A Thousand Heartbeats

I woke to the distinct feeling of gentle kisses along my shoulder. I had moved in the night and was facing the dying fire, and Lennox was holding me. I felt the warmth of him across my back, and where his arm wrapped around my waist. I was trying to think of the last time I’d slept so well. I was also trying to remember the last time I’d felt this happy.

Lennox stopped kissing me and buried his nose in my hair, just behind my ear.

“Done so soon?” I asked.

“I’ve finished all my research on your shoulder. I am most intrigued by this spot just behind your ear, so I’m dedicating all my attention to it now. Also, your wrists. They’re next on my list.”

I giggled. “While you’re back there, please feel free to whisper sweet nothings into my ear.”

I felt his lips move ever so slightly forward, his breath tickling my skin. “I have breakfast.”

I bolted upright, turning on him, watching as he moved to lie on his back, hands cradling his head. He seemed so easy, so unguarded. And, goodness, he was handsome.

“Please tell me you have one of those oat things that you threw to me in the woods. Please!”

He hopped up and walked over to where his shirt was. I hadn’t noticed him taking off his belt as well, but it was sitting there, too. He reached inside the pouch and there, wrapped in some paper and twine, were the same bars he’d given me in the woods.

I bounded over. “I’ve been dreaming about these things.”

He smiled. “They’re my favorite.”

He had two and went to hand me both. “Stop. You need one, too.” I bit into it, noting it wasn’t quite as crunchy at the last time. Probably because of the rain. It was still positively delicious. “Is this molasses?”

“Honey.”

“Honey . . . that makes sense. I was thinking about asking our cook to attempt to remake these, but I didn’t even know where to start.”

“I can show you,” he said. “But only if you show me how to hold my stance to do that spin block you do with your sword. Or am I too tall for it?”

“No, you’re not!” I insisted. “Just let me enjoy this first, and I’ll show you.”

He walked around with his bar sticking out of his mouth, which was hitched up into a perfect little smile. He put his hand down on his shirt, touching it in a few places. He did the same to my dress.

He started shrugging back into his shirt, taking a bite and talking around it. “Your dress is still wet on the bottom, but not much. Do you want it?”

I shook my head. “Not yet. Swords first.”

He smiled. “If you insist, Your Highness.”

I licked my fingers, enjoying the last of the food. Unless something fell into our laps, that was all we had left. I stuck my fingers out into the rain to rinse them, and I realized I could see more than I’d been able to last night. I could make out the entirety of the cluster of trees we’d run to when the earthquake hit. I could make out trees and rocks farther away even.

The storm wasn’t done yet, but it was weakening.

I ignored it and went to find where I’d left my sword. “I’m not sure we’ll be able to raise these, but I’ll try for demonstration purposes.”

He stood there, arms crossed, smirk across his face. “If this was your plan all along, I have to applaud you. It’s worked so well.”

“Ha, ha. Idiot. Go get yours, too.”

He pushed off the rock, still smiling. Even the way he walked looked good.

“All right. You stand like this.” I showed him. “Keep your weight on the ball of your foot and then push this way. You let the momentum pull the sword around.”

I did it very slowly, because it was just too tight a space to really move.

Lennox tried, but it clearly wasn’t going to be possible in the cave. “I think I understand the mechanics,” he said, leaning his sword up against the rock near the opening. “I’ll practice with Inigo when I get back.”

As soon as he said it, he froze. It was like a spell had been broken. We both were going to have to make plans for what came next.

I put my sword against the wall as well and walked over to my dress. I pulled it on like a coat, searching the ground.

“Where’s my ribbon?”

Lennox started looking with me, eventually finding it behind the boulder my dress had been sitting on. He handed it to me, looking sad. I started the lacing process, and he stood a few feet back, watching the ground in front of me.

“I’m thankful for Vosino, but I don’t want to go back to Kawan,” he said. “I’d almost rather be alone and build a house in some of the unclaimed land on the outskirts where I could forget all about him, and he could forget all about me.”

“Would he forget about you?”

Lennox shook his head. “Not if he’s alive.”

I tugged the ribbon tight and tucked it into the neckline of my dress. “What if . . . what if you came back with me?”

He smiled. “Your forgiveness means more to me than I can ever say. But in Kadier, I’m a criminal. If I go there, I’ll be tried. And, seeing as your mother is no longer here to dispense mercy, we both know what will happen to me.”

I winced, unable to stomach the thought.

“What if we didn’t give them your name? Or what if we told them you defected?”

“If I was cleaned up, it’s possible Dear Nickolas wouldn’t recognize me, but it’d be risky. And, even if he didn’t, how could I do that? Live in your comfortable palace while the rest of my people are left in hiding? Live under your father’s reign when I should be free in it?” He shook his head. “Annika, believe me when I say I want to be wherever you are more than anything. But I’m no coward. I can’t leave them behind.”

I looked down. “You’re right. I wouldn’t ask that of you.”

“Besides,” he said, coming closer. I felt myself relax when his arm wrapped around my waist. “I am the only one attempting to keep Kawan in check. If I don’t go back, whatever comes next will be barbaric.”

I leaned my forehead into his chest. He couldn’t promise another attack wouldn’t come; no one could. I was thankful that he would at least be able to try.

“What if . . . what if you came back with me?” he offered.

I looked up at him, wishing more than anything that I could. “I don’t know who has lived or died. If my brother has died, I’m heir apparent. If my father has also died, I’m queen.” He stared at me for a moment, not having considered this. “If I don’t go back, the kingdom goes to Nickolas. Trust me, no one wants that.”

