Ruthless Vows (Letters of Enchantment, #2)(106)

“I don’t know how to get Dacre below where he’ll be enchanted by music,” she confessed.

Roman began to pace, raking his hands through his hair. Iris carefully set the sword aside and sat on the edge of her desk, legs dangling, as Roman sorted through his wild ideas. But then he stopped and turned, staring at Iris with dark, glittering eyes.

“Do you remember when we were in the trenches? How Lieutenant Lark told us that the eithrals never appeared at the front but were reserved for civilian towns, kilometers from the actual fighting?”

Iris nodded.

“I think it’s because Dacre is the one who commands the eithrals when they drop bombs, and to do that, he must be underground,” Roman continued. “During any bombardments in the trenches, he wants to be above, overseeing the assault. But during the stalemates, when nothing happened for days, he would descend into his realm and send out the eithrals to terrorize civilians. And he was always in complete control of the beasts.”

Iris traced the bow of her lips. “If that’s true, then Dacre will be…”

“Below tomorrow, when the city is bombed,” he finished. “There’s over a hundred crates in my backyard. The bombs he plans to use. He’ll be sending his eithrals there to pick them up, one by one, to then carry them southward to drop. That is when we need to make our move.”

“We?”

“Did you think I would let you go alone?”

“Attie will be with me.”

“And what door do the two of you plan to use?”

“Your parlor door?”

“It’s heavily guarded. I don’t think I’ll be able to sneak you in.”

“What about the keys?”

Roman rubbed his jaw. “I might be able to find a key. One was on the war table yesterday, unclaimed.”

The idea of Roman stealing one of Dacre’s beloved keys made Iris’s blood go cold. She was quiet, desperate to think of another way, but there was none. It would need to be the parlor door, which was surrounded by Dacre’s soldiers, or a key to unlock their own threshold.

“I wish it didn’t have to come to this,” she said.

Roman’s expression softened, like her words had struck a bruise. He stepped closer until he stood between her legs. Leaning on the desk, his hands on either side of her, he bracketed her in.

Iris didn’t move, spell cast as Roman’s gaze aligned with hers.

“If you had touched me today, Kitt,” she whispered. “I don’t think I could’ve hidden it anymore. Who you are to me. Who I am to you.”

“Like this?” He brushed her knee with his thumb, just beneath her skirt. His touch was soft but possessive, and Iris closed her eyes. “Or this, Iris?” She could feel his fingers caress up her arm and across her shoulder, stopping at the buttons of her blouse.

“Yes.” She tilted her head back when she felt his mouth on her throat.

“Did you think I would let him tell me when and how to touch you?” Roman’s voice was hoarse as he traced her jaw with his lips. “Did you think that I would let him steal this last moment from me? When I would surrender only to you, take you in my hands, and burn with you before the end comes?”

“This is not our last moment,” she said, holding his stare. But she felt the weight of his statement as if it were fate.

She wrapped her legs around his waist, her skirt pooling on the desk. Over the papers and the books, the typewriter glinting as the table shuddered beneath them.

“Write me a story, Kitt,” she whispered, kissing his brow, the hollow of his cheeks. His lips and his throat, until she felt like love was an axe that had cleaved her chest open. Her very heart beating in the air. “Write me a story where you keep me up late every night with your typing, and I hide messages in your pockets for you to find when you’re at work. Write me a story where we first met on a street corner, and I spilled coffee on your expensive trench coat, or when we crossed paths at our favorite bookshop, and I recommended poetry, and you recommended myths. Or that time when the deli got our sandwich orders wrong, or when we ended up sitting next to each other at the ball game, or I dared to take the train west just to see how far I could go, and you just so happened to be there too.”

She swallowed the ache in her throat, leaning back to meet his gaze. Gently, as if he were a dream, she touched his hair. She smoothed the dark tendrils from his brow.

“Write me a story where there is no ending, Kitt. Write to me and fill my empty spaces.”

Roman held her gaze, desperation gleaming in his eyes. An expression flickered over his face, one she had never seen before. It looked like both pleasure and pain, like he was drowning in her and her words. They were iron and salt, a blade and a remedy, and he was taking a final gasp of air.

Please, Iris prayed, drawing him closer. Don’t let this be the end.

But it made their joining all the sweeter, all the sharper, with skin glistening like dew, with breaths ebbing and flowing, their names turned into ragged whispers.

To write the story they both wanted that night.

To think it could be their last.





{45}

A Hundredfold, a Thousandfold




Roman knew he had stayed out too late. He tried not to dwell on the consequences as he walked Iris home, one hand woven with hers, the other holding her jacket-wrapped sword. The streets were emptier than he had anticipated—even the Graveyard kept to their dens that night, as if they sensed the end was near. A slight rumble in the ground coaxed people to draw the curtains, lock the door, and curl up close to the ones they loved.