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air.
“It is a sad story,” her aunt said, one corner
of her red-painted mouth curling upward as
she leaned back on her seat carved into a
granite boulder. Her usual place, while they
had these lessons, these long, peaceful chats
deep into the balmy summer nights. “And an
old one.”
Aelin lifted an eyebrow. “Aren’t I a little
old for faerie stories?” She’d indeed just
celebrated her twentieth birthday three days
ago, in another clearing not too far from here.
Half of Doranelle had come, it had seemed,
and yet her mate had found a way to sneak her
from the revelry. All the way to a secluded
pool in the forest’s heart. Her face still
warmed to think of that moonlit swim, what
Rowan had made her feel, how he’d
worshipped her in the sun-warmed water.
Mate. The word was still a surprise. As it