Page 71 of A Bargain with the Fae King

Riven raises his hand. “I know. I overreacted. But seeing him with you this morning after last night…”

He runs a hand through his loose hair.

The mention of last night has me reaching for my glass of water.

“Why do you dislike him so much?”

Every time his name comes up, he frowns, growls, bares his pointed teeth, or all of the above. Much as Riven might dislike him, Sigurd has been kind to me. He showed me to May, offered to help find her, and helped fix the wards. And he gave me a flower. I don’t know why that lingers with me even though I left the darn thing in my tent.

By all accounts, he’s acted like a friend, even if he occasionally sets my teeth on edge and flirts way too much.

Riven’s frown deepens, and he pushes away the rest of lunch.

Okay, definitely missing something.

“We are not on the best of terms,” he says.

Yeah, I gathered that. “But you’re not at war?”

“No. Almost once, but no, it hasn’t come to that yet.” He shakes his head. “A war between courts would be catastrophic for both of our people, and we cannot afford that right now, not with other threats at our borders.” He scrubs a hand over his face. When it comes away, he’s not even looking at me. Instead, he stares at something on the far wall–a scene from the past that’s invisible to me. “The Wild Tribes, the Unseelie, have become more aggressive over the years. Growing in number and audacity. The Seelie Courts warred against them years ago when I was still very young.”

I swallow another piece of food before setting my own utensils down. Lunch is a thing of the past. “Will you tell me about it? The war and whatever happened back then?”

Riven nods. His attention drifts back to me. “Come sit with me.”

He motions to the interior sitting area. When we’re seated on the comfy furniture inside, he resumes his tale.

“It was a hard-fought war, over many, many years, but eventually we decimated their forces and pushed them back, deep into their Shadow Lands. I was young then, barely into my power, but I fought in my father’s army anyway. I was proud to lead our people into war. It was hard though, worse than I could have imagined, to see my people fall around me, despite my best efforts to fell the enemy first. Perhaps we should have taken it even further than we did then. But the victory we had was hard-won as it was, and we were tired of war and death. Their leaders were dead, their armies dead or scattered. Pursuing a broken, retreating people even further seemed unnecessary.”

His words are solemn, pained. It’s easy to see that he suffered loss in that war, and it still cuts him deep.

War isn’t something I can even begin to relate to. I’ve read about it many times. Heck, that was mostly what they’d taught us about in my many years of history class. I’ve seen it in movies, in video games, and in nightly news reports. But nothing comes close to personal experience. It doesn’t even touch it. Pain, though—that, I know.

I offer the only comfort I can think of and set my hand on top of his.

His head jerks toward me as if he’s forgotten I’m there. I squeeze his hand, giving him a small smile, no matter how I hurt inside thinking of May trapped with a brutal enemy. After a moment, he returns it, moving his hand to lace his fingers through mine.

My heart aches for him. For May. For my family. I want to do more. To wrap my arms around him and hold him against me. To run my hands through his hair and soothe away his worries. I might just need that too.

This story isn’t done though, the look on his face says that clear enough, so I hold myself back, content to feel the warmth of his hand in mine.

Riven sucks in a breath before he continues. “My father died in that war.”

I squeeze his hand tighter.

“Sigurd was our ally. Our people fought together, side by side, as he and my father fought side by side. The war changed all of that. In one of the final battles, Sigurd and my father led the front together. My father fell. I was too far away in the battle to see it happen, but I felt his power falter and then go out, like a piece of myself suddenly fading into nothingness. All the people of the forest felt the loss of our king. And then the power settled on me, a crushing weight that pushed me into the ground along with my grief until it settled under my skin. Those who survived the battle said that Sigurd could have saved him.” His hand tightens on mine, almost painfully before going slack. “He didn’t though. My father died there, and Sigurd survived. Injured but barely.”

I inch closer to Riven on the sofa, my free hand coming over to clasp our joined ones, trying to offer further comfort.

“I’m so sorry.” The words are insufficient but all I have.

His tight-lipped smile doesn’t meet his eyes. “He and my father had been close friends once, before I was born. Sigurd coveted my mother, but she chose my father instead. It drove a rift between them, but they remained tentative allies despite that.”

Evelyn. His mother who had also passed, though I don’t know when or how. I can’t add to Riven’s sorrow by asking about that now. Though I wonder about it and about Sigurd, who must be much older than Riven, despite the fact that they appear similar in age. He, too, carries a burden of loss.

Riven looks away again, seeing memories across the room that I can only guess at. “I think Sigurd always hoped my mother would change her mind and pick him instead. She would never have left my father though. Her heart was irrevocably his. Getting my father out of the way was the only way to make it possible.” He shakes his head at the memory. “Sigurd came to visit my mother at the end of the war. I was there when she asked him if he could have saved my father. He didn’t respond. Couldn’t lie to tell her no.”

Riven leans back on the couch and closes his eyes.

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