Queen of Blood and Vengeance (Secrets of the Faerie Crown #4)

36. Evander

36

EVANDER

“How do you move in these?” Mya spun to examine the back of her garment in the mirror. “These laces are impossible.”

She’d chosen fitted silver trousers and a flowing blue tunic. The laces at the back were meant to cinch in her waist and accentuate her figure. It was a relatively simple ensemble. But considering Mya’s clothing usually consisted of a woven brassiere and a tail…

“Stop smirking,” she ordered at his reflection. She considered the laces for another few seconds before sighing and turning to face him. “You don’t have any laces.”

Evander finished buttoning the tunic he’d selected. Gaheris had sent his trunk from the seaside estate where he had abandoned it months before.

“No, but I have these.” He buckled the shortsword to his belt. But that was just the beginning.

Mya’s eyes dropped from his, following each motion as he added several daggers to the bandolier across his chest. Then the quiver of arrows and a bow.

“I forget, sometimes,” she said softly. She reached into the space between them, trailing her fingertips across the straps of leather now in place over his chest.

She found an expanse of open chest and covered it with her hand. Evander could not feel her in his mind—he never could—but he recognized the gesture. She was anchoring herself in him. Mya’s ethereal powers allowed her to access the feelings of others. In doing so, she incorporated bits of them into herself. Too much, too fast, could make her lose all sense of herself and her own motivations. Her identity.

Evander breathed in and out, giving her all the time she needed. The growing clamor outside of their tent could wait. Agravayn’s war camp was immaculately organized, but enough soldiers in one place would always be loud—and only seemed to be getting louder.

Mya’s eyes finally opened. She kept her hand pressed to his chest, but her shoulders relaxed and a soft smile turned the corners of her sensuous lips.

“Thank you,” she hummed.

“Always.”

Her smile deepened, her light blue skin flushing slightly across her cheeks. “If you’d been half this accommodating to your own queen and king, they would not have sent you away.” He’d been sent away to assist Gawayn’s brothers with investigating the disappearance of elemental children. But he took her meaning just fine. No one at the elemental court had missed him.

Evander snorted. “Wait until you meet Veyka Pendragon before passing judgement.”

Mya reached for her sea glass crown, leaning down in front of the mirror to adjust her black curls around it.

“I am certain I will adore her,” she insisted.

“You adore everyone.”

“Mostly,” she agreed, straightening. The eclectic mix of blue, turquoise, and white sea glass shimmered softly in the muted daylight the white canvas tent allowed in. “Tell me something about her that you like.”

Evander’s dark brows nearly disappeared into his hairline. “Her Brutal Prince cut off my arm.”

“I did not ask you about him.” Mya reached for her own accessories.

Unlike Evander, she bore no weapons. She’d trained as a healer of sorts, using her ethereal powers to help other Aquarians sort through difficult feelings and learn how to cope with them.

“Your queen,” she prompted as she fastened a string of seashells around one wrist.

“You are my queen,” Evander huffed.

He never tired of watching her. She was singularly unique. Not her pale blue skin, characteristic of all Aquarian fae. Nor the way she adorned herself in the symbols of her home and its denizens. It was her quiet, fluid grace that always captivated him. Even on land, she moved like the sea. Steady. Constant.

She snapped her last accessory into place—a golden medallion that symbolized her office as Queen of the Aquarian Fae—and turned back to face him.

“One thing, Evander.”

He ground his teeth, but couldn’t hear the sound over the din of the camp outside. “She is unbothered by the expectations of others.”

Mya tilted her head to the side. “Interesting. See, that did not hurt quite as much as you thought.”

She patted his shoulder as she walked by. Evander caught her arm, dragging her against him. Mya’s mouth was still curved in a smile when he pressed his lips to hers. He was about to undo every careful preparation she’d made when a body came crashing through the tent flaps.