“Yes,” he said emphatically. “Of course I came back for you.”
“But why? Why, if you’re not even really here with me?”
“I am here. I can’t be with you more than I am right now.” His gazed shifted out to everyone else dancing around us. “This probably isn’t the best place to get into it.”
“There’s never a good time to talk, not with everything going on here. I just want to know what’s going on with us.” I looked up into his dark eyes. “Is there even an us?”
He took a fortifying breath. “I came back for you because you’re my first thought in the morning. Because you push yourself to be better, and in the process, you push everyone else around you to be better. You make everything better.
“You are far more courageous and stronger than anyone I’ve ever known,” he continued. “And I never thought you’d ever want anything to do with me. I was certain I’d never be good enough for you.
“But when we kissed for the first time, under the lights of the aurora borealis, everything I’d ever felt about you was proven true,” Ridley finished. “I came back for you because you’re all I’ve ever wanted or needed, because I want to be with you always.”
For a moment I was too stunned to say anything. I just stared up at him, my mouth hanging open and my heart pounding in my chest.
“You have me,” I said simply. “You’ll always have me.”
His lips turned up slowly into a smile, looking both relieved and amazed. Then he leaned in, and I wrapped my arms more tightly around him. His lips had just brushed up against mine when I heard shouting over the music.
The orchestra finally stopped, and I heard Baltsar shouting, “Ridley! KingMikko!”
“What’s going on?” Ridley pulled away from me, but kept his hand around mine. His eyes scanned the crowd, until it parted enough for us to see Mikko standing a few feet away with Linnea at his side.
Baltsar burst through the crowd, standing in the clearing between Ridley and Mikko. “There’s been an attack on our men walking the perimeter. Two were seriously injured, and one was killed. We need a medic, and we need to make sure the area’s secure.”
“Mikko, you go with Ridley and get the men together to make sure we’re safe,” Linnea said. “I’ll get the medic.”
Ridley let go of my hand and started hurrying toward Baltsar.
“Who was hurt?” I asked, and it was hard to be heard over the distraught murmurings of the ballroom. I took off my mask and started pushing my way through the crowd, but they didn’t part for me the way they had before. “Baltsar, what men were attacked?”
“A couple new recruits.” He paused long enough to look back at me. “And Konstantin Black.”
FIFTY-TWO
expiry
In the chaos that followed, I had to remind myself to breathe. Baltsar had said Konstantin’s name, then had run off, and I stayed where I was as everyone rushed around me. I didn’t know what to do, where I should be, and I looked around, hoping for direction.
Tilda had started commanding the Skojare guards, sending them to various posts around the palace so that any possible entrance would be protected. Marksinna Lisbet took control of the civilians who remained in the ballroom, assuring them that everything would be all right.
“Bryn.” Tilda put her hand on my shoulder, momentarily pausing from giving orders. I turned to her, and she had a knowing look in her smoky eyes. She could always see through me, even when everything had gone mad.
“We’ve got this,” she said simply. “Go.”
I dropped my mask, letting it fall to the floor, and then I was running, grabbing up the length of the gown and grateful that the fabric flowed enough to allow me to move as fast as I wanted to. I didn’t know where I was going, not at first, but I couldn’t slow down. I raced through the soldiers that crowded the halls.
Finally I spotted Linnea, dragging a medic by the hand as she ran in her own sparkly blue gown. She was way at the other end of the hall from me, rushing toward the south wing of the palace, but I could just see her platinum curls bouncing, so I followed them.
I managed to get to the room just after Linnea and the medic had arrived, and I stood in the doorway. It was a small room on the main floor, with a window that showed the stars reflecting on the lake outside. Two twin beds were in the room, but Linnea and the medic were blocking my view so I could only see the legs of the occupants.
And blood. Blood stained the white sheets and left a mess on the floor.
Ridley was already at work caring for the men before Linnea arrived. He’d taken off his white jacket and rolled up the sleeves of his shirt, and his forearms were stained red.
The medic started to take over, and Linnea tried to tell the wounded that everything would be alright.
“Dammit!” Konstantin growled, and I breathed in deeply for the first time.