TALIA
Ryin’s expression is particularly stony as we head back to my suite. I want to tell him what I learned from the king, but Shad is waiting for me outside my door. Two new guards stand at their positions looking especially fearsome, so as eager as I am to talk to the prince, I keep my expression neutral.
Once we’re inside, Ryin bows stiffly before disappearing into the servants’ room. He seems edgy and off, but maybe he’s just trying to avoid any display of emotion toward me. I’m hoping it doesn’t mean those emotions have already fizzled out. I’m not looking for any kind of PDA or anything else that would get him punished, but part of me is expecting him to come to his senses and realize that whatever attraction he had toward me is fleeting.
But I’ll worry about that later. Now Shad has some explaining to do.
Silently, he leads me into the dressing room and engages a dampener. “Harsh said you wanted to talk to me.”
I sit on the chaise lounge, back straight, and look him in the eye. “Do you know about the Revokers in the building? The experiments? Lyall's plans for destroying the Fai homeland?”
Shad closes his eyes on a grimace and rubs a hand over his face, then squeezes his jaw. “That is exactly what I’ve been trying to stop.”
He slides down to the ground to sit leaning against the large cabinet in the center of the room. “We’ve lost dozens of soldiers capturing those Revokers. Men and women who I command. And the danger to the Citadel…” He shakes his head. “Three Fai were killed just yesterday. I think it’s madness. Genocide is madness. It would stain all of our souls and decimate our covenants. But the king will not be moved.”
“And so he has to go.”
Shad looks up at me, brows raised.
“You’re planning a coup, right?” I say it sotto voce, but his eyes still widen and dart to the dampener between us.
He comes over to sit beside me on the chaise and whisper in my ear. “How did you know?”
“Educated guess. How is it going? Will you be able to stop this?”
His expression is grim. “I do not know. There are enough who oppose the king and are willing to stand beside me, but some of my most powerful allies are having second thoughts.”
“Why?”
“They believe the king suspects me. He and his diehards have been showing greater interest in certain allies. No threats, just the opposite, rewarding them with promotions and greater responsibilities.”
“Ensuring their loyalty?” I ask.
“Or keeping them close.”
I draw my knees up and rest my chin on them, thinking. “So, no coup before the Greenlands are poisoned.”
“I cannot guarantee it.” His tone is solemn.
“Do you have any other way to stop it?”
He looks at me wearily. “I am making progress on sabotaging the poison delivery system.”
Well, that’s something. “Okay, you stay on that. I have a plan of my own.”
“Care to share?” A corner of his mouth lifts, but I shake my head.
“Plausible deniability,” I tell him. “But it’s happening tonight. And if I pull it off, you’ll know.”
After Shad leaves, I call for Ryin—not using the stupid whistle that I’ve still refused to consider, but the old-fashioned way, using his name. He emerges from the servants’ room, sharp cheekbones looking more severe than ever. I make the sign for “talk” that Noomi taught me and lead him into the dressing room. Seems like I’ll be spending a lot of time in here.
The dampener Shad left me sits on the center cabinet. I push it until it pulses blue and Ryin tilts his head, studying me. Again, I settle onto the white chaise, this time perching on the edge. Ryin sits next to me, right next to me, warming my side. A knot of fear within me loosens. He’s not keeping his distance. His unasked questions are probably the cause of the furrow in his brow.
I swallow, getting caught up in the clarity of his whisky dark eyes. I could use a shot of whisky and I hate the stuff. Brown liquor is for the unevolved, my stepmother used to say. I huff a humorless laugh at the memory, which turns into a choked sob. Then I suck in a breath.
“He's going to wipe you all out. They've been trying to recreate the Revoker poison to use on the Fai and the Greenlands, destroy the forest that protects your home and kill all the Fai to get to your matrices.”
His jaw tightens, but other than that, his reaction is muted.
My fists clench on my lap. One of his hands covers both of mine, the red undertones in his skin a contrast to my darker tone. The back of his hand is covered in freckles. I wonder if his whole body is, too. The thought is so intrusive and out of place that I shove it away.
“I wonder where other people go when they die.” My head drops, heavy from the weight of all my thoughts. “I always thought it would be a better place.”
“How did you die, Talia?" he asks, squeezing my hands gently.
I sniff and look up at him. “It wasn’t heroic or anything. I had this car—my father’s old car, one he gave me. I guess our world is like this one before the Sorrows. We all had cars and drove everywhere. Anyway, mine was a piece of crap. And I'd told Dad about the weird sound it was making and the lights flashing on the dashboard, and he said that he'd take care of it. Promised, in fact.” I roll my eyes thinking of how often he promised things that never happened.
“Of course, one day, when I was running late for one of my jobs, the thing refused to start. Neither of my stepsisters would let me use their cars, either—brand-new ones, I might add—so I had to take the bus. Except, since we lived in the suburbs, the nearest bus stop was about a mile and a half away.”
