse kept me from answering. I took a sharp breath across my teeth that didn’t go unnoticed. She watched me, her emotions dipping to concern.
“Her majesty is waiting for us.” I finally managed.
She glared at me, frozen in place, her frustration wicking into my skin. I knew her feelings would be so much more intense without an imbued portrait to dampen them, but I hadn’t been truly prepared. I finally took her hand and squeezed it gently before tucking it under my arm and pulling her down the hall.
Chapter 25 ~ Half Memories
Rosalin
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The Blackwarden was true to his word, which I guess he had to be because Fae couldn’t lie. I don’t know how I knew this, but it was a tiny fragment of a half memory that I was one hundred percent certain was true. He pulled me through the queen’s cold castle but released my hand before we approached the door to the harem. I shivered from the profound sense of loneliness I was left with as his hand slipped from mine.
The queen was waiting just inside, impatient for us to return, a scowl marring her gorgeous face.
“What took so long?” she spat at her Blackwarden.
He took the question in stride, expression never changing.
“It took me longer to find her with...” He side-eyed me. “...all the other emotions from the revel.”
The queen put a hand on her hip, glaring at him in a way that made me shudder. I don’t know how he managed to stay so stoic.
“Take her to a suite for now, I’m still enjoying myself,” Bevgyah said as she turned, whipping her hair around and nearly smacking us both with her braids.
“As you wish, my queen.”
He ushered me through a different way to the hall than I was familiar with. Several of the doors that branched off of it were closed with a handful still open and dark inside. He led me into one and the brazier ignited, flooding the space with golden light. It was a small room, an overstuffed futon in the middle and surrounded by silks draped from the walls and ceiling. I froze in place. I’d been here before. But I knew that was wrong. I hadn’t stepped foot into one of these rooms so I couldn’t have.
“Are you okay?” His voice curled around me, pulling me from another half memory.
When I faced him, I realized I’d been holding my breath and let it burst past my lips.
“I’ve been here before.”
He smiled weakly. “No, not here, I can assure you.”
“No, I have. Or I dreamt it?” The memory was foggy. A man was with me. He’d led me here from another room. I couldn’t stop staring at his perfect body. “There was a man with me. He had pale skin. So perfect.” I was lost for a moment in the fragments of the past. “I remember him.”
