Page 142 of House of Ashes

Maristela mounted the dragon, pushing hair out of her face as she took up the reins. “Good luck, and we’ll see you soon,” she called down to us, and Gaelin took flight with a clap of his wings.

Elinor stared after them, her brow furrowed. Then she let out a slightly shaky laugh. “Gods…I was afraid Chantrelle might do the same to me. If she’s considering Doric her enemy…I think I’d die if I were excommunicated.”

I gazed at her evenly. No, Chantrelle would not exile Elinor.

Because Elinor’s mate bond to Doric was the key to bringing the Lunar Tides into her own Court. If she put enough pressure on Elinor, she might be able to convince Doric to renege on his agreement with us.

It seemed quite obvious to me, but Elinor brushed an invisible speck from her arm and turned on her heel, walking back into the inn. She turned in the doorway, as though she’d forgotten something.

“Oh, Sera,” she said over her shoulder. “They’ve cleared rooms on the top floor for us. You don’t have to sleep on the main floor with all the Bloodless and…the patients.”

I waited until she’d disappeared to scowl. So that’s where she’d been hiding all day. “I don’t want to say I hate her, but…I hate her,” I said under my breath.

I tried to reserve my hatred for people who deserved it, like Yura, or my father.

To my surprise, Rhylan didn’t admonish me for hating one of his old friends. In fact, he had a slanted little smile on his face. “You wouldn’t be the only one.”

I cut him a sidelong glance. “I suppose Doric saw something in her he liked.” Maybe she only showed her best face to her mate, though Doric seemed much less…snobbish than her.

Gods, it was rich of me to accuse someone else of being snobbish.

“He didn’t choose the bond. They had never even touched when it formed.” Rhylan was still leaning on me, but he straightened up, taking some of his weight off my shoulders. I rather missed it. “We were only a few months out of the Training Grounds, and one day…Doric seemed to just lose his mind. He took off, and when he came back he had Elinor with him. It was one of those rare bonds that form out of seemingly nothing. He’s made the most of it, though.”

“Hmm. I think that would be terrible, to be alone in your head and one day, somebody just…appears in it.”

Rhylan let out a soft laugh. “If it was someone like her, sure. I’m personally hoping to hear a voice in my head sooner rather than later.”

Something pinched in my heart, a reminder of the library, his body pushing me against the map. If the bond had formed between us…

But it couldn’t. It would be a mistake, and I had to remain clear-headed enough to remember why.

How could he love me forever, when he believed something I refused to countenance? I could not believe for a moment that my mother had murdered Anjali. As long as Rhylan believed it…deep in his heart, he would always think of me in that way.

As the spawn of someone who had destroyed his family. A murderer’s get.

Maybe that was why it had never formed. Maybe in another life, where things had gone differently…maybe we would have bonded before we’d ever touched.

Because if I wanted the bond to form this badly, with every fiber of my being, and it hadn’t—that meant that deep down, no matter what he claimed, he was the one pushing it away.

“Well…hope is nice to have,” I said, rather more grimly than I’d meant to.

Which made me think of Myst, and her accusation that I was forever hoping, never executing. That my hope was a useless dream.

Wyvernshit. I’d slept with him more than once—if that kind of closeness, the skin to skin intimacy of him becoming a part of me, didn’t help the bond…it was never going to happen.

Because he truly believed my House had destroyed his.

He was lying to himself, and he couldn’t see it.

“Isn’t it?” He had a cheeky grin, his dimples standing out. My heart skipped a beat as I looked up at him, close enough to kiss those full, soft lips.

I wanted to rip said heart out and stomp on it for wanting things it couldn’t have. “Stop smiling. You’re going to split your lip again.”

“But I’m leaning on a gorgeous draga who’s going to put me to bed and bring me soup. What isn’t there to smile about?”

My teeth were going to be worn down to nubs from all the gritting he made me do. “Let me refresh you on recent events: this town has been leveled, you were almost torn apart, Gaelin seems to think someone’s going to stab you in the back, oh, and Maristela has been excommunicated. Does any of that qualify?”

Rhylan sighed. “Gods, why must you be the voice of reason?”