Chapter 6

6

A flicker of flame from dying embers held my attention as I rested on my side, Ruslan curled around me. In the dead of night, I remained awake, long after Ruslan had finally drifted off to the land of dreams. Yet the thought of closing my eyes and losing myself to the endless void seized my stomach, and I refused to succumb to the desire for sleep. Too long, I had waded through the endless dark. In Ruslan’s arms, I was safe. The slow rise and fall of his breath brushed steadily against my spine as my thoughts swirled and spiraled.

Because in the quiet, my mind raged .

With no distractions, no one watching me, I had only myself and the memories that continued to haunt me to contend with. So I stared into the reddened wood cocooned by soot-stained stone, reliving the horror of the final moments of my memory prior to my long slumber. I wanted every drop of wrath imbued in my bones so that when the time came, I could draw on my magic and slaughter Kazimir without a second thought.

Because, upon tapping into the white flame and moonlight-wrapped crystal in my chest again, I discovered the light had vanished.

In its place, darkness reigned.

I swallowed a bitter laugh. Queen Immonen had been right – everything did go dark after I broke my bond with Kazimir. Dark, for the comatose state I slept in; dark, for the emotions in my source of magic; dark, for my bloodthirsty thoughts.

Absently, I stroked Ruslan’s arm with a lazy, light touch that contrasted the heaviness and force of my thoughts. What would my mate think if he knew that there was no light left in me?

As the first rays of dawn snuck beneath the heavy curtains blocking the wall-sized windows in front of me, Ruslan stirred. His arms twitched around me, and I finally tore my gaze from the fire to my mate. He blinked slowly, his dark lashes fanning against his skin before those smoky grays sucked me into their depths, unveiling the emotions of his soul. I didn’t need to be an empath to feel the profoundness of his devotion. With a single look, he made me feel as if I were the very sun shining beneath the curtains, the air he needed to breathe, and the water he needed to drink.

He would love me no matter what.

“Morning, sprite,” he murmured, that raspy voice of his sending tingles across my skin. The hand resting on my hip began kneading the muscle there, and I groaned under his touch.

“Morning, mate,” I replied once the movements stopped. I nudged him in a signal to continue, and he obliged, moving his ministrations up my back until his large hand cupped the back of my head.

“I love hearing you say that. I missed the sound of your voice so much,” he whispered, pulling my face to his and sucking my bottom lip into his mouth. “I missed kissing your perfect lips. I missed you being flush against my body like this.” He hooked his leg over mine and pulled me closer to emphasize his point. His hardness dug into my stomach, and I closed my eyes, appreciating the feel of his hot skin against mine, the cedarwood scent that filled my nostrils, and how safe I felt beside his bulk.

My eyes popped open as he moved me to my back, his muscles rippling as he caged me beneath him. My fingers ghosted over his shoulders, then down his torso and over his cut abs until I reached the V that led me to his morning erection. The moan that escaped him was primal and filled with longing when I wrapped my hand around him, savoring the velvety feel of his skin. “It must have been so hard for you to watch the time pass. I had no idea. I only wandered endlessly in the darkness. There was no time – no anything.”

“I told you once that I would die without you, Izidora. That is more true than ever. Should you leave this earth, I will follow you moments later. There is no me without you.” The ferocity in his tone sent goosebumps skittering across my skin, and I shivered as the force of his feelings traveled through our bond.

I opened my mouth to speak, but he shook his head. His eyes swirled with so much emotion, but deeper than the rest was a profound sorrow. “I am so sorry I didn’t protect you, sprite. That I let you wander off on your own. I should have gone with you. I should have done anything other than what I did. It is because of me that he hurt you.”

“It’s not your fault. Kazimir made his choices, and you had no way of knowing.”

“Why did you throw that shield in front of me instead of yourself?” Ruslan asked, searching my eyes for the answer. The thought must have plagued him for some time given how desperately he assessed me.

My throat worked as I fought against the rising tide of emotion. “I thought he was going to throw the dagger at you. In the heartbeat of time between Kazimir throwing that knife and creating that shield, I realized that I would die without you too and that I’d never told you that. I should have told you that. It was my final thought before everything went dark.”

