Page 82 of Dare

As I tucked myself into bed, I wondered. Did he suffer from shark nightmares anymore? My eyelids fluttered closed, the question pinching my dreams.

Hours or minutes later, I learned the answer. During the night, I lurched off the mattress, ripped from my sleep to the sound of Jeryn screaming.

30

Flare

I plowed through the haze, yanked aside my sheet, and raced toward the sound. Having abandoned his bed, Jeryn hunched on the floor of his chamber, with his back against a wall laced in begonias. Clad in only a pair of loose pants, he gripped the sides of his bent head, fingernails knifing into his hair.

It was indeed a nightmare. Some demon had slithered into his mind.

If it were me, I would have been quivering, lashing out, or rocking back and forth. But the prince stayed motionless. The naked muscles of his shoulders strained with tension, and the veins in his arms bulged like the roots of a tree.

Muffled noises grated into a pillow wedged between his upturned thighs and chest. To others, it might sound like coarse grunts. But I heard the shouts, the disorder he fought to conceal.

In my cell block, I’d never taken the suffering of my neighbors lightly. However, those bellows and sobs had never shocked me, because they’d been expected. But Jeryn’s turmoil overturned every memory I’d had of him, the disturbance cracking like a shell inside my chest.

Dropping to the ground, I scrambled on all fours. The villain prince didn’t see me crawling his way, yet he knew. Maybe he’d grown used to how I smelled or sounded. Either way, we moved at the same time. With his head bowed, Jeryn tossed the pillow and reached for me. A brittle sensation got stuck in my throat as I caught him, and then my feelings gave way to violence. Something had wounded him, and for the first time, I didn’t like this thought.

I didn’t like it at all.

In the dark, I swung one leg over his waist, climbing onto his lap just as he pulled me into him. I faced Jeryn, my thighs splitting around his waist, the short hem of my nightgown bunching high enough to reveal the profiles of my backside. His arms clamped around my middle, wrenching me closer until my breasts slammed against his bare torso, our bodies fastening together. And when my hands wove around his neck, the prince shuddered as though my touch had a devastating effect.

Heat emanated from him more than it did from me. It eclipsed the humidity tenfold, a bead of sweat leaking between my collarbones and landing on one of his own.

Amid the shadows, our limbs tangled into knots. His massive physique encased mine, and his damp forehead found solace on my shoulder.

“My grandaunts. They’re old. They could be dead,” he hissed, the words avalanching from his mouth as if they’d been corked for a thousand years. “My parents. They’re ill and don’t know where I am. They don’t have me. I’m not there. I’m not there for them.”

“Shh,” I whispered, to no avail.

“I’m a healer,” he ranted. “I heal my kingdom, but … I’m not a healer. I’ve tortured people. I’ve maimed them,” he muttered in a haunted tone. “What have I done? What the fuck have I done?”

I wouldn’t shush him about that. He needed to say it, and I needed to hear it.

“I used them,” Jeryn realized. “I used so many people to treat others. And I’m not there to change it. I’m not there to fix anything. I’m not there. Who’s healing Winter? Who?”

I heard it in his voice. This wasn’t just the terror of a bad dream. It was also the maelstrom of panic.

While the sun had set, Jeryn had revealed himself to me. Afterward, we’d been talking about his home, which must have triggered him, ambushing the peace we’d found. Out of nowhere, epiphanies blew through a formidable barrier and took this man captive, from his gruesome history, to every horrific deed, to his isolation from Winter. Our talk had made him think of the family he wasn’t there to help, the ailments he wasn’t there to fix, and the people he’d wronged.

“More prisoners will be used while I’m stuck here,” Jeryn said, breaking like a wall of ice under pressure. “My family’s going to die without me. They might be dead already. And I’m going to die here too. But I don’t want to die here.”

That last part hurt. I couldn’t say why, could hardly grasp where my heart fit inside this hurt. I yearned to defend the rainforest, not a more enchanting realm to be found on this continent. But I didn’t have a family anymore, whereas his living relatives waited for him.

Jeryn’s kin needed their ruler. His patients and subjects depended on him, and born souls could finally benefit from his skills. If he were still in Winter, he’d have the power to help them.

During our talk, I hadn’t considered that. But he had. The moment his mind had shifted, he’d gone there.

His palms burned through my nightgown, his grip crushing the material. “The siren shark,” he rasped against the crook of my shoulder. “I could have been bitten. It could have … I could be… and not know it yet. I could be dying without knowing it.”

That wasn’t true. He’d battled that shark and won.

For me. He’d faced that horror for me.

But maybe part of him was dying in another way. And maybe I was too. So maybe we could save each other.

Strapped in his arms and ensconced in these ruins, I couldn’t draw images of comfort into the sand. Instead, I did the only other thing left and brushed my fingers through his hair, the mane slipping through my fingers like a cascade. Over and over, I combed through his roots in a tender rhythm.