I sigh. “Long story short, I was hit crossing the street. A truck came out of nowhere, ran the stop sign, crashed right into me.” What I remember after that is a blur. And I'm not sure which car accident it is scrambling my thoughts: the one from a few weeks ago or the one from years ago. My head is a blur of sounds, glass crunching, my screams, my mother's screams. I was in that car with her for hours before someone found us.
Trapped in the dark. Pinned by my seat belt and the crunched-in metal of the door against my side. Walls closing in.
I shake it off. Blink hard.
“Then I was here. And there were growls and snarls and pain.”
I’m still caught somewhere between the near past and the distant past when his hand once again tightens on mine. “And I opened my eyes and saw you.”
“You thought I was someone else.”
I nod, rueful. “If I'm Celena here, you're Victor there. But he died a long time ago. And I still have no idea how I got here. Or why.” I figure Akeem hasn’t found any answers or he would have reached out.
I want to think I was brought here so that I can save them. Save Ryin. Though I'm not sure it's within my power. However, if I can get into the vault and find the souls…
The Fai man who was trammeled—Silas—his face comes to mind. The look on it when his soul was restored. What would Ryin look like with his shadow back? Would he finally smile? Would he and the others then be able to find a way to stop Lyall or at least warn their people?
Ryin’s palm, large and warm, cups my cheek. I lean into him.
“You seem lost,” he says.
“You have no idea. I have no home. I'm not even supposed to be here.” I unclench my fists and wrap my arms around him, sinking into his warmth.
“Me either,” he whispers, pulling me tighter. He inhales a jagged breath, arms enclosing me in safety and acceptance.
The air leaves my lungs in a way that isn’t painful—it feels complete, like a puzzle piece snapping into place. Then he pulls back, brown eyes shining, not from his daimon but from some inner light. And then he kisses me like I’m his last breath.
It is consuming. An inferno opens up within both of us, feeding one another. Teeth scrape, his stubble abrades my jaw, his tongue tangles in mine. We pulse with need and desperation. I grip his neck, pressing myself into him.
He pushes me against the chaise, straddles me, using his weight to keep me in place. I wrap my legs around him, the urgency pushing us forward. He palms my ass, grinding against me like he’s trying to fuse our bodies together even though we’re fully clothed.
As if reading my mind, he fumbles for the laces of my bodice as I pull up his shirt. We have to break apart to undress, fabric flying, and then we come together again, clothes tossed carelessly all over the giant closet, shoes gone, just us. I barely get a chance to look at him, to verify the freckles covering his body, before he's on me. Ravenous and famished. His heated flesh searing my own.
I cling to him as his lips feed on my ear, neck, collarbone, chest. Then he finally reaches my breasts and I’m lost. My head presses back against the smooth cushion as he feasts. The urgency hasn't lessened, but he slows down a fraction. Passion drives me forward; I don't need foreplay, I need him inside me. I tug on his head, pulling him back up, and then reach down to stroke his rigid length.
Greedy, starving, I bring him between my thighs. He freezes for one long moment before sinking into me, impossibly hot and hard. I cling to him tighter as his muscles bunch. His eyes squeeze shut, then open again, staring down at me as he takes me with deep, claiming strokes.
I kiss him, shivers rolling through me. Holding in the moan climbing up my throat. Stretched to an overflowing fullness by his invasion. I’m soon undone. Broken into a million pieces by the friction of him sliding out. Put back together when he glides back in.
It's an ebb and flow; a delicious pressure builds as we combine to invent a new creature of emotion and pleasure, of sweat and skin and sensation. He plunges inside me, deeper than before, and the veins in his neck pop in bold relief. I come a moment before he does, and then we're spilling over together. Crying out each other’s names and then collapsing. I’m oversensitive and hot, my skin sticking to his.
I gasp as he pulls out of me, feeling suddenly hollow. His gaze is soft and he cups my face again with his palm, letting me know I'm not alone. “Talia,” he says, then he just repeats my name over and over like a prayer.
At some point, we get up, take our clothes, and retreat to my bedroom. All in silence, the dampener having run out of power. I hope it lasted long enough to cover the sounds of our lovemaking. But maybe after tonight it won't matter.
We clean each other off in the bathroom and then tumble into bed, wordlessly. Ryin is asleep in seconds. He's seemed tired these past couple of days; I guess the life of a drudge doesn’t offer much rest.
I watch him sleep, comforted by the rising and falling of his chest. Freckles everywhere.
Guilt threatens, but I know it’s the right decision not to tell him what I have planned. This stolen moment of peace is precious; I wouldn't want to taint it with either false hope or my failure.
I also don’t want to leave him now, but it’s the perfect time. Late enough so that no one should be around. I can go up to the vault and try to locate the Fai souls. If I fail, he won’t know I tried at all, and if I succeed...Well, I can't even think that far ahead. All I know is that I cannot allow the Fai to be destroyed without at least trying to do something about it.
So I leave the last place I want to, the warmth of being by Ryin's side. I slip from the bed and dress in silence, hoping that the next time I see him things will be different.