Ruslan crushed me against his chest, enveloping me in his warmth and cedarwood scent. “I know. I’ve always known, even if you didn’t say it, Izidora. That’s why I tried so hard for you while you were sleeping. I wanted to be worthy of you when you awoke.”

Tears welled in my eyes, and I cupped his cheek, scratching at the hair that coated his strong jaw. “You are so worthy of me, Ruslan. You are so worthy of love.”

His throat worked, and then he exhaled, his whole body seeming to relax with my words. “I still should have done more, and I swear to you I won’t let that happen again. You’ll never leave my sight.”

I shook my head. “You have always empowered me, given me the space and freedom to become strong on my own. Coddling me now is not what I want. You would burn the world down for me, slaughter anyone who dared lay a hand on me. Don’t force me behind a wall out of your own guilt. Let me be free.”

His head dropped, resting in the center of my bare chest. Ruslan trembled as he sucked in a few shaky breaths. “Reconciling the two is difficult sometimes,” he admitted quietly. “Especially as I watched over you all those months. How am I supposed to give you both protection and freedom?”

“By doing what you’ve always done – training me. Pushing me past my limits so they grow. Supporting me on the days my emotions are overwhelming. Being by my side when I need you. Educating me and ensuring I am not reliant on you for everything.” My voice grew stronger as I listed all the ways Ruslan had helped me. “I love you, Ruslan. The reason I returned from the dark is because I knew that all the pain that awaited me here would be worth it, so long as I had you.”

He lifted his head, showing me the redness rimming his eyes. “I am so glad you returned to me. I can’t tell you how many times I debated moving myself to Este Castle to slit Kazimir’s throat while he slept. How many times I’ve bloodied my knuckles trying to ease the ache of your absence. How many bottles I emptied alone to numb the pain. All this time, I tried to hold myself together, to be the male you deserved when you finally woke. I never doubted that you would. I knew you just needed time to heal.”

I ran my fingers from his jaw to his hair and smoothed back the long strands. “I’m so sorry you suffered for so long.”

“And I am sorry you are still suffering,” he whispered.

“I still have more healing to do, I think,” I said. Twin tears tracked down the sides of my face and plopped against the soft sheets.

“Whatever you need, I am here,” he swore.

Swallowing down the lump in my throat, I nodded. I was just so fucking happy to be with my mate again. We’d find a way forward, together, that soothed our traumas.

Bending his head to me, he skimmed his nose along my neck until he reached the sensitive underside of my ear. “Marry me. Tomorrow.”

I threaded my fingers into the hair at the nape of his neck and scratched his scalp. “Not now. Not when I can barely stand on my own. When I marry you, I want it to be the biggest celebration the Iron Realm has ever seen. I want everyone in attendance to see how strong I am. How powerful we are together.”

And not when I was still so lost in the dark, with vengeance in my veins. Not when my thoughts were consumed with images of my twin blades flaying my enemies.

He shot back, his eyes flaming with black fire, and I smiled sweetly up at him. My heart raced when he braced himself with one hand and brought the other to rest on my neck, his thumb running over my bottom lip. “Maybe I should drag you before the High Priestess today and we can celebrate later.”

“Is that a challenge?” I taunted, my low belly heating as his head dipped closer to mine.

“There’s my sprite,” he growled, capturing my mouth and forcing his tongue past the seam of my lips. It explored carefully for a few moments, tasting me, teasing me as it twined with mine. But when I arched my back into him, scratching the nape of his neck, he lost all semblance of control. His movements became wild, frantic, as he touched me everywhere but my heating center and my hardening nipples.

The way his tongue moved against mine, like this was our last kiss and he wanted it to last lifetimes, had me melting even further into him, desperate for what we’d both been missing for the past six months.

When he broke away from me, chest heaving and cock dripping onto my stomach, it felt as if my heart had been stabbed again. “Don’t stop,” I begged, tears springing to my eyes.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” he groaned, feeling the same pain as me.

