MARK OF LOVE (Lovemark #3)

16. Quilla-1

Chapter 16

Quilla

“s**t, s**t, shit.” Melaina closed her eyes and shook her head, before opening her lashes and frowning at me of all people. “How could you let me tell him that, you worthless cow?”

“Me?”

I probably would’ve started another brawl with her then for accusing me of something that totally wasn’t my fault, but Indigo blurted, “You mean, the only thing you need in order to switch places with someone on Earth and remain there permanently is a simple talisman?”

“No, no, you i***t boy.” Melaina sniffed loftily, forgetting about me for the moment. “A talisman enhances a mage’s power. An amulet protects them from evil, or in this case, the suction of the portal between both worlds. Without the amulet, you’ll get pulled back into the Outer Realms when the pathway closes in a few moon cycles. Of course, you can always reopen it—if you’re a Graykey or a Graykey mate—and return there, but you’ll be continuously sucked back here unless you have a certain amulet to perpetually ground you there.”

“Except it’s dangerous to keep going back to Earth too often,” I put in forcefully, reminding Melaina of that with a hard look because she put herself at risk to visit Taiki, Questa, Quailen, and their families far too often.

She ignored me. “So, yes. There you have it. We’re going to Tyler to find two amulets so we can leave the Outer Realms forever. Congratulations. You’ve just made yourself a liability to us. Now you could tell someone where we went. I guess this means we’ll have to kill you when we leave after all.” She produced a dagger from her cloak and flipped the blade open, adding, “Or I could just take your life right now.”

“Or you could take me with you when you go,” Indigo countered.

I stepped between him and Melaina, where I gave my aunt a dry sigh. “Why would it matter who he told?” I asked. “The only people who could follow us through and harm us are other Graykeys.”

“Like Qualmer,” Melaina spat back. “And don’t tell me you think he’s not still kicking around out there somewhere, hidden under some immaculate and no doubt gaudy disguise. Let’s not forget, the last time I saw him, I tried to murder him. Again. And I failed. Do you honestly think he wouldn’t come looking for revenge if he ever figured out how to open the portal? Besides, can we seriously trust the Graykeys-only part of the portal opening legend? No one was supposed to be able to break their bonded mating to a Graykey either, yet Janicka Godone proved that was possible. We’ll never be safe if we leave with a loose string like him behind.”

When she motioned toward Indigo with a sneer, I shifted another step to block him from her view.

“Which is a non-issue, anyway,” Indigo put in, appearing at my side. “Because you’re not leaving me behind. I’m going with you.”

“No, you’re not,” I spat, sending him an incredulous glance. “You’re not a Graykey.”

“I’m a Graykey mate,” he shot back, with a little too much glee. “Or I will be.” Then he pointed at the mark on the side of his head. “Prove me wrong.”

“That may prove I’m your mate. But you’re not mine. I would have to claim you as mine to truly bind you to me in order for you to pass between worlds. And I’ll never do that.”

He pointed at me as if he was going to say something nasty, but then he shook his head and countered with, “We’ll come back to that later.” He turned to Melaina and announced, “I’m going with you two to Earth.”

“If you were to come with us,” she shot back haughtily, “we’d need to find three amulets, then, and we haven’t found any. Not in the past eight years. And I don’t feel like waiting around long enough to discover a third.”

A spark of guilt shot through me, knowing I probably should tell her about the amulet tucked away on my person, but I couldn’t seem to risk it. Not yet. She was too unpredictable.

Indigo glanced at me then, his brow furrowing slightly, as if he were catching a whiff of my guilt. But then he turned back to Melaina.

“Which is exactly why you need me,” he announced. “Investigating, collecting information, and discovering where things are is literally what I do. I can help you find the amulets.” Lifting his book as if that were proof of his abilities, he said, “Just ask your niece. She read some of my research. If I want something found, I find it.”

“No,” I growled. “No, no, no, no. You’re not helping us find the amulets, because you’re not going.”

“So, what?” He spun toward me, suddenly irate. “You just plan to leave me behind?” Something in his gaze shifted. The anger drained so hurt and betrayal could fill his eyes. “Alone?”

The word alone struck me hard. That was the very reason I was so intent to help Melaina find the second amulet and go to Earth with her. So I wouldn’t be left here alone.

Dammit. How had he known to use that very word against me to argue his case?

Hardening my jaw, I shook my head, refusing to fall victim to his mock pity party. “Alone?” I repeated, lifting a censorious eyebrow. “Give me a break. You were leading an entire kingdom’s army when you came across my path. So don’t try to play on my sympathies with some lonely act. You can go back to being your queen’s right-hand man once I’m gone.”

He stepped toward me, his lips quivering with rage. “Except Queen Nicolette isn’t my true love. You are. You’re my future, whether you want to accept it or not. You’re the only shot I have at getting a truly happy life, and I’m not going to just stand aside and watch you walk off into the sunset without me. We’re in this shitshow together, woman. Until the end. There is no going off anywhere without me.”

With a growl, I stomped my boot on the ground. “God, you sound like such an overbearing caveman right now.”

