Page 85 of Broken Hearted
I raised my hand, a breath away from freezing her like I did her mother when Adrien grasped my fingers, staying me.
“Let me?” he asked.
Anger and fury swirled in the depths of his teal eyes. She had done the worst to him after all.
I nodded.
Elisana sensed her impending doom and took off running, heading for the back of the aisle while holding her bleeding shoulder, but Adrien’s shadows were faster.
She hit the shadow wall and tried to change course, but he blocked her in on all sides, giving her nowhere to run. She spun to face us, her chest moving up and down with rapid breaths.Her eyes filled with fear as she watched Adrien walk down the aisle toward her. As she watched death coming for her.
When Adrien reached her and glared down at her, I didn’t feel even a flicker of remorse. She had brought this upon herself. This was the reckoning that she deserved.
“There is nothing I can think of that is more evil than forcing your will on another,” Adrien said, his voice as cold and sharp as one of my ice spears. “You deserve to be ripped apart limb by limb.”
Elisana whimpered, cowering before him.
“But I’m a decent man, and so I’ll offer you a quick death.”
Elisana’s head snapped up and in an instant the fear melted off her and her face sharpened into a hate-filled mask. Screaming, she lunged for Adrien with her fingers bent like claws, but she didn’t reach him before his shadows consumed her.
One second she was there, the next she was eaten by darkness. There were screams and the sound of a struggle, but then the shadows disappeared.
Elisana was dead, collapsed on the floor, face blue like the oxygen had been taken from her lungs.
I sighed in relief as Adrien turned to me and we took stock of what threats were left.
Some witches at the back of the theater were being chased out by Dawn and Zander. There were a few lying dead in the surrounding area, but everyone else seemed to have fled.
“I will never give a witch my blood again,” Zane declared, which caused Adrien to smile slightly.
I stepped closer to him, needing Adrien to see me fully and hear what I was about to say.
“I thought I was going to lose you,” I told him as he pulled me into his arms. “I thought you would die, or be forcefully married off to another without knowing how I truly felt.”
He stepped back and peered down at me with an adoring gaze as he stroked my cheek. “And how do you feel, Isolde?”
I took a deep breath. “I love you. I can’t imagine being without you, and I think love is enough. Our love is enough.”
A huge grin graced his face and he pulled me in for a toe-curling kiss.
Dawn whooped and clapped as I smiled against Adrien’s mouth.
When Adrien drew back, he peered down at me. “Does this mean you’re not afraid of marriage anymore?” He sounded hopeful.
“Not with you. In fact, I can’t imagine spending one more moment not married to you,” I declared. “Marry me? Right now?” I begged.
He looked around at the flower-decorated altar and then to the dead bodies on the ground. “Hmm, this place wasn’t quite what I envisioned for us.”
I laughed.
“Hey, there is a waterfall down here,” Dawn called out. She was at the top of the amphitheater steps, looking down on the canyon.
A short ten-minute hike later we all stood at the base of a small pool at the bottom of a twenty-foot waterfall. The water that cascaded down from the ledge above was crystal clear and sparkling in the last rays of the dying day’s sunlight. It was breathtaking, and free of the carnage from our battle.
Dawn stood on my right holding a handful of wild flowers and thistles she’d picked on her way down here. Zane stood on Adrien’s right.
Zander stood in front of Adrien and me to officiate the wedding. Since he was the Ethereum lord of this Northern Kingdom, he had the power and authority to legally marry us.
