Page 74 of Queen of Whispers and Mist

She had to laugh, because fuck if it wasn’t true.

There was one last question she couldn’t help but ask. The rest would come later, but this one she selfishly needed the answer to. “What about Helena?”

His lips twisted. “We really have to teach you not to bring up other people while we’re naked together, kitten. Especially a woman I consider my sister.”

“You started it with Bast—”

Ronan groaned and finally slid free of her.

She dropped an apologetic kiss on his nose. “Last time, I promise.”

He sighed good-naturedly, his large palms roaming up and down her back. “What about Helena?”

“She’s the Kiri. You’re her Shield. You are life-sworn to her.”

He lifted a shoulder. “So?”

“What do you mean ‘so’?”

“Loving you doesn’t suddenly make me incapable of protecting her. If the last few years have been good for anything, it was proving that.” His gaze grew tender, and one of his hands slipped up to curl around the back of her neck. “What is it you’re really worried about?”

“I don’t want you to have to choose between us. I know what she means to you. What being one of the Circle means to you.”

“After everything I’ve endured to find you, you’re worriedthatwill be the thing keeping us apart?”

It sounded silly when he put it that way. But Ronan was a man of honor, and he’d given the Chosen’s queen his vow. It wasn’t something he’d walk away from lightly. She needed to know he was sure. It would break her heart to only lose him in the end.

He must have read the uncertainty in her expression because the fingers around her neck dug in gently. “Helena knows where my heart lies. If being yours means I must relinquish my title to be with you, then I will. But that will be because of your obligations, not mine. I already told you, kitten. Where you go, I go.”

Her heart gave a happy flutter. “My obligations?”

“You’re the Night Stalker’s queen.”

Her bark of laughter was harsh. “In name, perhaps.”

“Only name?”

Reyna ached at the thought of all the friends and family she’d loved who were lost to her. The ones she’d unknowingly left for dead. She didn’t think she’d ever be able to forgive herself for that, even if she’d been helpless to stop it. As much as she wanted to explain, she didn’t know how when so much of the answer involved Erebos’s betrayal, and he’d asked her not to speak of him.

“A queen requires subjects to rule. I fear few, if any, Night Stalkers remain.”

That seemed to be enough of an explanation because his eyes shone with empathy. He knew exactly what she was referring to.

“Then we find the ones who are left and begin again.”

“You say that as if it’s going to be easy.”

“Easy? No, probably not. But if that is your path, we will walk it together.”

“Ronan.”

So much was wrapped up in that single word. Sentiments she couldn’t begin to convey. But because it was Ronan, he understood all of it.

“Do you doubt us? In the last two days alone, we’ve fought and bested literal leviathans. I think a rescue mission would be child’s play.”

“First, I’m not sure we can claim to have bested the Lusca. Second, you’re forgetting a specific monster we’ve yet to deal with.”

His expression shuttered. “Erebos is naught more than a man with a god complex.”

---