The door latch rattles.
A frisson races through my body. I lie on the tumbled mess of my narrow bed, every muscle tense, my heart in my throat. My hands grip the blanket I’ve partially pulled over my naked flesh. The latch rattles again. Stops. I stare at it. But the bolt is dropped. My privacy is still protected, for the moment at least. I let a shivering breath ease out through my lips.
After a pause of several seconds, Hael’s voice emerges from the far side of the door: “Princess? It’s me. Are you in there?”
I don’t want to answer. I can’t trust my own voice. I feel raw and ragged, like my insides have been carved out and emptied.
“The King sent me,” Hael continues. My heart lurches to my throat. The King? Vor? Did he leave my presence and go immediately in search of his captain of the guard? Has he ordered her to haul me back to my own world, willing or otherwise? Are those last, anger-fueled moments with him truly to be the end of our story?
Hael holds her tongue for some moments. She is loyal to both her king and her own sense of duty, however, so eventually, she rattles the latch again, harder this time. “Please answer me, Princess. I need to know you’re all right, or . . . or I’ll have to break the door in.”
I squeeze my eyes tightly shut. I can’t very well ignore a warning like that, can I? “Yes,” I manage. Then, clearing my dry, thick throat, I try again. “Yes, Hael. I’m all right.” By some miracle, I sound almost normal. Scarcely a quaver or hesitation. But then, I’ve learned to hide my feelings well over the years. “I’m just a little tired. That is all.”
Hael is silent again. It’s an uncomfortably knowing sort of silence. “Very well,” she rumbles at last. “I am at your service should you need me.”
I nod, unable to offer a verbal response. My heart falls back to my breast where it belongs and starts to learn how to beat once more. So. I’m not about to be dragged from the room by my hair. Not yet anyway.
Sitting up slowly, I swipe a hand across my tear-stained face and look dully around the room. How empty it feels. Devoid of Vor’s presence, which had filled my senses so completely such a short time ago. How could everything have gone so wrong so fast? How could we have misunderstood one another so completely?
“Juk,” I whisper. I’m not entirely certain what the word means, but I’ve heard it uttered often enough, accompanied by strong emotions. Just now, it’s the only word in my possession capable of expressing my true feelings. “Juk!” I growl again, my hands forming fists.
Here I am. Once again. Trapped in this cursed room. Waiting. Waiting for Vor to make decisions about my life. So much for taking control! So much for asserting my will! Growling wordlessly, I tilt my head back, stare up at the stalactites overhead. Gods on high, why did I let myself hope like that? Why did I open myself up, place my trust in his hands? What was the use? I once believed in the divine purposes of the gods, in the ultimate goodness of Nornala, my goddess. I’d even dared to believe there was a plan in place for me. A plan to transform my pain and suffering into purpose. That I’d been divinely guided into this world to become Vor’s substitute bride.
For a handful of glorious moments—as my body burst with passion and my soul soared to the very heavens—it had all seemed so real, so possible, so true.
Rough trolde voices erupt suddenly outside my window. I’m up so high, they seem far away, but the stone walls of the palace catch and echo the sound all the way to my open window. Soon the shouts are punctuated by the now-familiar bray of morleth.
My skin prickles. Though I’m too far away for my ears to detect words or my gods-gift to pick out any strong feelings, uneasy instinct coils in my gut. Gathering the blanket close around me, I slip from the bed, pad across the room. With one hand, I part the curtains and step out onto the balcony. The lorst crystals of the high cavern ceiling are already beginning to dim. The shadows in the courtyard below are long and deep. From those shadows, brave trolde grooms drag angry morleth out of their reality and into this one. A lot of morleth, all stamping cloven hooves and snorting sparks and sulfurous smoke.
The flash of armor draws my attention away from the beasts to the armed men and women congregated on the palace steps. Far more than last time—twenty, maybe thirty in total. My heart quickens, rams against my breastbone. What is happening? Something must be terribly wrong for this many of the household guard to be mustered. Has there been another tremor? Some new disaster?
Vor appears. Suddenly, like the moon emerging from behind storm clouds. The sight of him shocks me all over again, his beauty and majesty both awesome and terrifying. He carries a helmet under one arm, while his other hand clasps the shoulder of a broad guardswoman with whom he exchanges earnest words. My heart catches painfully. Even at this distance, a mere glimpse of his face is enough to set my blood rushing.
“Vor.” His name breathes through my lips, a voiceless whisper. Is he going to mount his monster and ride off to face unknown danger without another word between us? If only I dared call out to him! But he wouldn’t hear me from this distance. Even if he could, what would I say? Too much anger stands between us, like a wall of daggers.
I lean against the rail. The blanket slips from my shoulders, and my hair tumbles free across my bare skin. I drink in the sight of him, knowing too well it may be my last. Terrible foreboding grips my heart.
Or perhaps it isn’t foreboding . . . perhaps it’s my gods-gift, discerning the rising swell of feelings from the men and women below. The proud trolde warriors cannot suppress the fear that simmers in their veins. They are setting out to face a terrible foe. Some of them will not return.
Vor dons his helmet, mounts Knar. He turns the beast around, surveying his men and women. Then with a cry and an upraised fist, he leads the way to the palace gates. A surge of dark beasts flows into formation behind him. I try one last desperate time to call out his name. My throat closes tight, trapping my voice.
It doesn’t matter. At the gate, in the last possible moment, Vor turns in his saddle. Looks over his shoulder. I cannot see his face from this distance, hidden beneath his spiked helmet. But somehow, I feel the moment when his eyes lift to meet mine, when our gazes connect and lock.
My heart leaps, suddenly alive with nameless feelings so strong they steal my breath away. “Vor,” I whisper one last time. “Don’t go. Don’t leave.”
Then he faces forward in his saddle and rides on. Beyond my sight. Gone.
