Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 71403 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 357(@200wpm)___ 286(@250wpm)___ 238(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71403 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 357(@200wpm)___ 286(@250wpm)___ 238(@300wpm)
I bit the inside of my cheek. “We shall, and you will start. Tell me the price you must pay to activate the convergence rune.”
“Very well.” He unfastened his jacket. “I never intended to tell you, because I never intended for us to become so close. But here we are. The rune demands… me. The heart of me. To release its power, it will become my heart. There will be no undoing it. As long as I live, I will feel nothing but its power.”
Confirmation landed beneath my ribs like a wrecking ball. There it was, stated plainly. No half-truths. No misdirections. Just the unadulterated truth. If I kept fighting for said heart, I risked the fate of his kingdom.
I stopped, head dropping. “You told me it won’t drain you, as it did your mother. But there’s still a chance, isn’t there?”
“If ever I’m catastrophically injured, there’s a possibility.”
My eyes stung. “This’s why you keep warning me away?”
“It is. And that was my second secret.” He unbuttoned his cuffs and rolled up his shirt sleeves. “Now it’s your turn. Lady’s choice.”
Nein. “We aren’t done talking about the rune. There must be a way to activate it without pushing out what you feel for me.” And he did feel something.
Sebastian stared at me, unmoved. “That was a statement. A wrong statement, but not a secret.”
Hands fisted, I relaunched my pacing. He wanted a secret? Sure, no problem. “I once set the royal library on fire. Not on purpose, but I was young, and I sneezed, releasing a stream of flame. Two historical scrolls burned, and no one but you knows I was responsible.”
His reaction didn’t come for several seconds, but when it did, it brought me to an abrupt halt. He chuckled, tickling my ears. “Admit it, you were the most adorable little dragon to ever grace those palace halls.”
I ground my molars. He could be serious every moment of every day except right here and now for this one? “I do. I admit it. I was adorable. And that’s two secrets from me.”
He ran his tongue over his teeth. “I haven’t slept through the night in decades. I can’t. The dome hums. The kingdom pulls. Jon taunts. The primordial’s return. My duty.”
I teetered between sympathy, anger and understanding. My shoulders drooped. “I intended to win you,” I admitted.
He gave me the saddest smile. “You already have, Brona. I didn’t lie to Jon. I’ve wanted you from the first moment I saw you, and the thoughts in my head quieted. I’ve crossed unexpected lines to get you. To prevent the manticore from attending the vote, I had to release him from a blood debt he very much deserved to pay.”
More confirmation, and this one stung just as badly as the first. “You did that, and you knew you couldn’t keep me. Knew I couldn’t keep you. And you withheld that from me. You let me think we could be something.”
“I did.” Leaning forward, he caught me by the hips and tugged me backward onto his lap, where he held me captive. “I crave time with you. I don’t want to fight my desire anymore. We may not have a future, but we have right now.”
“That’s not good enough.” I cupped his cheeks, peering at him as I unveiled my fourth secret. “You are my firebrand, Sebastian.”
Satisfaction pulsed from him. Satisfaction and more sadness. “I am yours.” He slid his hands to my throat and glided his thumbs along my jaw. “And you are mine.”
Air hitched in my lungs. There it was, his final secret.
Tremors shook me. “When did you know?”
“At the vote,” he said, though he owed me no more answers. “You looked at me as if I’m the reason you breathe. I’m sure I looked at you the same.” He gently brushed fallen strands of hair behind my ear. “Awaiting your arrival was agony.”
I swallowed a whimper and pressed my brow to his. Now, my final secret. “I will never accept a temporary arrangement. I want everything. Marriage. Family. Forever.”
His grip flexed on me. “I will give you everything I can, but none of that. I can’t, Brona.” The agony he’d spoken of seeped into his voice. “I can’t leave my people to Jokull. And that is what will happen if the rune is not transferred to me.”
Ja. I knew that. And it didn’t change my stance. “I will sleep in my room tonight. You should go.”
Tension invaded his body, but he nodded and peeled his fingers from me, one by one. “I understand.”
My heart ached as he stood. As he stalked to the exit. As he paused with his back to me. As he vanished inside his room. But he left the door between our chambers open behind him.
I, however, crossed the room and closed it myself. The soft snick haunted me all night long.