He swallowed hard. “You’re going to marry Nickolas, aren’t you?”

I nodded. “In Kadier, he’s my only choice.” I looked to the ground, finding myself wildly jealous. “You have someone waiting for you, too.”

“It’s not the same,” he insisted quietly.

The tears were close to breaking through, but then I noted something on his shirt. “Do you have a dog?”

He looked down, taking in the strands of gray fur on his shoulder. “No. I have a fox. Her name is Thistle.”

“Thistle? I love that. How do you even tame a fox?”

“Well, it’s not as if she’s a pet,” he stressed. “We’re not allowed to have any; they take resources from the livestock. But I found her as a kit. Her paw was injured, and I treated her. She’s very smart. I leave my window open so she can come and go as she likes.” He shook his head. “Gray foxes are nocturnal. I can’t tell you how many nights she’s come in only to run around my room, knock things over, and then just hop out the window again.”

I chuckled. “It must have been hard to leave her and not explain.”

“It’s hard to leave even when you can.”

Wordlessly, a lifetime’s worth of conversations were happening. While I kept hearing heartbeat upon heartbeat, I wondered if he could hear every fiber of my body screaming that I loved him.

I wanted to say so. I wanted him to be able to wrap himself in it like I could with his cape. But some part of me worried that if I let those words out, they would make cuts that may never heal.

I knew that he felt something . . . but I didn’t want to back him into a corner with my affection. And then, as if the Island was telling me to just let go, I heard the rain come to a stop.

It changed the sound of the cave entirely. I could hear him breathing now, it was so quiet.

We stood there for a moment, a whisper apart, simply watching each other. Finally, Lennox looked at the crack in the rock, at the picture of a world outside coming into focus.

“Am I a coward for suggesting we stay here?” he asked.

I shook my head, smiling sadly. “Not a coward, but also not a realist.”

He nodded. “If we must go, is it better to part ways of our own will rather than wait for someone to discover us?”

“I think so,” I replied. “I don’t want a soldier finding me with you. I don’t know if I’ll be able to stop them.”

His lip trembled like he might cry. Before he could, I moved in, kissing him. I threw my arms over his shoulders, keeping him close. If his laughter brought on a thousand heartbeats at once, this kiss was a thousand goodbyes.

I pulled back, tears stinging. I had to make myself go now or I never would. I moved away, brushing the dirt from my dress for something to do.

“Wait,” he said. Lennox pulled a small knife from his waistbelt. He carefully reached up and cut part of the tie from his cape, the tassel swaying as he moved.

“What are you doing?” I protested. “That’s your father’s!”

He reached out wordlessly, tying it around my wrist. Not just tying, but looping the strand over itself. “I hope you still sleep with my cape sometimes, but this is much easier to carry around,” he said.

I held out my hand, marveling at the dark fabric against my skin. I had stores upon stores of jewels back in my palace, but I’d never loved a bracelet more. I smiled up at him.

“My turn,” I said, reaching down and pulling at the lace around the hem of my dress with my teeth. I looked up, watching him swallow hard.

“You don’t have to . . .” His words were cut off as I pulled out his dirt-covered wrist. I looped my bracelet around itself as many times as the lace would allow, grateful that he let me, grateful for this beautiful tradition that he shared with me.

He let out a slow breath, staring at the lace, looking awed.

“By the way, did you have that switchblade on you the whole time?”

He looked down at the tiny object in his other hand, confused by the question. “Yes. Sorry,” he added, shaking his head. “I should have given it to you to use.”

“No,” I said. “We laid down our swords because we couldn’t swing them in here, but you could have attacked me from the start. And you didn’t.”

He smiled down at me and finally shrugged. “You had a hold on me from the second you left a scar on my chest. What can I say?”

“That was the moment?” I asked in shock.

He nodded.

“You’re insane,” I told him.

“You’re perfect,” he replied.

I was very close to losing my will to leave him.

“I have to go,” he said, reading my mind. “If I don’t soon . . .”

“I know,” I told him. I held up my wrist, the tassel swinging like a charm. “Thank you.”

He held up the dingy lace on his. “Thank you.”

I walked over, picking up my sword and looking back into the depths of the cave. The footsteps from where we’d danced, the remnants of a tiny fire, the markings I couldn’t understand on the wall. I wanted to remember it just like this for the rest of my life.

Lennox looked out from the thin opening, surveying the area. “If you go north, you should make it back to where you docked.” I nodded, hoping that someone would be waiting for me. “Annika . . .”

“Yes?”

He took a deep breath, struggling to look me in the eye. “I have to assume another battle will come. If that happens, and if we lose, can you promise me something?”

“Of course.”

“The dance I taught you. I want you to share it with others. I just want something of my people to live on if we don’t. Will you promise me?”

I drew in a shaky breath. “I promise. And if this battle comes, and we lose, I beg you to let people—especially the commoners—leave peaceably. I want my people to live on, too.”

“I give you my word. And . . . don’t forget this,” he said, pointing back to the cave. “Don’t let time convince you it didn’t happen.”

“Or you.”

Lennox looked deep into my eyes one last time and bent to kiss me. His hand was laced in my hair as he stood for a moment with his forehead against mine. After a shaky breath, he pulled away, taking one last look, and started walking south. I watched him for a moment, clutching the bracelet against my wrist with my other hand, and then I turned, too, trying not to cry.