Tempted by a Rogue Prince (40 page)

She was one of her most beautiful creations.

It had to work.

He released her hands, laying them on her stomach, and pressed one palm to her chest and one to her forehead.

He channelled everything he could into her, doing exactly as he did when he healed wood and earth. The drain on his power was instantaneous, sapping his strength and scalding his bones until he trembled uncontrollably. Darkness crept into the corners of his mind and it began to spin and twirl, his grip on consciousness slipping as he gave everything to Rosalind. Crippling pain stabbed along his nerve endings, making them scream in agony, but he held on, his focus locked on Rosalind and saving her.

Bringing her back to him so they could have their forever.

After everything he had been through, countless centuries of pain and suffering that had driven him mad and killed all hope within his heart, he had finally broken the shackles of his past and had found something good. Something worth living for. He would not let death take that from him.

When darkness swallowed him for a second, it severed the connection between him and nature, halting his work. He had given everything he could and surely he would be rewarded for it. He opened his eyes, expecting to see Rosalind’s smile as she came awake.

She lay still, her chest unmoving, their link still cold, forming an abyss within him that threatened to swallow him whole.

Vail growled, moved both hands to her chest and pressed them against her sodden black dress. Fresh blood pooled around them and crept along the gaps between his fingers. He frowned and funnelled power into her again, using every last shred of it and drawing on all his reserves, giving everything to her until his muscles turned to liquid beneath his skin and his bones to ashes, fire seared his mind and blood poured from his nose.

She still didn’t wake.

Tears flowed down his cheeks and he curled his hands into fists and collapsed over her, resting his head on her stomach, his shoulders shaking as he fought each sob that tried to escape him.

“Little Wild Rose,” he whispered and looked at her face, imploring her to hear him and return to him.

A breeze stirred the trees and the blooms glowed brighter, nature mocking him with their light and how they danced, so alive and beautiful.

He wanted his mate alive and beautiful again.

He had failed her.

The darkness within him was too strong. It had tainted and destroyed his deepest connections to nature, so she would no longer grant him the power to save Rosalind.

But he couldn’t give up on her.

She deserved to live.

She deserved forever in this world.

He didn’t.

If he couldn’t have forever with her, then she would have forever without him. She would live in his place because this world needed her more than it needed him. She was good and light. He was evil and darkness.

He rose off her and stared all around him at the trees. He dug his fingers into the grass and the earth, clutching it in his fists, feeling nature flowing around him.

Life flowing around him.

Rosalind deserved that life flowing through her.

“Please,” he whispered, his lips trembling as tears blazed hot trails down his cheeks. “Hear me. Hear my wish… mother nature. Take my life in exchange for that of my ki’ara. She is more worthy of living in your world and she is connected to you just as I am. I willingly give my life for hers. Destroy me and save her. Please.”

He looked down at Rosalind and blinked, clearing his eyes so he could see her.

“Please.” It had to work. “She deserves life. My beautiful mate.”

Cold swirled around him, chilling him to the bone, and the trees swayed, their light and life still mocking him. Nature was going to deny him, and he would die here anyway, with his mate where he belonged.

“Then take my life anyway, because I do not wish to live without her.”

Heat rushed over him like a tender caress and he looked at the glade.

Plants burst from the grass, growing wildly, their colourful flowers blossoming and withering in the blink of an eye, only to be replaced by another wave of blooms.

Fine mist curled around him and sparkled like a rainbow in the bright glow from the trees that reached above him, their branches stretching towards each other, forming a canopy above him and Rosalind that shut out the darkness.

Vines crawled over his black armour and over Rosalind, twining through her hair. They caressed up his sides and over his shoulders, and tiny blossoms formed on their stems, the same pale blue flowers that grew on the castle in his kingdom. They glowed and their light traced over his body, increasing the heat rushing through him, filling him with strength.

He felt the power flow through him, the connection he had always possessed that had always been stronger than Loren’s for some reason.

Flowers continued to burst into bloom only to die a second later, their fragile hold on life speaking to him as he placed his hands on Rosalind’s chest and tried to give her back what had been taken from her.

He closed his eyes and funnelled all of the power flowing through him into her, using it to heal her damaged heart.

It stuttered back into life and he bit back a sob as it began to beat and she gasped her first breath.

Vail kept channelling everything into her, giving her all of his strength, determined to heal her fully before nature took its toll for the use of her power.

That power dwindled before he could finish his work, his connection with nature fading and the vines covering his shoulders and legs wilting away.

“No.” He tried to grab them but they turned to ashes in his fingers.

Rosalind’s heart beat weakly.

He wasn’t sure how long it would hold on for before it gave out again. He wasn’t sure why nature hadn’t taken the life he had offered. He didn’t have time to question either.