His eyebrows lifted. “I have no idea what a caveman is,” he admitted, “but they must be pretty damn smart if they think remaining with their partner through thick and thin is a good idea.”

“Jesus.” I threw my hands in the air, beyond frustrated. “Why are you fighting this so hard? Your mark will disappear when I go to Earth, so you won’t feel so connected to me anymore, anyway. You’ll be free.” I waved my hands like a bird flapping its wings. “So just let it happen.”

“Except I don’t want to be free of you because, newsflash, empress…” He moved even closer, towering over me. “I like the connection.”

“You what?” He was so close, I could see golden flecks in his eyes, just as he’d claimed to see some in mine earlier. They sparkled as if they were catching fire from all his heated emotions.

“I don’t want to lose my connection to you,” he repeated, making my pulse flutter rapidly.

I sucked in a deep breath and blinked before wrinkling my nose in confusion. “But why would you want that kind of connection to a complete stranger?”

I couldn’t fathom why anyone would want me that strongly if they did know me, but he’d still basically just met me. I couldn’t mean that much to him.

“Because it’s a security I haven’t had in a long time,” he admitted. “After I lost my parents when I was eight, I only got five years with my grandparents before they too were gone. Then I was shipped off to my uncle Everett’s family, where I only stayed for a couple of years before joining up with King Ignatius’s army as soon as I turned eighteen, hoping to find a place to belong there. But they shipped me off to Donnelly when Princess Allera married Prince Brentley, and then I was assigned to be Nicolette’s personal bodyguard. And yes, she did grow to be my best friend, a sister of my heart, and the closest thing I have to family, so when she became the queen last moon cycle and asked me to be her army’s commander, of course I said yes. What else was I supposed to do? Where else was I supposed to go? I might have plenty of friends, but she was the only thing I had that somewhat resembled family. I would do anything for her, but I don’t want to be a knight forever and fight wars and kill people. I just want to settle down with my true family and solve mysteries.”

He stared at me a long moment after confessing all that. I stared back, not sure what to say.

A second later, his heated feelings drained from him, loosening his shoulders and bringing sad hopelessness to his eyes. “When I first felt a spark in my tattoo, telling me you were near, I was so happy and eager for my connection to you, I was ready to give up everything to follow you wherever you went. And I still am.”

Pressing the heel of his hand to the side of his head and directly over his mark, he watched me earnestly. “This thing tells me I belong somewhere. With someone. I belong with you. I can’t lose you with it there. I can always tell if you’re fine. Or it alerts me if you’re not fine, so I at least know I need to do something to fix that. It tells me that you’re my one shot at getting the best life I could have. And I’m not letting that go. So go ahead, empress. Try to resist it all you want. But I’m not. I’m going to put in all the work I need to in order for both of us to reach our nirvana. Together. Got it?”

Heaviness filled my chest. He had so much faith and hope in his stupid mark; I was almost jealous of his convictions. But then I reminded myself that reality never had such a fairy-tale ending.

The man was clearly delusional.

Except a small part of me wanted to believe him and have the same delusion.

Before that silly part could grow any larger, though, Melaina spoke up, breaking the moment.

“You know,” she said. “If Pallo had ever talked to me like that, even once, he never would’ve had to forcibly marry me and then suppress my compassion, empathy, and kindness, until I cried tears of blood and possibly bled to death from the eyes if I ever got too close to feeling any of those things. I probably would’ve just married him willingly.”

“Jesus,” Indigo breathed, gaping at her in horror. “That’s why you bleed from the eyes?”

“Yes. Now, let’s get back to the topic of these amulets. Just how successful did you say you were at finding things?”

“I said no,” I broke in with a serious frown, pissed that he’d managed to sweet-talk his way to my aunt’s side. “He’s not coming to Earth with us, ergo he’s not going to hunt for amulets with us either.”

Neither of them paid me any attention.

“So there’s this legend…” Melaina started, hooking her arm through Indigo’s and leading him away to sit on some tree stumps near the burnt-out campfire. “It’s been passed down through the Graykey family line that stems back to the original nineteen.”

“You mean the first nineteen settlers who came to the Outer Realms?” Indigo slipped in curiously.

She nodded. “From the old world, yes.”

He nodded too. “Okay, I’m listening.”

“Corandra Graykey was the first to arrive and, if the story can be believed, she was the only one with any magical abilities.”

With a snort, Indigo shook his head. “Of course that’s how the story would go in a Graykey family legend. Leave it to them to give their ancestor the only one with powers.”

“Possibly.” Melaina shrugged. “But anyway, back in the old world, Corandra was murdered, hanged from a large oak tree, I believe.”

“Oak?” Indigo furrowed his brow. “But there’s no such thing as an oak tree.”

Melaina laughed. “Not in the Outer Realms, that’s for sure. Because seriously, why would she allow the very tool that killed her to inhabit the new world she created after that?”

“She actually died then?” he asked skeptically. “So how was she able to create a new world in the first place if she was dead? Are you saying the Outer Realms is just a product of her imagination? We’re just puppets playing in someone else’s afterlife?”