When Elm started moving inside of her, he couldn’t think. Couldn’t focus. Yellow hair was spilling everywhere and Ione’s face was flushed and so vulnerable, hazel eyes searching him, that he felt his chest constrict.
The slowness didn’t last. There was too much need—too much newness—between them. Elm stroked his thumb over her sex, his fingers digging into her bottom and hips as he moved with her, caught between savoring the moment and the unsatiable need for more.
He reared up, grasping the back of her neck. “What do you feel, Ione?”
Like a rush of wings, she sighed. “Everything.”
Elm thrust harder, dragging his mouth over her jaw, her throat. “I’m yours. Even if you won’t be Queen—I’m yours.”
Ione’s eyelids fluttered, her pace quickening. Elm palmed her breasts, meeting the hummingbird thrum of her heartbeat with his mouth. She fell back onto their clothes, pulling Elm on top of her, wrapping her legs around his waist. Her breaths came faster, laborious, and then she wasn’t breathing at all, tensing around him.
Elm looked down through a haze. Ione’s brow furrowed, her eyes still on him. She opened her mouth, let out a sharp cry—
Pressure, so much pressure, Elm felt every muscle clench, then powerfully unwind. His head crashed forward onto her breast. He bared his teeth, a curse slipping out—
And saw stars.
Ione folded him in her arms. When they’d stopped panting, they shared lazy kisses, pleasure-spent. And it was so heartbreakingly perfect, that moment with her, that Elm told her everything.
About his childhood, the death of his mother, the horrors of what happened after. About hating Hauth and his father. About wanting to die until the Yews took him in. He told her about becoming a Destrier. About Emory’s infection and his slow degeneration. About Providence Cards, and how the King had planned to spill Emory’s blood to unite the Deck.
About Elspeth. Her magic. The voice—the Shepherd King—she carried in her mind.
About the Twin Alders, and how Ravyn and Jespyr had gone to find it. And how Elm, the new heir, would do everything in his power to fight for them when they returned.
All while he talked, Ione stayed silent, her grip on him tightening. When he finished, she put a hand over his heart. “So that’s what you’ve been doing with all your time.”
“I’d be liar if I said I wasn’t damn tired from it all.”
“Thinking you could collect the entire Deck under the King’s nose, including a Card that has been lost five hundred years, is the most arrogant—most Elm—thing I’ve ever heard.”
He chuckled, curling a strand of her hair around his finger. “I wasn’t the only mastermind.”
“What about my mother and brothers? The Spindle girls? I thought you’d know where they’d gone. But when I asked, with the Chalice—”
“It was important I didn’t know. That way, not even a Chalice could make me share their whereabouts.”
Her eyes widened. “You got them out?”
The Scythe was never far. Elm found it in his cloak pocket and moved it between his fingers, flipping it until the edges blurred. “Jespyr warned your mother and brothers, and I compelled the Spindles to flee. I tried to get you out, too. I had no idea you weren’t in Spindle House. No idea what Hauth had done.”
Twin tears fell from Ione’s eyes. “Why?’
Elm sat up, took her face in his hands. “Because I don’t believe in it, Ione. Any of it. Five hundred years of Rowan law—it doesn’t mean a thing to me. Better we all dropped our charms and let the Spirit consume us than live in a place that punished people for magic not of their own doing. I’d rather Stone burned before I saw a woman and her children punished for hiding an infected niece.” He brushed her tears away. “Your family will be safe someday. I’m going to change things. I’m going to be the worst Rowan King in five hundred years.” The tips of his lips curled. “I might even enjoy it.”
Ione’s tears stopped. She was looking at him the same way she had when she’d called him beautiful. She pushed into him, arms wrapping around his neck. “Then let me enjoy it with you,” she murmured into his mouth.
The Scythe fluttered to the ground, utterly forgotten.
They decided to announce the marriage contract that night—to put a stake in the heart of pageantry and end the feasts a day early.
It was well after midday when they returned to Stone. Somewhere deep within the castle, a bell was tolling. Ione looked up at the tall, looming towers. “What’s that?”
Elm handed the groom the reins and took her hand. “I’m not sure.”
Baldwyn wasn’t there to ask. Neither was Filick. A string pulled in Elm’s chest. He thought maybe Ravyn had returned early.
Fingers laced with Ione’s, Elm took the stairs to the royal corridor and stepped into his chamber. A shadow rose in the corner of the room. It wasn’t Ravyn waiting for him.
It was Hauth.
PART THREE
To Bend
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Elspeth
The Spirit of the Wood’s shore was much like the one I’d occupied in the Nightmare’s mind. A listless, infinite space. Only this beach was pale. The sky, the rolling waves, the fine sand—all a wan, lifeless gray.
Ravyn sat in the sand, Jespyr in his arms. He could not reach her, not with his Nightmare Card, not with his voice. Not matter how he shook her—called out her name—she would not wake.
I don’t know how long we sat on that beach, waiting for the Spirit of the Wood. The Nightmare gnawed at a fingernail, watching the Yew siblings from the corner of his eye.
Ravyn’s voice was ragged. “How long do we wait?”
“The Spirit keeps her own time.”
Dozens of cuts from branches and thorns marred Ravyn’s face. He looked so tired. When he pressed a calloused finger to his sister’s neck, a pained sound came out of his mouth. “Her pulse is slowing. The fever is killing her.”
Do something, I pleaded in my dark chamber. Don’t let him lose hope.
“Your family is steeped in magic,” the Nightmare replied, harsher than he should. “She will live.”
Ravyn clamped his eyes shut and said nothing.
“You did not come all this way to yield to despair.”
Ravyn didn’t answer. But another voice did.
It came from the sea, deep and vast. It filled my dark room, echoing near and far. “The King of Blunder,” it called, “come to barter once more.”
When the water parted, a creature with claws and pointed ears and silver eyes slipped out of it. And I knew, deep within the inky blackness in my veins, who she was.
The Spirit of the Wood.
“Welcome back, Shepherd King. Welcome, Ravyn and Jespyr Yew.” Her unearthly eyes met my window. She smiled. “Welcome, Elspeth Spindle.”
Chapter Forty
Elm
A flash of red. “Don’t move,” came Hauth’s voice. “Don’t even speak.”
Salt stung Elm’s senses. His mind skittered to a halt, locking his muscles along with it. He was frozen, one hand in his pocket, the other laced with Ione’s.