Page 39 of The Phoenix Inheritance

“And then there were your actions.” I wave another set of fingers. “Escaping the fort’s walls every chance you had. Things like helping me, a human, catch fish to put food on the table.”

“I only ever managed to capture one or two,” he mumbles in the shadows.

“Saving me on the battlegrounds,” I speak over him, refusing to let Dane browbeat himself.

“You almost died out there today!” He barks, his fiery rage making me flinch despite my resolve.

“And even if I did!” I counter in a hiss. “Your actions speak of what’s in your heart. Whether you overcome circumstances or not will never change the fact that with me, everything you did always came from the right place.” I search his gaze, hoping to convince him with my eyes if words fail. “That’s something I can understand. Something I can love.”

Dane’s mouth moves but no sound comes out. He looks at me with a world of heartache, like defeated though he won in front of the whole Kingdom today.

“You have no idea how firmly I believed people like you need to be destroyed,” he eventually sneers, lips curling into a vicious snarl, “simply for not having the power to destroy me in return. Hell, Isobel, I was even ready to destroy myself because I wasn’t strong enough. I preferred being found dead in the Barrens rather than suffering the humiliation of never challenging my brother!”

My jaw drops as grim understanding hits me. So that’s how he came to me. He jumped off the cliffs because he couldn’t accept an existence any less mighty than a phoenix’s.

Can he even be happy with me? My constitution doesn’t allow for a life of great feats and adventure. I hardly even manage a regular human life to start with.

“I hated your kind,” he spits out so ferociously I take a step back. “Sure, because I was brought up to believe that way. But also because I desperately needed something, someone to make me look less weak in comparison. Maybe I didn’t send the Gargoyles to your house. But you know what, Isobel?”

Dane searches my gaze, grey beams hard as stone. When I fail to answer, his fists clench. His veins bulge with barely contained fury.

“I didn’t care.”

My legs give in and I drop back onto the bench. Even if I know his feelings have changed, Dane’s words still sting. Didn’t care, when I became an orphan overnight? Didn’t care, when my world was ripped away from me, when I almost lost everything, including my will to live…?

“I couldn’t care less if my father’s Gargoyles gutted a hundred families or if they wiped away every single person in Gronlund. If anything, I was glad my shortcomings weren’t the prime subject at dinner for a while.” My breath grows shallow as I’m drawn between pity for this man and blind resentment. “The life of your parents? Yours?” He shakes his head forcibly. “Worthless. Because I was so bloody selfish, and cruel, and pitifully small though I pretended to be big, and–”

All of a sudden, halfway through the speech that manages to awaken an ounce of bitterness despite the love flowing in my heart, Dane drops to one knee. He gazes up at me from the grimy ground, a phoenix Prince bowing to a prisoner of his own Kingdom.

“And so Isobel,” he finishes in a gravelly voice. “Won’t you marry me?”

A stunned laugh escapes my lips as a thrill travels down my spine. No, this can’t be true, I chant to myself frantically. And yet Dane still kneels before me, eyes begging and bold.

“I’m not sure painting such an unflattering portrait of yourself is the best strategy for a man about to propose,” I weakly dodge the question.

But Dane scoots closer, sullying the kneecaps of his fine attire. He captures my hand and presses a delicate kiss to my fingers, a tender gesture belying the slightly savage air that still remains after his harangue.

“But both things are true,” his whisper echoes within the cell’s walls. “I could’ve gone through my existence as a coward and a brute, and then I met you. You changed everything. I don’t care if my father, the whole Kingdom or even fate disagrees. The world is wrong.” Dane looks at me with an air so full of affection, there’s no way I can hold his past against him.”I know what I want,” he grunts huskily. “And that’s to love you every single second that we have.”

My heart slams in my chest. Never in my wildest fantasies would I have dared imagine I could be so lucky. Happiness is at the tip of my fingers – but one last obstacle looms between us before I can grasp it.

“Oh Dane,” I sigh wistfully, wishing we had already slayed all our demons and could live our Happily Ever After. “I would say yes a thousand times over, but–”

His nose brushes mine as he hunts for my gaze imploringly. His ragged breath feathers over my skin, making my pulse race.

“My eyes won’t ever stray from you if you’re by my side Isobel, I swear,” he vows. “Even when you’re old and grey and I’m… not.”

Tears blur my vision at his impossible promise. I’ve never wept in front of Dane so I avert my face, but he nudges me back towards him. His calloused thumbs travel over the wet trails, drying them as they cascade down my cheeks.

“That sounds wonderful, actually,” I mumble, losing the battle against the sobs that wrack my chest. “But–”

“I don’t want to be King, if that’s what you’re thinking. I’ll never look back upon that. My brother will be better at it anyhow.”

He’s crazy, I tell myself as I’m held transfixed by those boundless wells of grey.

“Wait,” I beg before he weakens my resolve altogether. “There’s something you need to know, so that you can make this choice without regrets.”

Dane’s determination doesn’t waver. “If I accept, you’ll be my bride?”

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