Chapter 35

The evening before they reached the Rhinnean capital, Rea, they made camp on the side of the mountain. A path through the woods led to a rocky overlook that afforded a view of the valley where the brightly lit city lay. Annalise had walked the path when they made camp, but didn’t stay for long at the overlook—something about seeing the city stretched out before her, nestled on the banks of a large river, made everything feel so much more tangible. Rea was no longer a strange foreign city, an idea that diplomats and generals talked of. Instead, it was real; it was sitting before her, and it reminded her of both her duty and her dreams, which felt more opposed every day. When she returned to the campsite, the sound of laughter and the sight of Soren helping Elsabeth set up her tent made Annalise want to cry. 

It was a life she’d longed for, a life by his side and surrounded by friends. Instead, the dream was ending too soon, and she had the uncomfortable feeling that she was about to walk into a nightmare. 

Long after the evening meal was finished and several of the guards had already bedded down in their tents, Annalise was still sitting up, staring into the fire. She knew they had an early morning the next day, but she wasn’t ready to go to sleep yet. The knowledge that the next morning she would join the Dovean caravan and meet the man she was to marry, burned and buzzed in her veins like her blood had taken the form of red-hot bees. She stared into the fire as the night grew darker, unwilling to move from her perch.

With a sigh, Elsabeth set her knitting to the side and rocked to her feet. “Princess Annalise, I’ve already packed your bags for the morning, so don’t worry about any of that. Everything is ready to go. Try not to stay up too late. We have a big day tomorrow,” she said before looking at Annalise meaningfully, cutting her gaze to Soren, and then closing the tent flap. The only other people still outside were a few sentries facing the woods, their backs to the camp. 

Soren and Annalise sat in silence next to each other on the same log, he sharpening a dagger and she focusing on the small figurine she was whittling. It had been a skill she’d picked up in Murana during the long winter evenings in the dining hall to give herself something to do while she spoke with her aunt and learned of her heritage. 

Annalise savored the bite of the icy forest breeze against her skin and considered it especially sweet because she didn’t know when she’d be able to sit without any protection again. She tried for the hundredth time to not think about what awaited her in Rhinnea. Ambassador Selveg had assured her father that he’d communicated her cursed state to King Nelan, but that felt like a lifetime ago. What if he hadn’t? What if he’d been accosted by more bandits on the road and the news hadn’t reached the capital ? What if the Rhinneans decided that she was sent as an assassin and killed her for it? The questions swirled darkly in her thoughts like the shavings curled around the blade of her knife. 

Soren broke the silence with a sigh. He set his dagger and whetstone to the side, and took her hand in his. Annalise froze and turned to look at him. 

“Come with me,” he said, drawing her to her feet.

She could tell by the frown that marred his face and the intensity of his eyes that he had something to say of grave import, and she followed him as he led her away from the camp and up the short path to the rocky outcropping that afforded a better view of the city below. The night was clear and the moon was nearly full, casting everything in a silvery light. Soren guided them to a smooth portion of the rock.  

The air was thick with tension between the two of them, something that had grown over their travel time. Annalise hated it, hated the discordant energy that buzzed between them, but couldn’t think of a way to end it that wouldn’t leave them both heartbroken. She sat and Soren took the seat next to her, holding her hand in both of his. The moonlight cast a silver sheen over his hair, but there was no disguising the seriousness of his expression. 

“Annalise,” at the sound of her name with no formal title, Annalise almost forgot how to breathe, “I know you don’t want to talk about this but if I don’t say something now, I’ll regret it for the rest of my life,” he said, his voice starting out unsure but slowly gaining strength. “Surely you know how I feel about you, how I’ve felt about you ever since we were small children playing knights and ladies in the sunlit garden in Dovela. I love you, Annalise. I love you like a flower loves the sun, like the tides love the moon, like a bird that loves the wind beneath its wings. It’s not too late. We can sneak away right now, or, if you’d rather, we can wait until first light tomorrow morning. Elsabeth’s already packed your bag, and I can be ready in a handful of minutes. We could go anywhere, could be anything. I can captain a merchant ship, and we can travel the world in search of a cure for your curse, or we can settle down in a sleepy hamlet far away and farm. I’ll work in the fields growing flax and raising sheep, and you can weave it into linen and fine wool. We can be happy together. I swear to you that I will do everything in my power to give you a good life, a happy life, a life full of love and joy.” 

