fell on his back.
Safi fell on top of him, chests colliding. Merik oomphed—as did she—and emitted a pained moan.
“What?” she demanded, trying to push off of him. Her hand was stuck beneath him and each yank jostled her body against his.
Heat flamed through her. She’d been close to Merik yesterday—during their brawl—yet this felt … different. She was all too aware of Merik’s shape. Of the angle of his hip bones and the muscles in his back—muscles that her fingers insisted on digging into. By accident. Completely by accident.
Safi was also keenly aware of Evrane laughing and Iseult gawping in a most un-Threadwitch way. But before Safi could order them to help, Merik rolled up his head, and his stomach clenched against hers. “Get. Off. Me.”
His growl rumbled through Safi’s rib cage, yet she had no chance to snarl back, for Evrane’s chuckles broke off—and the sound of creaking wood reverberated through the clearing.
Twenty arrowheads peeked out from behind the sun-bleached pines as Iseult murmured, “Oh, Safi. He did say to be quiet.”
THIRTY
Merik had expected the soldiers with bows—he really had. What he hadn’t expected was that it would take so long for their leader, Master Huntsman Yoris, to call them off.
Or that Safiya fon Hasstrel would be on top of him while he waited.
Iseult and Evrane—his aunt’s hood pulled low—stood with their backs against the cave and their hands up, and Merik did everything he could to pretend he wasn’t pinned beneath Safiya. That his legs were not twined in hers, that his chest was not heaving against her much softer chest, and that those were not her nails scratching at his back or her storm blue eyes mere inches away.
It was her eyes that always did it—that pulled the rage to the surface. But he wouldn’t let his magic loose, no matter how much it ached for release. No matter how much he wanted to flip Safiya over and …
Noden save him.
A groan stirred in the back of Merik’s throat, and he prayed the earth would swallow him whole.
Safiya mistook his distress for laughter. “Do you think this is funny? Because I’m not laughing, Prince.”
“Nor am I,” he answered. “And I told you to be quiet.”
“No, you told me to push. Which I did—except that you fell. Where was your wonderful Windwitchery then?”
“I must’ve left it onboard the Jana.” Abdomen tightening, he lifted his face close to hers. “Right next to my patience for your constant harping.” As long as he stayed angry, he wouldn’t have to think about the shape of her mouth. The weight of her hips pressing into his.
Her eyes thinned. “If you think this is harping, you’re in for quite a treat—”
“Your Highness?” a voice boomed. “Is that the royal son of Nubrevna I see cozying up to a lady? Lower your weapons, boys.” As one, the arrows in the forest dropped. Merik immediately shoved Safiya off him and scrambled to his feet.
As soon as Safiya was also upright, Iseult and Evrane moved in close, their stances defensive while Yoris’s “boys” trickled out from the forest with their leader at the fore.
Yoris was a lean man with only three fingers on his left hand—supposedly he’d lost the others to a sea fox.
“’Matsi scum.” Yoris sucked his teeth in Iseult’s direction. Then he spat at her feet. “Go back to the Void.”
Iseult barely managed to grab Safiya before she lunged. “I’ll show you the Void,” Safiya growled, “you hell-ruttin’—”
Six of Yoris’s soldiers trained their bows on Safiya—and more arrowheads materialized from the dead pines.
Merik’s hands shot up. “Call them off, Yoris.” This was not the happy reunion he’d hoped for with one of his childhood idols.
“Arrows won’t save your skin,” Safiya muttered. “I’ll shred it with my kni—”
“Enough,” Iseult snapped with more emotion than Merik had ever heard. “His Threads are harmless.”
Safiya clamped her mouth shut at that—though she still moved in front of Iseult.
“Lower your bows,” Merik ordered, louder now. Angrier. “I’m the Prince of Nubrevna, Yoris—not some raider.”
“But who’s this, then?” Yoris tipped his head toward Evrane—who still had her cloak tugged low and body poised for action. At Yoris’s nod, a soldier extended his bow and flicked back her hood.
“Hello, Master Huntsman,” she drawled.
“You,” Yoris growled, shoving past Merik. “The Nihar traitor. You aren’t welcome here.”
Evrane’s sword rasped free at the exact moment that Merik yanked out his cutlass—and thrust it against the old man’s back.
“If you slander anyone else in my party, Master Yoris, I will run you through.” Merik prodded