A shudder ran through me, and I held on to her tighter. I didn’t even know why I tried—I already knew what I would find—but I opened my senses to see if I could pick up anything from her.
In the past, her emotions were always right beneath the surface. She had many feelings about lots of things multiple times throughout the day. But that had changed when she was wounded by shadowstone and fell into a deep sleep.
My senses brushed against a void of nothingness, reminding me of what it was like when I tried to read the Ascended or a Revenant. But she was neither of those things.
What she had become…
The memory of me sitting by her side, trying to heal her after she’d been wounded, returned. So much eather had poured from me into her that my palms sometimes felt as if they were on fire. She hadn’t woken until she was being cared for by Wilhelmina—theMiss Willa. She was one of the eldest Atlantians, and I knew if anyone could help Tawny, it was her. But she wasn’t the cause of the changes in my friend.
I was.
Even though I hadn’t healed her with my touch.
“Poppy?” she whispered, making me realize I had gone silent.
I swallowed against the burn of tears. “I’ve missed you, too.”
“You better have,” she murmured, her hand fisting my braid. “I would’ve been offended if not.”
A shaky laugh left me.
Tawny pulled back just enough to give me a once-over. “How are you feeling? Are you okay? Where did you go?” she asked, one question running into the next. “Will you ever be allowed to be alone with anyone in private again?”
“I know you—” I blinked, her last question completely caught me off guard. “Why would you ask that?”
She held my stare as a slight furrow formed between her brows. “You should ask”—she cast a narrowed-eye look that was awfully close to a glare over her shoulder—“PrinceHawkethroneover there.”
“It’sKing”—Casteel shoved the door shut with a finger as he returned her look— “Hawkethrone to you.”
“Whatever,” she muttered, facing me again.
My gaze darted between them as my brows inched up my forehead. “Do I even want to know?”
“I think you already do,” she said, clasping my arms. “Your husband is seriously overprotective.”
I glanced at Casteel as he lifted his glass with an unapologetic tilt to his lips. “I kind of know that.”
“Kind of?” Tawny snorted.
Casteel sent me a wink.
Tawny huffed as she looked at him. “It’s a good thing you’re nice to look at.”
Another laugh burst from me as I pulled her back to me. Gods. Only Tawny would say that without a hint of fear or concern. She was stillher. That had to count for something. It had to be all that mattered.
That insidious voice from minutes ago, the one that told me I’d be fooling myself believing in what I knew wasn’t true, returned.
Sorrow choked me, and I squeezed her despite the chill of her skin bleeding through her gown, not wanting to let her go.
Tawny’s milky-white eyes widened in alarm. “Poppy?”
Casteel was at my side in a heartbeat, causing Tawny to give a start. “What’s wrong?” he demanded, the eather pulsing brightly in his eyes.
“Nothing’s wrong. I swear,” I assured him—both of them—as my heart pounded. Letting go of Tawny, I stepped back. Maybe I was wrong. But I knew I wasn’t. Bile crept up my throat.
“You’re starting to worry me,” Tawny said quietly, inching closer. She reached out, seemingly unaware of how Casteel tensed beside me, and placed her hand on my arm. “Poppy?”
I looked down at her hand, her cold skin chilling mine.
