Eliana stepped inside the room, where several people had gathered—King Eri, King Tavik, Lady Ama. Hob, and a passel of royal guards. A woman in healer’s robes, tending to the leg of someone hidden from view.

Simon turned at Eliana’s entrance, an unreadable expression on his face, and then stepped aside.

Beyond him, filthy and battered, sat a ghost.

Eliana’s shock rooted her to the floor.

Harkan.

7

   Rielle

“Not for love or church,

not for country or crown,

Only to the Gate do we pledge our hearts

Until the end of days, until the skies crash down.”

—The Vow of the Obex

Rielle awoke in the warm nest of Audric’s arms and immediately regretted opening her eyes.

It had become grossly apparent, over the last few days aboard the Kaalvitsi, that her power was no protection against seasickness, and without sleep to bring her respite from the rolling sea, her stomach pitched with the waves.

She groaned, curling her body against the sensation, and hid her face once more in Audric’s chest.

He laughed, groggy with sleep. “You can fly on a godsbeast and stop a tidal wave in its tracks, but the sea bests you.”

Rielle grunted in protest. “Nothing can best me.”

Audric kissed her brow, the warmth of his hands soothing her. “Our last day on the water. We should arrive this morning.”

“And then we’ll have the return journey on this horrible, stinking death trap.”

“The Kaalvitsi is a fine ship.”

“I hate it,” she declared, “and I hate you for loving it.”

“For someone who claims to hate me, you certainly do kiss me a lot.”

Grinning, Rielle moved up his body to kiss his neck, his jawline. “I don’t hate you. I could never hate you. I love you like the moon loves the sun. I love you so much I could die from it.”

Audric groaned at her touch, a smile playing at his lips. “Your seasickness is making you talk nonsense.”

Rielle giggled, her body stirring in that sweet, urgent way that it always did around him. She climbed atop him and pinned his arms to the bed, delighting at the flare of want in his eyes. “I’m tired of waiting, darling. I feel fine. I really do. My strength has returned, and I’m no longer bleeding, and I need you.” She circled slowly against him. “What do you think?”

Audric cupped her hips, helping her move. His voice darkened, sending a delicious thrill down her body. “I can’t imagine a better cure for seasickness.”

She relished the sight of him leaning back against the pillows, his eyes drifting shut. He groaned low and slow, in that deep, chest-rattling way that made her belly tighten.

“You’ll be gentle with me, won’t you?” she said softly. “Given my tender stomach.” She leaned over him, unbuttoned his tunic, kissed her way across his chest. He murmured her name and slid one hand up her thigh, raising the hem of her nightgown. The other hand he moved into her hair, winding his fingers through the wild waves and tugging slightly—as they had discovered, over the past several weeks, that Rielle very much loved.

She smiled in approval. “Ah, but not too gentle.”

Audric moved the hand on her hips between her legs and rubbed his thumb in soft circles, his gaze intent upon her. “Just the way you like it.”

Rielle clutched his shirt in her hands, moved her hips against his fingers, bent lower to kiss him—

And suddenly Audric was gone, and the room around Rielle had changed.

It was a dark chamber, lushly appointed, with a wall of square windows overlooking an icy landscape, mountainous and unfamiliar. Perhaps a northern country—Borsvall? Kirvaya? Astavar? She looked down at her body and saw she was no longer wearing her sleeping shift. Instead, a gown of black velvet, spangled with gold embroidery in abstract shapes, hugged her body like a soft glove. The neckline was low and wide; the wintry air pricked her exposed skin.

And in a chair by the windows, overlooking the ice, sat Corien, alive and whole, wearing a long black coat over a fine vest and trousers, and holding a glass of red wine.

At once, Rielle wanted to both move toward him and run from him. Her indecision kept her frozen.

Corien glanced at her, his eyes glittering with tears. Rielle’s breath caught in her throat.

“Having fun?” he murmured.

She managed a step toward him. “Where are we?”

“You’re in bed with your lover,” he mumbled into his glass. “And I’m far away, scheming how best to ruin him.”

Heat flared in her chest. “Impossible. He’s too good for you to ruin. And besides, he has me to protect him. Touch him, and I’ll burn you again.” She raised her chin, approaching him slowly. Her palms itched with the urge to punish him for speaking of Audric in such a way. “Was it fun for you, when I burned you? Do you crave more pain from me?”

Corien watched her, unmoving. “I crave you, and anything you can give me.”

As Rielle continued her approach, she remembered to observe the room—the landscape out the windows, the stars in the sky, anything of note in the room itself. Papers, paintings, artifacts that would give away Corien’s location. Audric would want her to gather information.

Corien chuckled into his drink, knocked back the rest of it, and set the empty glass on the small table beside him. “Spying on me, are you? You’ll see what you can see and then take it back to him like a faithful dog?”

Rielle marched over, her vision suddenly sharp and gold-tinged, and slapped him.

Corien bore it silently, then looked up at her, his cheek reddened, unafraid and unabashed. “I’ve missed you.”

As she stood there, her hand stinging from the blow, Rielle could not decipher any of the feelings racing through her mind except one. She had missed him too, with a desperation she didn’t understand. Though she refused to utter the words, they sat heavily on her tongue, and Corien must have sensed their presence, for his small smile broadened.

He rose, not touching her. Every line of his body looked as tense as Rielle herself felt. “Was it fun for you, being forced to save people who don’t deserve you? Driving yourself to the edge of death for a kingdom of simpletons?”

Rielle raised her chin. “I enjoyed subduing that wave.”

“I know you did.”

Unnerved by the fondness in his voice, Rielle forced her own calm. “Establishing and maintaining a friendly relationship between Celdaria and Borsvall is crucial in these uncertain times. By saving them, I did my part in the name of peace. I’m proud of that, and you can’t take that away from me.”