Page 47 of Winds of Darkness
“The Fire Prince does not let you offer comfort?”
“Centuries of life together, and he still pushes others away,” Briar sighed.
“Surely he just needs to find his way. He and Queen Eliné were close. He was her soulmate,” Ashtine pondered aloud.
“Yes, which makes her sudden disappearance all the harder on him, but he won’t fucking talk about it,” Briar gritted out.
She waited for the apology that always followed after someone cursed in her presence. Not that she cared, but everyone treatedher differently. Even Talwyn and Azrael conversed differently when she was around, but the apology never came from Briar. From what she knew of the male, he didn’t appear to act any differently around her. In fact, he was the only one who seemed to treat her the same as everyone else. No one everteasedher. Perhaps Renly had when she was younger, but after her coronation, that had ceased.
“But you do not need to hear of my burdens this night,” Briar went on. “If a war is on the horizon, the other Courts need to be made aware.”
“I have tried,” Ashtine sighed.
“Have you?”
She lifted her gaze to his, a bit taken aback. “Did I not come to you and seek your aid? Did you not initially dismiss my concerns?”
“I do not recall dismissing your concerns.”
Ashtine sat up straighter, her eyes narrowing. “You denied my request.”
“I never spoke such words. I wanted to discuss things further—which is a rational request when someone is asking to increase their stores of magically enhanced weapons—and you became upset and left before we could do so,” Briar said simply.
“I— That is not—” Ashtine snapped her mouth shut as she started to sputter, something a princess was never to do.
“If others are not taking your concerns seriously, it is because you are allowing such a thing,” Briar said.
Ashtine could only gape at him. “You believe Iallowothers to dismiss me?” she demanded, failing to keep the incredulity from creeping into her voice.
“What is your explanation?”
“I do not have one,” she retorted. Briar’s brow arched, and the mannerism only served to make her more upset. A gust of wind swept along the beach, grains of sand and droplets of water splattering against her skin and marring her gown. “I have never considered you a rude person, Prince Drayce.”
“I have never considered you meek,Ashtine,” he replied, still calm and collected as he got to his feet.
Ashtine scrambled up as gracefully as she could beside him. “I am not that,” she retorted, air swirling beneath her and lifting her feet a fraction off the ground.
Briar glanced down before bringing his gaze back to hers. “You certainly shouldn’t be,” he replied. “Not with the power that runs in your veins and not with the title you wield. But I stand by what I said, your Highness. If your concerns are not being taken seriously, it is because you are allowing it. Feel free to stay on these shores as long as you wish.”
A water portal appeared, Briar retreating through it a moment later, leaving her standing on the shore beneath a sky slowly taking on the colors of dawn. A flash of faint silver light appeared a second before Nasima’s cry mixed with the sound of the waves.
The realm hangs in the balance.
A beginning or an ending? Time will tell.
Biting down on a cry of frustration, Ashtine stepped into the winds that tortured her and went home.
Chapter 5
Briar
Fuck!
That was all he had time to think as he rolled to the side, but not before he conjured a wave of water to meet the wall of flames coming at him. And not before he sent an ice dagger flying.
The Fire General lifted her sword with a second to spare, the dagger shattering into tiny crystals when it collided with her blade.
Briar rolled onto his knees before pushing to his feet. Eliza’s skills never failed to impress him, but it wasn’t a surprise. She and Nakoa trained together and trained their forces together, and he’d lain awake all night with an idea rolling around in his mind. The problem was, he didn’t know how to approach his Inner Court or the Fire Court with the idea because relations with the Eastern Courts were strained enough as it was.
