A Court of Whispers and Song

Chapter 42

His body was frozen. Unable to move. To breathe around the tension seizing his chest, the same spiraling down his arms to clenched fists resting at his sides.

Elain.

Elain. The once-broken girl who opened her heart to him and only him.

The female Azriel once believed would be his above all else. That the Cauldron had made a mistake, and they were destined.

Elain. Whose sweet scent alone had at one time brought him to his knees in surrender. The cool, steady water to her eldest sister's scorching silver flames. The radiant day to offset her youngest sister's midnight.

His eyes narrowed on Elain's purely innocent face.

I don't think Elain likes me.

Elain. The same female who made Gwyn feel unpleasant at Rita's recently.

"Elain," Azriel greeted, indifference delineating his expression.

Her petal-soft lips curved up as she caressed the navy fur-lined cloak, drawing the dense fabric closer to her body as a barrier against the brisk night. Her exposed cheeks flushed from the icy wind. Or at least he hoped the added color came from the breeze alone. Mother, spare him.

"Chilly evening to be strolling the gardens," he remarked casually, though in honesty was more of a query. Why wasn't Elain with their family in the warm house? Considering this was her beloved nephew's first Solstice, the fact Elain hadn't arrived at all this eve was strange. Curious. Was this a sheer coincidence to encounter her out wandering the wintry grounds? Was she avoiding somebody in the household? Nesta? Lucien? Gwyn?

Or was Elain following him?

"I was determining whether to go in," Elain softly confessed with a modest smile. A smile that still affected him. Because Azriel remembered when nothing made Elain smile or laugh at all. And when she was the one person who made him grin. "And you?"

"I required a moment by myself."

"Ah." Elain drifted forward, close enough to sense the warmth of her body at his side even through the many layers of fabric. She tipped her head back, staring up at the constellations appearing as diamonds against crushed velvet. Snow settled on her dark, long lashes. "Seems like the last Solstice was merely yesterday, does it not?"

Elain grabbed him before he was able to elude. Slender fingers he used to imagine on his bare body wrapped around his wrist. They seemed to be wrong now. In every sense, this was wrong.

As he slipped the mask on, a muscle in his jaw worked. "The last Solstice was another lifetime, Elain."

The moment they nearly kissed while her unsuspecting mate slept beneath the same roof. When Azriel thought she held the answers to all his forgotten prayers. Held the key to unlock his happiness. Pictured them flourishing from the ashes. When he'd wanted to seduce her. Envisioned Elain coming apart beautifully under him in bed, tasting her sweet desire on his tongue. A time when he would have relished the fact she grabbed him with interest. When Azriel would have interlaced those fingers on his forearm with hers before carrying her away.

However, that was before a pitiful and resentful shadowsinger stumbled upon a sword-wielding priestess. Alone in the dead of night, her entire focus fixed upon a streaming white ribbon in the moonlight. Gwyn was relentless in everything she did, even when it came to coaxing every laugh and smile he could muster. She trusted him. Questioned him. Challenged him. Forced him beyond his comfort zone.

Elain Archeron may once have been the softness to his razor-sharpness. The gentleness to his brutality. The floral balm to his wounded soul.

But Gwyneth Berdara met him steel to steel. Blade to blade. She faced his scarred, shadowy soul. Stood before it, and saw every bleak part. Embraced him for who he was, the faults and flaws. The trauma and rage. Despite the darkness, she loved him for who he was.