“Allow me.” A whisper of the prince’s magic misted around us, and then one of his encapsulating domes from his air affinity created a Shield. The air warmed. The frosty puffs from our breath disappeared. Yet the sky still twinkled above us. His magic was so powerful, able to create so much destruction but controlled enough to do something this gentle.
“You have a nice home,” he said, breaking the quiet and pulling my thoughts from his power.
I arched an eyebrow. “That’s polite of you to say.”
“I’m not being polite. I mean it.”
I angled to face him more. “My entire home can fit within the Exorbiant Chamber.”
His lips curved, and my attention snagged to how perfectly they were shaped. “It’s not the size I’m referring to. It’s the feel of your home. Your friends. Your sister. It’s obvious you all care for each other, that you’d all do anything for one another.”
A small smile parted my lips. “We would.”
“You’re lucky to have that.”
I frowned at the slight catch in his tone. “But what about you? You have this—” I waved toward the castle. “And your family. You all have power and rulibs. You have everything you could ever ask for, and if there’s something you want that you don’t have, you can just demand it.”
He gave a rueful shrug. “It does appear that way, doesn’t it?”
I frowned. “Are you saying it isn’t?”
He sighed, and his wings draped more when he leaned into the bench’s slats. “Appearances can be deceiving. Yes, I live in a castle. Yes, I have a family. Yes, I have rulibs and power.”
“But . . .” I raised my eyebrows.
“But we don’t have what you have. We don’t have the freedom of anonymity. We don’t have the luxury of nobody watching us. We don’t have the easy warmth that so effortlessly flows through your family’s home. We have—” He cut himself off and shook his head.
“What? Tell me?”
“Nothing. I’m speaking too freely.”
“You’re not. I want to know.”
He turned to face me again, his gaze penetrating in the moonlight. “My family might have rulibs, power, and endless food, but we don’t have the love that your family does, and I don’t have the luxury of doing whatever I want, despite what some think.”
I paused, not sure where to begin after hearing that. I started with, “But what about Nuwin? You love him, don’t you?”
He chuckled. “Yes, I suppose I do, even though he enjoys driving me mad.”
“And your mother?”
His expression turned guarded before he said softly, “I love her very much.”
“And . . . your father?” I probed.
All expression left his face before he said, “With royalty comes demands. With demands come chains.”
His statement made me pause, not just because he’d refused to speak of the king but also because, for the first time, understanding hit me. “You’re no more free than I currently am.”
He gave another shrug. “Perhaps a bit freer than you, since I can command your servants, but in some ways, I’m not free at all.”
His tone held a lightness to it that hadn’t been there previously, but I still detected the underlying despair. And not for the first time, I saw again the deep-seated emotion that resided within the prince. He not only had empathy, but he felt things deeply, felt things so viscerally that I once again wondered what being Death Master of our continent did to him.
Breaths coming faster, I turned away. It was happening again, exactly what Cailis had warned me of. I was falling under his spell anew, feeling things for him that I shouldn’t.
I abruptly stood from the bench. “I think I would like to return to my room now.”
His expression closed off as he gazed up at me, but only a heartbeat passed before he stood. “Of course.”
We walked silently back to my chambers, ambling through the outer paths until we ducked through a door into his private wing.
We passed a door I’d never seen before, and the prince angled his head toward it. “That leads to my private chambers.”
“It does?”
He smiled, and some of the heaviness from our earlier conversation lifted in that one movement. “I could show it to you if you want.” He waggled his eyebrows playfully.
I suppressed a laugh. “Are you asking me back to your chambers?”
“Would you if I asked?”
His tone suddenly turned serious, and my step faltered. “I can’t bed you. You’re to date other females while I date other males.”
“I won’t be inviting any of them back to my chambers.”
“How do you know? You may.” I quickened my pace, finally recognizing where we were in his wing.
“I won’t.”
I frowned as my stomach flipped. “Even if you don’t, you still killed my parents. I could never bed you despite what happened at the ball.” It was the closest either of us had come to discussing our kiss on the balcony again, that soul-searing tangle of lips and tongue.
His footsteps continued quietly beside me before he said hesitantly, “What if I didn’t kill your parents, what then?”
My heart stopped. Just when I’d started to truly think that maybe, just maybe, the crown prince wasn’t a monster and that he did harbor true kindness in his black soul, he had to go and throw that in my face.
“Don’t be cruel.” Ice formed around my heart, and I swallowed the tears that wanted to come as I walked even faster.
“Ilara, can I trust you?”
My brow furrowed as I abruptly stopped and faced him, my chest heaving. “Why are you asking me that again?”
He glanced over my shoulder, down the hall. The faint sound of servants reached my ears. “Perhaps I’ll explain another time.”
“Explain what?” I demanded as I rounded the final turn, and Jovin appeared. “What are you hiding now?”
But his mask had descended. Any hint of what his cryptic words would reveal had vanished.
I brought a hand to my forehead. Fatigue hit me suddenly. The prince was hiding something again, perhaps many things. He was a male of shadows and darkness, death and destruction, and whenever a hint was revealed as to what truly lay within him, a veil always descended, blocking me out. The Bringer of Darkness always stared back at me.
And right now, following too much champagne and leminai, a grueling day of training, and the late hour . . . I couldn’t process his riddles, and quite bluntly, I didn’t want to.
I sighed heavily.
The prince stroked a finger across my cheek, featherlight and so fleeting that only the trail of goosebumps left in its wake told me I hadn’t imagined it. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
In a wink of mistphasing magic, just as I reached my bed chambers door that Jovin began to open, he disappeared.
Every morning over the next three days, I trained with Sandus and returned religiously to the Isalee field to heal what I could, followed by grueling lessons with Matron Olsander in the afternoons, which always bled into the early evening.
Each day was similar, exhausting, draining, yet exhilarating. But there was one change to my new daily duties—the prince no longer stayed with me in Isalee.