“Will you grant me one request?” Maeve asked, glancing toward Tiernan. She unsheathed her dagger and he nodded slowly.
“And what’s that, my pet?” Parisa’s hideous grin stretched wide, her single eye alight with the glow of victory.
Maeve swallowed. “A final kiss. Just one.”
Parisa groaned then, leaning back in her makeshift throne. “Fine. But make it quick. I want to watch the life fade from the High King’s eyes when his beloved finally ends him.”
Nodding sharply, Maeve turned back to Tiernan and started toward him.
“Maeve.” Rowan caught her hand, but she pulled away from his grasp, closing the distance between them.
Tiernan would rather die by her hand than any other.
Everyone watched as she approached him, and the dark fae had the decency to let him go, to afford him this last opportunity to say goodbye to her. She sucked in a breath, and his gaze dropped to her mouth, to those lips just waiting to be kissed. Another step and she was closer, peering up at him from beneath a set of dark lashes. Her tempting scent—cinnamon smoke, woods, and vanilla—layered with sun-drenched palms and warm sandalwood, weakened him.
A tear slipped from the corner of her misty gray-green eyes and she searched his face, pleading with him. Begging him to find some other way. But he would not allow her to change her mind.
He bent down toward her, pressing his forehead to hers. “Your soul is mine,astora. In this life, in every life.”
She took hold of the leather armor covering his chest and yanked him forward.
“You,” she whispered across his mouth. “I willalwayschoose you.”
“I love you, Maeve. Infinitely.”
“And I love you. Eternally.” She rose up on her toes and her lips slashed across his in a kiss of urgency. It was filled with fire, with passion, with the promise of a better world built on hope and dreams.
Maeve draped her arms over his shoulders, deepening the kiss. Tiernan was acutely aware of the way she melded against him. Of the hitch in her breath. Of her sporadic thoughts. Of her hesitant movements. She hoisted the dagger, positioning itbehind him, so all she would have to do was plunge it quickly into the back of his neck, and end his life without suffering.
It would break her, ruin her, and therein lay the problem.
Tiernan would never again allow her to suffer alone.
“Do you trust me?”he whispered into her mind, and broke their kiss.
She stared up at him.“With my life.”
“Good.”
Uncertainty gave her pause and that was all the time he needed.
Tiernan grabbed her arms, hauling them up over her head. Maeve gasped, her eyes widening as he wrenched the dagger free from her hold. Binding both of her wrists with one hand, Tiernan whipped her around, then yanked her hard against him. She stumbled backwards into him, struggling while he easily pinned her arms to her chest, pressing her tightly against him. With his free hand, he threatened the smooth flesh of her neck with the tip of her own dagger.
“What are you doing?” Parisa shrieked from her place in the stands. “Guards!”
The dark fae clamored, a swell of tainted rage and violence so strong that the rush of dark magic nearly suffocated him.
“Not so fast, Parisa.” Tiernan edged the sharpened point against Maeve’s throat directly above the iron collar and Parisa froze, lifting one hand, halting the assault.
“You wouldn’t dare.” Fumes of sickly green smoke seeped all around her. While she appeared to maintain a sense of calm, Tiernan knew she was seething, damn near foaming at the mouth with rage.
Parisa leaned forward, gripping the edge of the mantle before her where Maeve’s Aurastone glittered like the dawn. “You don’t have it in you to do it because she’s yoursirra. You wouldn’t touch a single hair on her pretty little head.”
“You’re mistaken.” Tiernan eased the blade into Maeve’s skin, so it nicked her flesh. She jolted in his grip, crying out, but he held firm, clutching her against him. Unease slithered through her, causing her body to tense. Her heartbeat kicked up, her pulse as familiar to him as a song. A single drop of scarlet pooled on the blade, and Parisa surged forward. “I took a vow. An oath.”
He kept his gaze locked on Parisa, barely acknowledging the fact that Rowan and Casimir were slowly inching toward them. The distraction was working. Everyone was too absorbed by the spectacle of the High King holding a dagger to the throat of his mate to pay attention to anyone or anything else.
“You see, I love her so fucking much that I agreed to be the one to take her life if it meant saving her from you.” Tiernan dipped his head, brushing his lips along Maeve’s ear. Her answering shiver destroyed him. “And I always keep my word.”
