Lena sits on the top step of her dais and watches Brene. Just for a moment, I think I glimpse pity in her eyes.
“From what we’ve been able to learn from her,” she says, “the remnants don’t know about the serum. Naito will have time to track down his father.”
The serum. Right. That’s the reason I’m here.
“Are you planning to use it?” I ask.
She draws in a slow breath, lets it out. “I would like to,” she says. “It will benefit us. It would benefit you, too, but if you are completely against it? Then, no. I won’t use it.”
I don’t like that answer. I can’t be her moral compass. Kyol tried to be that for King Atroth, and he failed. He failed because the king had someone else whispering in his ear and because Atroth wanted to do what was expedient, not what was best for the fae. I need Lena to do what’s best for the fae and for my people.
She must see my thoughts written on my face. “I know it’s wrong, McKenzie. I won’t involve your people unnecessarily. We still need to get the serum, though. The remnants might not feel the same way we do.”
The knots in my stomach relax. “We’ll need to find and destroy the research, too, or someone might be able to reproduce it. But we don’t have to wait on Naito. I know where the serum is.”
I show them the cell phone. No one gets close to it, of course, so I summarize the texts between Lee and his father. It’s better to think about this, about what we have to do, than to think about Aren and what he did.
“All I need is for someone to take me to Earth, so I can send the text,” I finish. In my peripheral vision, I see Brene lie down flat on her back.
“I’ll take you,” Aren says, stepping to my side.
“No.” I don’t want to be near him right now. I need time to think, to process everything.
“I’ll take you,” he says again, his voice harder this time. “It’ll be a quick trip. I think you can stand me for that long.”
“Kyol can take me.”
“He can’t heal you,” Aren counters. “Come on.”
He places his hand on the small of my back before I protest again. The warmth of his palm is familiar. So is the firm, but gentle pressure he uses to urge me forward. He’s always touched me like this, even when I was doing everything in my power to get away from him, and I remind myself that he’s the same person he was five minutes ago. He’s the same person he was before I found out about his connection to Thrain. And, besides, I won’t fight with him here in front of Lena and Kyol.
He trails slightly behind me as we leave the throne room and pass the palace’s administrative offices. I use the time and space to gather my thoughts. I need to figure out exactly what I’m doing with him. Just when I think I’m close to accepting his past, I learn something new. It’s a blow every time, and I don’t know how many more I can take.
Outside, a bright sun warms what would otherwise be a chilly day. It feels good on my skin, and I soak it in, letting it ease some of the tension in my muscles. Aren moves closer to me now. Even though this is the most affluent area of the Inner City, it’s not 100 percent safe. Most of the high nobles have homes here. The eaves of the buildings are silver-trimmed even though we’re still inside Corrist’s silver walls. It’s purely something to show their status. They have money to throw away on things that aren’t necessities.
We reach the silver wall without incident, then cross the terrace to the river. That’s when Aren takes my hand, pressing an imprinted anchor-stone into my palm.
“If I could undo my past for you, McKenzie, I would. But I don’t have that power. No fae does.”
I watch my chaos lusters dart across the back of the hand he still holds. His touch is hot, tantalizing. I still crave it. “Why do I have to find out about your past like this? When you don’t warn me, it’s like you’re trying to keep things from me.”
“Do I need to name every fae I’ve made tor’um?” he asks quietly.
I meet his eyes, a little startled. “How many are there?”
“I do remember them. Every one,” he says. Then, as if he’s just hearing my question, he adds, “There were five. All but Brene were when I was under Thrain’s tutelage.”
Five. After seeing Brene, it sounds like so many.
Aren bends down to the river to cup water in his hand. He raises his palm to the sky, then the air rumbles as a fissure splits through the atmosphere. I feel like it’s splitting through me.
“Ready?” he asks.
I nod, then let him pull me into the light.
The icy bite of the In-Between makes my muscles tense, and that sends a sharp lance of pain through my side. I hiss out a breath, or try to, but the In-Between has stolen the air from my lungs. When we emerge on the other side, I’m coughing, which makes my ribs feel oh so much better.
I double over, holding my side.
“McKenzie.” Worry fills Aren’s voice. He puts his arm around my waist to support me, and that only makes it worse. My knees hit grass.
“McKenzie,” he says again, more anxious this time.
“Ribs,” I manage to get out. I concentrate on drawing in a slow, careful breath as he slides my shirt up.
“Sidhe.” He crouches beside me. “I know you don’t want me to touch you, but you should have said something. I didn’t know you were hurt this badly.”
He places his hand over my bruised side. Heat sinks into me as he flares his magic, using it to heal my ribs. They must be cracked or broken because it hurts. It hurts almost as much as it did when he healed the arm Lena broke after I tried to escape the rebels in Germany. My hand clenches on Aren’s forearm. I squeeze my eyes shut against the pain, but it only lasts a few seconds. Then, the edarratae take over, and the only thing I feel is a hot, delicious tingling.
Aren’s hand is still on my side. His touch was clinical at first. It’s not clinical anymore. The lightning affects him just as much as it does me, and I know he feels it gathering. What he said was wrong. I do want him to touch me. I want it so much, I can barely think.
“Aren,” I whisper. His body gives a little shudder, and I half hope he doesn’t regain control. He’s always done this to me, made me want him when I shouldn’t. I shouldn’t right now. There’s too much between us, too much that we need to talk about.
We move away from each other at the same time. I see him swallow, and his eyes have a wild edge to them. There’s a glimmer of something else there, as well, though. Something that I’ve rarely seen from him. Fear. He’s afraid of losing me.
I’m afraid of losing him, too. I almost feel that, if I take the time to sort through my thoughts, if I create a list of reasons to stay with him and reasons to go, the reasonable thing would be to go. We were enemies. He threatened my life more than once and killed fae who were just trying to protect me. The thing is, I don’t want to walk away. No matter how illogical it might be, I want to be with him.
“You have a call to make,” he says quietly. He runs a hand through his already disheveled hair as he straightens.
A text to send, but I don’t correct him. I stand as well, shutting down my feelings for now as I slip Lee’s cell phone out of my pocket. Then, for the first time, I take in my surroundings. It’s dark, and there’s nothing but a starlit river beside us. The shadows from our fissure have already disappeared, so I have no clue where we are. We’re practically on top of a gate though, which is good. We can be back in the Realm as soon as I contact Nakano.