She felt blessed, like the Stars themselves had granted her this. There was no limit, no rules or constraints. She was boundless; she was home, safe and secure in his unbreakable embrace.
~
Shackled in an abrupt and demanding upbringing, Althera is...
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There was a melodic sound in Althera's ears, and it was growing louder and clearer as she kicked around, her hands clawing out at whatever object she would get her hands on to help herself out of this oblivion. There was nothing – she saw nothing. Whoever was singing had every pore in her body bursting into flames, every hair on her arms standing upright. She struggled again, all of it to no avail.
Then her hands skimmed against something – something cold and leathery and hard. She felt her lips curl into a frown before her fingers found what she had touched. A blade. A very sharp and mighty blade. The same one she had used to climb down that tower. It had dropped to her side when she fell and was carried off elsewhere. Her other hand groped around as well. Another blade appeared in her palm, bandaged in leather and carvings that felt deviously familiar against her flesh.
Something flickered above her. She jerked, angling the knives at whatever had moved, her eyes still shut. There was strangled breathing and an object smooth as marble and warm as a winter's fire grazed her leg. Her eyelids fluttered open.
The second time she had almost killed him, and she wished she had actually done it.
"What are you doing here, Rhaye?" She looked into his amber eyes, really into them. There was no emotion or thought that she read that revealed the reason for his appearance here, in the center of three trees that produced enough cover for them both.
He tried to look calm with her knives pointed directly at his neck. His throat bounced. "I came to find you."
"I don't need you anymore," she hurled at him, the blade inching closer toward the skin of his flesh, almost enough to prick the golden tinge of it.
"I know you don't," he said, "and I respect whatever decision you choose. But please, just let me help this time. I know the shifts of every guard here – I can get you out safely."
Her eyes thinned into slits. She couldn't trust him. "And why should I believe what you say?"
"Because you have no other choice."
Her body went taut. It was the truth. She really did have no other choice: climbing back up the tower was definitely not one of them and sneaking around with guards all over the place – it would be a death wish, especially when they saw she had weapons coating every inch of her and she was in a frenzy, scanning every exit.
And whether or not she liked it, he was the only key to getting out of here unharmed.
"Fine," she huffed, her breath like a cloud of frost in the night. "But don't ever think this means I have forgiven you."
He obliged and twitched aside a low branch of one of the trees. She heard voices speaking, joined with laughter that sounded too obnoxious to even belong to someone working at the palace.