Annalise was tempted. Soren’s earnestness dripped from every word he spoke like a love confession of itself, and turning away from his shining brown eyes, with the lights of the city below reflected in them like a beacon of hope, was the hardest thing she’d ever done. 

“I can’t,” she whispered, but she couldn’t bear to remove her hand from his.  

His hand tightened, and his jaw clenched. “Because of your duty?” 

She couldn’t bring herself to look at him, afraid that if she did, it would break her will and she wouldn’t have the strength to tell him no again, even as her eyes filled with tears. “No, Soren, because I can’t ask that of you. I can’t doom you to a life without touch, without children, without love.” 

“If I’m with you, my life will never be devoid of love.” He pressed her gloved hand to his chest over his heart. “You say that you can’t doom me to such a life, but a future where I can see you every day and know that you’re mine sounds like heaven. I can’t let you follow through with this plan, to spend the rest of your life hidden away by cloth and ivory, a figurehead for a king who only sees you as a pawn in his political intrigues. Tell me you feel the same way, Annalise, and I’ll take you away tonight. We’ll leave it all behind and you can be free.” 

“I can’t.” Try as she might, she couldn’t stop her voice from breaking.  

His voice was low and intent, a shadow growling in the light of the moon. “Then tell me you don’t love me, that you don’t want what I offer to you.” 

Tears slid down her face. “I can’t do that either. You say that you want a future where you call me yours, but you can’t even touch me. What kind of marriage is that? What kind of life for you? You deserve more, my dearest Soren. You deserve a wife you can hold, someone who can host dinner parties for you and teach your children to ride ponies and kiss their bruises when they fall. I can’t do it, Soren. I love you too much to let my curse stand in the way of your bright future and happiness.” 

“Annalise, please…” She could hear the brokenness in his voice as if she’d just taken his heart and shattered it on the icy ground. 

She pulled her hand away from his but felt like she left her heart behind. “No. We can never speak of this again. I am going to my tent, and tomorrow we will meet with the rest of the group and enter Rea. I will marry King Nelan, and you will return to Dovea as the hero you are. I’m sorry if I’ve hurt you, but once you’re back home I’m sure it won’t take long for you to recover and find a lovely woman to share your life with.” 

Soren took a great, shuddering inhale, as if she’d punched him directly in the stomach. “Fine. If that is truly what you want, we will never speak of this again after tonight, but first let me be entirely clear on something.” He leaned forward towards her, so close their icy breaths mingled in the moonlight. “Where you go, I go. If I cannot be with you romantically, then I will be the wall that protects you from those who wish you ill until my final dying breath. There is no future for me without you in it. My princess, my love, my dear, precious Annalise, there were no women before you, and there will be none after. If you insist on following this path, then I will be at your side every step of the way, no matter what you do or what you say.” He paused, then lifted his hand to her shoulder, and his gentle caress sent a shiver down Annalise’s spine even through the multiple layers of cloth between them. “Please, Annalise. I beg you, not for my sake, but for yours. If you don’t want to be with me that’s fine, just don’t do this to yourself.”  

“Soren, I wish for nothing more than a future with you.” She reached out and cupped his cheek in her palm, her gloved hand nearly glowing in the bright moonlight. He froze, his entire attention riveted on her. He didn’t say anything; he didn’t need to–his eyes spoke volumes and she hoped that he could read the truth of her emotions in hers as well, everything that she couldn’t confess to him because she was promised to another man with the fate of two nations hanging in the balance. 

“I am an honorable woman and will not shirk my duty, especially when doing so places so many people’s futures and lives, including yours, at risk. Goodnight, Soren.” Annalise paused, so many more words on the tip of her tongue, but she forced herself to swallow them all like the most bitter of pills. Without another word, she withdrew her hand, turned away, and walked down the path back to their camp.