“When have you ever treated me as fragile? Don’t start now.”

The growl that rumbled in his chest vibrated against my own, stirring a longing deep inside me. “You are not fragile – never have been. You are a fucking diamond, forged in the depths of hell and pulled from the earth ready to shine. But I don’t mistake that shine for weakness. That shine is a distraction from what really lies beneath your pretty exterior – a will of fucking iron and a dark side that wants to be let out to play. And, oh, sprite, how we’ll play.”

At his words, tears pricked my eyes, spilling over the sides and tracing a path to the rumpled sheets beneath me. “I am an insidious bloom,” I murmured, repeating my version of the words Kazimir had said to me. He’d called me deadly, but I was insidious, and I’d proven that with the way Ruslan and I had worked his alliance right out from under him. The war we’d wage against him would be no different. I’d trap him in my orbit, slowly but surely tugging him down the path I wanted, and at the end, it would be my sword that sliced through him, ending his pathetic life.

“That’s right. Now show me those thorns, sprite. I want to feel your pain,” he ground out as he ground into me.

My nails scratched a bloody trail into his back, the metallic scent filling the air around us as he threw his head back and moaned. “Spread those pretty legs for me.”

I obliged, my core already dripping as my body called out to his. Aligning himself with my entrance, he pushed in slowly, hissing through his teeth. “You’re so tight. Gonna have to stretch you back out.”

I gasped as he sank deeper, feeling so deliciously full. I never wanted to be without him again. When he seated himself fully, white and black sparks danced around us, our magic flaring to life at our deep connection.

“Oh!” I gasped, looking around us as the embers danced and played in the half-darkness. Ruslan stilled his movements to admire them with me, grinning wildly as his black sparks chased my white ones.

It was still white on the outside.

“Even our magic missed each other,” he murmured, leaning down to kiss me. He circled his hips, earning a groan of pleasure from me.

“I didn’t know our magic could do that,” I breathed around his lips.

“Mate magic has a will of its own,” he said, grinding in so deep more stars sparked to life overhead. My eyes rolled back as the sensation overwhelmed me, and I gasped for breath once he started moving faster. My walls tightened around him, already so close to coming with his thickness sliding through me. Wetness coated my thighs as my body melted for him, and my nails dug deeper into his back, grasping for purchase as he pounded into me.

The sounds that slipped from my lips were filled with pleasure. “Ruslan, I need more.”

“More what?” he asked, pausing so his smoky gray eyes swirled above me, pupils dark with lust.

A noise of protest caught in my throat at his stillness. “More pain. More pleasure.”

Without hesitation, he plucked a hardened nipple between his thumb and forefinger, pinching it harshly and causing me to cry out. “Yes!”

He repeated the motion, resuming grinding his hips against mine, and I pushed back into him, wanting him deeper. “Play with yourself, sprite. I want to feel your pussy clenching around me as you scream my name.”

Obliging him, I dipped a hand between us, finding that sensitive bundle of nerves and circling my fingers over it. My hips bucked at the added sensation, and Ruslan grounded me with another tweak of my nipple. A tingle spread from the top of my head to the tips of my toes, those sparks flying around us increasing their fervor.

“That’s it, come for me,” Ruslan groaned, his thrusts becoming erratic as he chased his release.

With a cry, my whole body spasmed, my pussy clenching around his cock as my back arched off the mattress, and I clung to him like he was the only thing saving me from falling into the abyss. “Ruslan, oh fuck–”

With a grunt, he pulled out of my center, leaving me aching and empty, then spilled his cum onto my stomach, panting heavily as his cock twitched and finally stilled. He reached over the side of the bed and found a discarded towel, using it to clean me off before tossing it away again.

“I’ll make sure you get a contraceptive tea this morning,” he finally managed to say, sweat dripping between both of us. Despite that, he pulled me into him as he laid on his side, cradling me with a tenderness I’d come to expect from the male who had always been known as a ruthless prince. Only I got to see this side of him, and I preened under the knowledge that he reserved this only for me.

