Court of Ice and Ash: A Dark Fantasy Romance (The Broken Kingdoms Book 2)
Court of Ice and Ash: Chapter 24

WE RETURNED TO RUSKIG before the pale dawn broke through the trees. Those we’d left behind greeted the weary and battered with nettle soups and herb rolls. Ari barked orders to find shelter for those we’d rescued from Mellanstrad.

Siv disappeared into the trees with Mattis, and I doubted I’d see much of them before midday.

Valen, surrounded by the Guild of Shade, looked at me across the great hall. His eyes cut through me like broken glass. How could he control every piece of me with a single glance? How did he keep this power over me when the entire journey back he’d said nothing?

Perhaps the greater question—why did I allow it?

I couldn’t find the energy to be in his presence now. Not if he would continue to build walls between us. I’d build my own. Tears threatened to wet my eyes, but I rubbed them away and hurried back to my shanty.

Inside, I dimmed all the light but for one candle, slipped into a thin chemise, and opened Lilianna’s journal. The only way I found nearness with the Night Prince lately was through the memories of his mother.

Two pages in, the door slammed open.

I let out a strangled cry, clutching the journal to my chest, and whirled around to face the intruder.

My pulse quickened.

Valen stood in the doorway, eyes like pure midnight. His dark tunic and trousers faded against the darkness, but the candlelight warmed his bronze skin.

He stepped inside and locked the door behind him.

All at once I was aware my chemise was entirely too diaphanous. I folded my arms over my chest and turned away, saying nothing. Not even the words to ask why he’d come.

His heavy footsteps groaned over the floorboards. With a touch of caution, the Night Prince came to stand in front of me.

He cleared his throat. “I’m sorry. For your father. It is not easy to watch those you love be harmed.”

I winced. “My father has little love for me, but he is the only father I have. Why are you here? Could we have not discussed this on the ship?”

Valen shifted on his feet. He stared at his fingernails. “Are you . . . are you injured at all?”

I didn’t want to talk about what happened in Mellanstrad. I didn’t want to pretend like we hardly knew each other. Not when we knew so much.

“I’m fine.” More silence. I pretended to read the journal again. “You?”

He smirked. “They didn’t touch me.”

I swallowed past a dry scratch and fiddled with a wooden cup of cold tea on my table. “Is there something I can do for you?”

“Do you wish me to leave?”

No. Stay. I wished I knew why he ran from me, only to come back again and again. I could’ve said it all out loud. Instead, I pretended to read again.

“What are you reading?”

I bit my lip, desperate not to grin. He kept fidgeting. Lacing his fingers, fiddling with his belt, running a hand through his hair. A prince—a king—lost in nerves was entertaining.

“The journal. The queen has just caught her rakish youngest son and one of the courtier’s daughters in the stables. It’s scandalous, actually.”

The smile couldn’t be contained when I flicked my eyes to Valen and a flush added a layer of pink to his face.

“It’s quite funny,” I went on. “A mother catching her son in various states of—”

“All right.” He hurried and took the journal out of my hands. “My mistake for giving this to you.”

“Understandable since you did not know it was written about you at the time.”

“Yes. But now that I do, you should know my mother was notorious for writing every detail of her days and had a proclivity to . . . dramatize the truth.”

I lifted my eyebrows and played indifferent. “Night Prince, are you trying to tell me your mother wrote exaggerations?”

“No,” he said, inching closer. “I would not call my mother a liar, but you are wrong about one thing?”

“And what’s that?”

He didn’t answer right away. Valen grinned, a sly kind, placed the journal on the table, then his arms went on either side of my chair, making a cage around me.

My breath burned in my chest.

His eyes had a magic all their own. The hot black tried to break into the wall I’d carefully built between us. A few cracks splintered my resolve to be indifferent to Valen Ferus. But the clean scent of his skin, the smirk on his mouth, the way dark waves gathered over his brow—I was at risk of crumbling at a single touch.

Weak. I was weak, and there was no other way to describe it.

“I was young,” he said, “but I am no rake.”

My throat tightened. He’d come so close. I could see the gold and dark green in his eyes. If I did not take care, I would be at his mercy.

“What—” I cleared my throat when my voice cracked. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m tired of distance.”

“Distance you have created.”

“For good reason. At least I thought so.” Valen leaned his forehead to mine, voice low. “I feared for you tonight.”

I licked my lip. My skin burning to get closer. “Makes some sense. It was frightening.”

“I did not fear for anyone else.”

His fingertips followed the line of my jaw, down my neck. I drew in a sharp breath.

“Valen,” I whispered. “What are you doing?”

He hesitated. “Do you believe I am distant because I am indifferent to you?” Sᴇaʀᴄh thᴇ (ꜰind)ɴʘvel.nᴇt website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

“Yes.” I did not hesitate. “I think you enjoy me—or like to enjoy me. Like at the Black Tomb.”

“You make it sound as if you mean nothing and are simply a warm body to me.”

I shrugged. No mistake, I’d seen the desire in his gaze, but for me, it was more than want. He was so much more, and I hated that I could not let him go. Doomed from the beginning. The damn icy voice raided my thoughts again. I shook my head and turned away.

