Page 27 of Beneath a Shattered Sky
I look over my shoulder at Jaro, who’s walking down the beach, still pretending that I don’t exist. I need him. He’s the one who holds me together when things feel like they’re falling apart. My dependable, loyal wolf. His absence is cutting.
“Prince Bram is dead.” Drystan doesn’t deliver the words harshly; in fact, I’m pretty sure we’re back to him pretending I’m a horse that might spook at any second.
Still, they bring a lump to my throat. Bree senses it, stepping in and taking my hand.
“Eero was going to kill her. Bram shifted to escape the fae holding him, then shifted again to take the blow. In the process, Rose fell from the throne room window,” Drystan explains.
Dare’s anguish returns, harsher than before, and I flinch, my heart squeezing painfully.
“I’m sorry.” The apology slips out, raw and bleeding. “All my coming to Siabetha has done is brought you pain.” Firsthis imprisonment, and now the loss of a brother he’d only just regained.
“You are not responsible.” Dare shifts Yvaine in his grip until she’s supported entirely with one arm, freeing up his hand to ruffle my hair with easy affection. “Goddess, you’re just like him. Taking on the world’s problems.”
In that sentence, I glean a ghost of some old argument, a fragment of who the brothers were before war, separation, and our mother’s death broke apart our family.
But he’s wrong. He’s so, so wrong. Bram’s death is a hundred percent my doing. Sure, he made the choice to jump between me and the blade, but I made choices, too. Choices that led us to that room.
Jaro has stopped with the horses a little way off from our group, and Dare leads the way over to him with his mate in his arms.
“We’ll ride to Pavellen with haste and send news when we have it,” he promises. “Watch for my hawk.”
Drystan nods on my behalf, and I watch as Jaro silently helps Dare manoeuvre his mate into the saddle. Then my brother takes off, riding into the morning sun.
Which leaves me alone with my Guard and Prae. A wave of exhausted grief crests and threatens to tear me apart at the seams.
Seven
Rhoswyn
“We should get going.” I go to pull my hand from Bree’s, then frown. “What?—?”
Lore cackles, breaking the awkward silence. “Oh, you made the mistake of touching the sticky prince. Good luck getting free now.”
Looking up at Bree, a sense of dread steals over me. I’ve been holding it together, promising myself that when everyone was safe and I got a moment alone, I’d allow myself to grieve. I’m fraying at the seams. The dam I built to hold back the pain isn’t going to hold forever, but my mates are in no state to comfort me, Bree least of all.
After what he’s just been through, putting my own grief and pain on top would be cruel. I want to be there for him, not add to his burdens.
Last time he could barely stand any touch, and now he’s sealed to me.
I get that Dare couldn’t have known and wouldn’t have any reason to assume that mates would do anything but welcomeeach other’s touch, but a burst of anger fizzles through me, anyway.
“I know Naris is nothing like Blizzard,” Bree mumbles, his eyes dull. “But I promise riding him isn’t uncomfortable enough to warrant that look, dragonfly.”
Shit. “It’s not you,” I reply. “Or Naris. I just… I could use some time alone.”
All of my mates freeze. I’m pretty sure Jaro jerks like he’s been slapped, even thoughhe’sthe one avoidingme.
Bree’s head cocks to one side, and I shiver, feeling naked as his eyes rake over me.
What does he see? A girl in a ruined dress with bloodied arms, who hasn’t washed in three days, still fighting to calm her ragged heartbeat after successfully breaking into an enemy stronghold? A healer who reattached his ears and then saved a banshee from iron poisoning? A killer who murdered fae to save him and set a palace ablaze?
“You won’t even know I’m there,” he promises, moving me so I’m standing in front of him.
His free hand brushes over his side, summoning the enormous cat-sìth, and I let out a little squeak of surprise as I realise he’s spared us from having to figure out how to mount the creature by conjuring it into being directly beneath us. My thighs part, settling automatically behind Naris’s prominent shoulder blades.
“Give him some head scratches for me?” Bree asks softly.
He guides the big cat into line behind Blizzard as Drystan leads us away from the blood-soaked beach. Jaro is riding alongside the dullahan, the two of them murmuring quietly to one another.