Our hearts beat in sync as we laid there, spent from making love for the first time in far too long. “So, about the wedding…”

“Yes?” He perked up immediately behind me.

“I want to be strong enough to walk on my own in front of our people. I want them to see me as powerful, not to pity me.” The conviction was strong in my voice, leaving no room for argument.

Thankfully, Ruslan didn’t try to sway me. “You will show them how powerful you are. Nothing has ever stopped you or broken you before, and this is no exception.”

A wave of sadness washed over me, the vague memories of wandering in the dark rising on the tide of it. “Ruslan… when I was… sleeping, I wanted to give up. I wondered what the point of returning was, if there was only going to be pain for me. There’s just been so much of it…” Tears burned my eyes, blurring the form of my mate.

Sucking in a shuddering breath, I asked, “What did I do to deserve this pain?”

A rough palm cupped my cheek, thumb swiping away the salty tears that overflowed as I began crying uncontrollably. Voicing that one question broke me in a way I never knew possible. The whips that had rained upon my back in the cave did not compare to the pain of thinking that somewhere along the way I had done something that brought this pain upon myself – pain that seemed as endless as the night sky. The kind of pain that dragged me to the dark depths of despair where the only way out was death.

The raspiness to Ruslan’s voice thickened as I shattered to pieces, clinging to him like the lifeline that he was. “Sprite, you have done nothing to deserve this pain. The Goddess and the Fates wove this path for you – for us – long before either of us were born. It is them you should be blaming, not yourself. We are only pawns in some fucked up game they are playing, and the prophecy is proof of that.”

I lifted my soaked face from his bare chest, and he brushed the chestnut locks away from my face, showing me the strength of his conviction. The words from the prophecy floated to the front of my mind, and I let them fall in time with my tears.

“The ones that are part of all will be born under a full moon

Her white light will fill the land

But her mates’ darkness will rise

Kings will fall

Rivers will run with blood

There is a choice

Follow the light

Descend into the dark

The harrowing pass decides it all”

I’d made my choice – Ruslan. The mark between my shoulder blades demonstrated that for those who could not feel this incredible bond that threaded our fates, our souls, together.

But there was one more choice the prophecy mentioned – light and dark. And with what I’d discovered when I woke, I wondered if that was the heart of the matter. “Ruslan, there’s one more thing.”

The skin across his face tensed as if he sensed my trepidation. “Yes?”

Swallowing, I admitted the truth. “My magic… inside, it’s no longer white.”

“What do you mean?” he asked, brows dipping slightly.

“Before Kazimir tried to kill me, when I called on a positive emotion, the crystal in my magic well turned white. The crystal itself had been clear before. Now, only dark fills the black crystal there,” I whispered, tugging my bottom lip between my teeth.

He thumbed it away. “Sprite, are you worried I will think differently of you because of that?”

I nodded, nose and eyes pricking. Hurriedly, I swiped at them both.

A growl rumbled from his chest, pressing into mine. “There is nothing that could make me love you less, Izidora.” The toned muscles of his arms flexed around me, as if he could show me through his physical strength alone that he’d never stop. “In fact, watching you embrace that darkness as we slaughtered the males who abused you was one of the memories I slipped into whenever I laid here with you, waiting for you to wake. The sheer ferocity you displayed that night, the way you reclaimed your power slice by slice… I was in awe of you. Still am. So don’t fear the darkness, sprite. Embrace it. Hone it. Use it as the weapon it can be for you. Claim its power as your own and don’t let anyone tell you there is something wrong with that.”

The hard set of his mouth as his gray eyes roamed mine told me he meant every word.

“Especially yourself. We’ll face the darkness together, head on.” His fingers tightened across my spine, his words falling from his mouth with renewed fervor. “We’ll become it. Make the world fear us for it. Kazimir has nothing compared to our combined might.”

The last of my tears dried as I felt the strength of Ruslan’s conviction through our bond. The worry bled from his eyes, morphing into pride as I straightened, steeling myself with what I needed to do to make that happen. It was time for kings to fall and for us to make rivers run with blood.

“Let’s go train.”