Valen used his knuckle to tilt my chin. He brought his face nearer. “The curse was broken, so there must be no other reason for me to remain near you, right?”

“You feel indebted.”

“Ah,” was all he said.

I shook my head, afraid if I did not move, I’d suffocate from want and desire.

I rose from my chair and stepped out of his arms. “Valen, maybe at first you felt differently, but I know you do not wish to be here. I know you—”

Words pinched off. Valen had closed the space between us. His arm surrounded my waist, his hand trapped my cheek. Chests to hips collided. My body burned for him.

“You’re wrong.” His voice was deep and husky. His thumb brushed my bottom lip. “I wish to be anywhere you are, Elise Lysander. I have lost everyone. I watched them be used against me, watched them be tortured. But the thought of losing you is worse than any agony I’ve felt in the past. And I hate myself for it.”

I curled my fingers around his tunic, holding him close. “Why?”

“Your name alone puts a price on your head. Add me, and the web of risk increases tenfold. How can I do it to you?”

“Who says you are the one who makes the choice alone?”

He coiled his fingers in my hair, tipping my head back. “Distance between us is the safest. It is the best choice. For you.”

“Then why are you here?”

A half grin tugged at his mouth. “Because as my mother wrote—I never was one to make the best choices.”

Valen crushed my lips with his.

At once my arms curled around his neck. My mouth parted. His tongue was warm and soft. I dug my fingernails into his shoulders.

We staggered together until my back hit the wall.

“You command me.” He smiled against my mouth. “All of me. Irritating, since I am a prince.”

I kicked his shin. “No. You are a king.”

I broke the kiss, breaths heavy, heart racing. His eyes were heated with desire. One of his clever hands slid down my waist; he bunched the satin of my chemise into his grip, then glided his calluses over the smooth skin of my thigh.

A smirk teased the corner of his mouth. “Kvinna, if a man were to touch you like this, would you like it?”

Moments when he was Legion Grey, a man forbidden to touch me, a man who did it anyway, filtered through my mind. I closed my eyes and allowed my head to fall back against the wall. My grip on his tunic held me steady as his sly fingers burned across my flesh.

“Or this?” He grinned against the nape of my neck as he drew his second hand up the curve of my waist, my ribs. Lips and teeth brushed over my skin, dancing trembles down my spine.

“Yes,” I said in a breathless whisper.

His touch climbed higher, grew more daring. Each draw of breath came heavy and deep until my head spun in delight, and I thought my legs might give out.

Valen only deepened his command on my body, holding me closer, keeping me upright. I arched into him, and twisted his hair in my fingers. My body shuddered in desire as his hands claimed every inch of me, and his lips met mine again.

Legion Grey had once ignited a blinding passion in my soul, but to have those moments collide here, in my shanty, with a once-dead prince burned through me in an insatiable need.

Into something deeper.

Something like love.

My fingertips slipped beneath his tunic, tracing the lines of his chest. Valen moaned against my mouth, and his body tightened. I rested a hand to his heart, and pushed him back. The edge of my bed hit his knees, so he fumbled into sitting. I stood before him, fingers numb, body alive.

He was not the Night Prince, was not a vow negotiator. In this moment, he was simply Valen, a man who’d dug into my heart and never left.

He was mine.

The night in the old schoolhouse at Ravenspire, his hands had claimed my body. He’d earned my loyalty then, but tonight was different. No secrets remained between us. No illusions.

My hands shook as I reached for the sleeves of my chemise. As girls, Runa and I would wonder about lovers and what bedding them would be like. We’d giggle and imagine sweeping, grand gestures of handsome warriors, of lust filled nights on petals and plush furs.

This was not how I imagined.

I would not change any of it.

My chemise slipped off and bunched at my feet. Valen’s lips parted; his gaze roamed my naked body with a rush of heat. He swallowed, then took my hand and guided me to him.

The Night Prince pulled me onto his lap, leveraging my hips until I straddled him.

“Do not turn from me again, Valen Ferus,” I whispered, stroking my fingers down his cheek.

“I could not even if I tried.”

“They win if we do not live.”

One of his hands traveled the curve of my hip, the other on my leg, slipping between my thighs. I sank into him, breathless and feverish, then pulled his tunic over his head. The heat of his skin on mine sent a ripple down my arms. He groaned when my lips grazed his ear.

Valen laid me on my back and settled over me, legs tangled, bodies aflame. In a frenzy, he shucked off his trousers and I gasped into his mouth as we glided together. He pulled back, as if he expected me to stop, to turn away from him.

I kissed him instead. Kissed him until his harsh breaths matched my own. I bared my throat, wishing I could be closer, but it would still not be enough. Each touch left bright heat across my skin.

Valen kissed the sweat from my brow. His eyes drank me in as his hips rocked against mine. Our bodies heated, soft gasps filled the night. Fast and greedy, then slow and tender. With each shift and position in the narrow bed, laughter passed through traded kisses.

All the need and want since we first met collided in a swell of passion and desire and something softer.

Something gentle and lasting.

When we finished, Valen touched his fingers to the line of my lip, then kissed me like it was the first and last all in one. I held his head to my chest. He drew soft lines up and down my arms.

Before sleep took me, Valen whispered in the dark, “Elise. I choose to live.”

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