Rosalina wraps her arms around my waist and hugs me so tightly, my armor jingles. “Tell me something about her,” she whispers.
I sigh and hold her tight. “She wore a starlight silver helm. I never saw her face, but in my mind, she was beautiful.”
“Of course she was,” Rose says. She blinks up at me. “And no matter what, she’s always with you, Ez. There’s a piece of her inside of you that will never leave.”
“I suppose that’s why I must go to Spring and make sure the realm she left me is in good order,” I say.
“Wait. Before you go—”
My heart lurches. Ask me to stay.
But instead, she scrunches up her face and says: “Anon caria mirel baelorin. Yavanthy caeotin. Darisfeli em onore. Ezryn.”
The words are choppy, labored. But I’d know them anywhere.
“That is a language of Spring,” I tell her.
She places her palm flat on my chest plate and stares at her spread fingers. “I know. You said that to me down in Cryptgarden.”
“You remembered?”
She reaches up to caress my helm. Her brown eyes shine as she holds my gaze. “The mountains told me your name. The forest sang your song. My heart has been searching for you since the first dawn.”
Of course, the first thing Rosalina would do upon hearing a new language is find a way to translate it. I can picture her in the library, poring over a dictionary. My chest tenses. Those were words I meant to keep secret …
“My heart searches for you, too, Ez,” she whispers. “Let me find you.”
As much as I wish I could sweep her into my arms and tell her again and again and again that I’m right here, the mirror beckons me forward. “I’ll be back soon.”
“I’ll be waiting for you,” Rose says and lets me go. “I promise.”
With her promise giving me the strength I need, I take one step forward and enter Spring.
6
Caspian
My palm smacks against the back of the wooden armoire, and an annoyed growl sounds in my throat. Not here either. I’ve covered the floor with Rosalina’s dresses, emptied every desk drawer. And the fae woman is still sleeping peacefully in her bed. She must be a deep sleeper.
Or my presence soothes her. The thought disturbs me.
I limp to her bedside table, ignoring the biting pain shooting up my leg. You don’t lose the Autumn Realm without a little retribution. The drawer is brimming with paper, pens, and a half-eaten cookie. But not my book.
“Where exactly did you hide it, Flower?” Her dark hair is loose, pieces curling around her face, with full lips slightly parted. She’s kicked her blankets low, and it’s so easy to make out the delectable curves of her body through the thin fabric.
Clutching my hands into fists to resist touching her, I proceed to the other side of the room. Of course, she could have hidden it anywhere in Castletree, but there’s this peculiar feeling that it’s here somewhere.
I sense the exact moment she wakes up, like a shock through my chest. But I don’t turn, busying myself in a drawer I’ve already checked. I pretend not to hear her stupidly loud breath or feel her taking control of my thorns and snaking them around my ankles. The floor creaks. Stars be damned, does she actually think she’s being sneaky?
The thorns yank me off my feet, and I slam to the ground. Rosalina straddles me, pinning me and pressing an elongated thorn to my neck.
“What are you doing here, Caspian?” she snarls, her face poised in an adorable grimace.
“I could ask you the same question.” I smirk. “If I’d thought this was what you were after, I’d have bargained for a lot more than a kiss.” My eyes snap to the thin thorn bracelet around my wrist, and the two matching ones around hers.
Her expression changes into a silent O, and she eases up from the position her little assault has put us in. Her thighs are spread on either side of my waist, one palm flat on my chest, and of course, the thorns around my ankles. Those I take control of now, untangling myself and coaxing them to slide up her legs.
She gives a sharp hiss of pain, and I can feel her pushing to take command of them again, but I don’t allow it.
“You let me surprise you,” she says.
“How else was I to get what I want?” I glide a hand up her milky white thigh. “And I always get what I want.”
She hisses and presses the thorn a little harder against my neck, but she doesn’t realize nothing she can do at this point can hurt me. Not after what’s already been done. My fingers graze beneath her nightdress, and her scent fully consumes me. “Do you have an aversion to panties, Flower?”