Page 116 of Wrath of the Fae Queen
“Trust me, I intend to.” I grind my teeth. “The moment the throne is mine at sunset, we will storm the palace with nothing left to hold us back. I want Titania dead before the sun rises on the next day.”
The door to the tavern opens and closes again, the screams and shouts of the not-so-distant riots filtering in. A group of bloodied Nightmares enters, all claws, antlers and dark scales, scattered with blood. Both Nico and Ada are among them. A fresh group who just finished their turn sleeping exit into the fray.
Keira gawks at the sight. “The people are still fighting?”
“You have no idea,” I say. “It never stopped.”
The door swings open a second time, and Klara and Hawthorne enter carrying Jasper between them. He is staggering, hardly able to support his own weight. There is so much blood all over him, I cannot immediately tell where he is injured. It coats his face and there is a huge stain covering his abdomen. Then I see it: the handle of a knife protruding from his side, positioned in the gap where the panels of his armor meet.
We all gawk at them, frozen, as the room falls to silence.
“Don’t just stand there!” Klara roars. “Clear a table for him so I can treat his wounds.”
I react first, throwing out an air wield that removes the discarded mugs from two tables and pushes them together, while Cyprien rushes to help with Jasper’s bulky weight. As they heft him up onto the surface, I join Jasper’s side, ready to offer my magic reserves to Klara if she needs them.
Keira brings a bowl of warm water and cloths, methodically cleaning the blood from Jasper’s skin. “What happened to you?” she whispers, her eyes huge.
“It is pure insanity out there,” Jasper grunts. “The people have lost their fucking minds. Civilians in makeshift Truth Templar uniforms are attacking the army.” He lets out a choked-off scream as Klara opens his armor and tears his tunic to get to his wound. Blood seeps out around the blade.
“Stay still, or you are going to make it worse,” Klara says between gritted teeth.
A rush of running footsteps explodes down the stairs. Silvan freezes at their base, still covered in scratches, splatters of crimson and ash from his recent return from the battle. His face drops when his eyes fall on Jasper, and then he is racing over, pushing people out of his way to get to the man’s side. I take a large step back, pulling Keira with me and giving the two space.
“What happened to you, you stupid fool? Tell me who did this to you, and I will squeeze the life out of them with my bare hands.” Silvan’s wild eyes roam all over Jasper, his hands hovering, but not quite making contact.
“A dead butcher, Silvan,” the Captain of the Guard gasps out, body shuddering.“Do you care now?”
“I care, Jasper. I care too fucking much. Don’t you see that is the problem?” Silvan snarls, pushing Klara’s hands away and slowly healing the wound himself, somehow making it seem like an intimate, loving gesture. Jasper’s eyes turn wide and search Silvan’s face, like what he will find there is so much more urgent than his current predicament.
Klara gives both an incredulous look for their terrible timing, then grabs the handle of the huge butcher’s knife and tugs it out of Jasper’s side. His entire body jerks, and Silvan holds him down with one arm while thrusting his healing magic into the wound with the other hand. His tears fall onto the torn flesh of his ex-lover.
Keira looks like she is about to vomit. “How did he make it here at all with that thing in him?”
“Trust me, he has taken worse and survived.” I remove the bowl of pink-tinged water from her hands before she drops it. My mate has seen plenty of blood during warfare, but it is so much worse when it sprays from someone you care about.
I wipe away as much of the blood that coats Jasper as possible, and when Keira takes over, I add my palm to Silvan’s and Klara’s, not just healing Jasper, but replenishing him with magic and energy. Silvan gives way too much of himself, until he is swaying on the spot.
Jasper lies on the joined tables, staring up at the ceiling, his chest heaving as he tries to catch his breath and work through the pain. When his eyes flick to Silvan, they are bright and clear. “Do I have to nearly die for you to look at me?”
Silvan doesn’t even flinch. “I’ve been a blind fool, drowning in my self-righteous anger for years. I blamed you for abandoning me, when in truth, I did the same to you. Will you forgive me, Jasper? Can we go back?”
Jasper doesn’t say a word. He sits up, grabs Silvan by the back of the head and pulls him into a rough kiss. It is a thing of desperate need and hunger all wrapped into one, as though the rest of the world melts away. Then Jasper presses his forehead against Silvan’s and both men close their eyes.
“We can go back,” Jasper murmurs. He completely misses the expression that ripples across Silvan’s face—the tension, the constant anger, all of it melting away. Silvan eases Jasper off the table, but we clearly healed him well, because it is Jasper who drags his ex-lover into another crushing kiss, then pulls him up the stairs toward the bathing and bedchambers.
I hold a hand to my head as I watch them leave. I really hope those two are going to stop trying to kill each other with a glare now.
“Well, thank fuck for that,” Klara huffs, breaking the stunned tension of the room.
“I forgot how dramatic those two could be.” Hawthorne laughs, standing awkwardly behind us all. “I’ll clean this up, then Klara, we better get back out there and rejoin our task force.”
Keira turns wide eyes my way. “What is going on out there? He said the people are ripping each other apart.”
Edmund approaches, never one to keep his daughters in the dark. “Show her, Aldrin. She has a right to know. To see what she is fighting for.” He pinches the bridge of his nose. “There is no more planning we can do here.”
I take Keira by the hand and lead her up the many flights of stairs, desperately trying to ignore the masculine grunts that already come from one of the rooms. The way leads to a smallovergrown rooftop garden at the top of the tavern, overlooking the city streets below. With a flick of my wrist, my magic clears the vines from where they tangle over the balcony railing, opening up the view beyond.
Keira sucks in a sharp breath as she grips the rail tightly, taking in the madness. Her eyes sweep from side to side and her nostrils flare. I place an arm around her tight shoulders and pull her into my chest.
