The Broken Crown

Chapter 39

Adrianne

 She had been given a week. It seemed like such a short time, way too short to say the goodbyes she wished to say. Too short to prepare.

 Exile. The word seemed so violent, like a death sentence. The small attacks did not feel like a rebellion, not to her. Even with the attack on her way home from visiting Samuel, it did not feel like rebellion. Maybe it was just hope, she thought to herself on several occasions. Maybe it was just the hope that she had, in fact, made herself deserving of their love. But why, then, a voice would always say, would they have attacked her?

 It was hard to get to leave the castle without guards. Raphael would not leave her unguarded, would not risk her. She knew, of course, that it was dangerous, but compared to the suffering that it would surely be to leave the castle without seeing Samuel one more time, it was a risk she was willing to take.

 As she slipped out into the night, covered by a black cloak, she wondered if this would be their last meeting. She hoped not. In her heart, with all her being, she hoped not. She thought she might die if it was.

 In one way, the trip to the forest felt longer that night, but at the same time it felt so very short. Short, she reminisced, thinking of how short her time with Samuel was. They never had more than one night, squeezed in between what seemed like a million nights.

 She was crying silently when she reached his cottage. She tied her horse to a branch and walked to the door to knock. When he opened and she saw his face, she could do nothing but cry.

 “Adrianne,” he whispered and drew her insides. When she felt his arms tighten around her, she trembled and sobbed against his tunic.

 “They’re sending me into exile,” she muttered into his chest. The warmth of his body made her realize that she had been cold. “They’re sending me away.”

 “Shh,” he whispered against her curls and she wanted to do nothing but listen to his voice the rest of her life. She never wanted to leave him, never again. “It’s going to be alright,” he told her, even though they both suspected it was a lie. “You’ll be alright.”

 “I don’t know,” she whispered. She had never felt like this before, like she was lost. The woods surrounding her seemed to creep closer, drowning her in their shadows. “I don’t know anything. I don’t know when we’ll see each other again, or if we’ll see each other again. I don’t know when I can return home. I barely know where I’ll be living in a week. I don’t know if I’ll be alive in a week.”

 Samuel pulled her closer, so tight she could barely breathe, but she wished he would never let go. “The King would not let you die.”

 “I wish he would.” She shook when another sob took over her body. “I wish he would let me stay so that I could live or die at the will of the gods.” She pulled away enough to look him in the eyes, look into those warm, brown eyes. “So that I could stay with you.”

 He kissed her then, muttering about how he loved her, how he would never forget her, in between his kisses. Adrianne’s tears fell onto his cheeks and soon enough, they were lying beside each other, naked and sated. His hands roamed her body reverently, not the caress of a lover but of a man having his last sip of water before attempting to cross a desert.

 She remembered what he had told her the last time they saw each other. Twisting in the mattress of discarded clothes on which they lay, she looked at him. “Do you remember what you said to me, last time?” Their eyes met and for a moment, all she could do was stare. “That it didn’t matter to you if we ever saw each other again, because we would have had this.”