He pulled Rosalind into his arms and focused all of his remaining power on undoing the barrier surrounding the Fifth Realm and unlocking the portal to his rooms in the castle of the elf kingdom. Pain rippled through him, tearing at his muscles and lashing his bones, and he ground his teeth against it and held his focus, forcing his way through the walls that stood between him and where he needed to be in order to save Rosalind.

The barrier gave and it took most of his remaining strength to undo the locks he had placed on the portal to his rooms, sealing the elf kingdom to him. The moment it opened, he teleported, hoping he would have enough power to make it with Rosalind draining him.

He landed hard on his knees on the dark stone floor in a room now unfamiliar to him but painfully familiar at the same time.

Light streamed in through the tall arched windows to his right, where his large bed stood against the dark stone wall. He stumbled onto his feet and carried Rosalind there, setting her down on the dusty purple covers.

He brushed the tangled strands of her bloodied blonde hair from her face, pressed a kiss to her brow when she moaned, and whispered, “I will be right back, Little Wild Rose. I will bring you Olivia and she will heal you.”

She reached for him and he took hold of her hands, pressed a kiss to both, and laid them on her stomach.

Stepping back from her was one of the hardest things he had ever had to do but he forced himself to place the necessary distance between them. Her life depended on his brother’s female and Vail was weak right now, liable to stay here with Rosalind if he didn’t push himself away from her and hold himself at a distance. It would be all too easy to surrender to his need to comfort her and she would slip away from him again. He refused to squander this second chance that nature had given him, this precious gift of his mate and a shot at forever with her.

He focused on the connection to his brother, wobbling on his feet. He had to find him fast, before anyone else discovered that he was in the castle. They would kill him without waiting to hear why he was here. Only Loren could stop that from happening.

And only Olivia could save Rosalind.

He sensed his brother in the great hall.

Vail teleported into the centre of it.

Right into the middle of a grand affair.

The ornately carved white wooden pews of the enormous hall were filled with females and males dressed elegantly in their finest attire, and some of them were not elves. Demons and mortals sat amidst the gathered, along with a few from shifter species.

Vail started down the long wide aisle between the towering black columns that supported the vaulted white ceiling. Light streamed in through the tall arched windows that lined both sides of the hall, illuminating the beautiful carvings of nature and life on the black columns, scenes that had fascinated him as a youth.

Each silent step pulled him back further into his past, to a time when he had walked this same path with his head held high and pride in his heart as all around him had turned to admire him and had whispered in awe.

A thousand pairs of eyes swung his way, a few startled gasps and fearful murmurs escaping their owners as they settled on him. None admired him now. All feared him. He couldn’t blame them, not when he wore the blood of his enemies on his skin and his armour.

He flashed his fangs at them and looked for Olivia.

She stood at the head of the aisle, wearing a pale blue elven gown with silver metal curves and swirls forming a corset over her torso. Loren stood beside her, dressed in his finest black tunic with rich purple embroidery, trousers and his knee-high boots.

Behind Loren, Bleu growled and called his armour, replacing his formal attire with it. He drew his spear out of the air and ran at Vail.

Vail sensed several guards coming up fast behind him too but he couldn’t move as he stared straight into Loren’s wide purple eyes and felt surprise ripple through him too as he realised something dreadful.

He had just interrupted their wedding ceremony and Olivia’s coronation.

Beside Olivia, the huntress he knew as Sable tossed her flowers, hitched her purple dress up and reached for her friend, and the demon king Thorne stood and reached for her. Intending to teleport both of them.

No. He would not allow them to take Olivia away.

Vail silently apologised to his brother for ruining what should have been a beautiful moment and teleported between Sable and Olivia. He knocked the huntress’s hand away from Olivia, turned and grabbed the female before she could run to her mate. Olivia gasped as they disappeared.

Loren’s bellow of fury echoed through the castle as they reappeared in Vail’s apartments, his rage flowing through the bond between them. His brother would be coming for him.

He didn’t have much time.

He set Olivia down and she shoved him in the chest, knocking him backwards. She swung at him and he barely dodged her fist, his movements sluggish as the last of his strength drained away.

“Listen to me,” he snarled and she hit him this time, her fist connecting hard with his jaw and sending him stumbling towards the bed. He growled and shook his head to clear it, and held his hand up to Olivia. “Save Rosalind.”

She froze mid-swing and her dark eyes darted to the bed and widened. She pulled the skirt of her pale blue dress up, rushed to the bed and checked Rosalind over from head to toe before pressing her fingers to her throat.

“Rosalind,” she whispered and his mate’s eyes fluttered open and slipped shut again. Olivia turned on him. “I need to know something important. Is she—”

Loren appeared with a roar, grasped Vail around the throat and teleported again. Vail didn’t fight him. He let his brother slam him against the stone wall and pin him there, throttling him, and stared beyond him to Rosalind because she was all that mattered right now. His brother could kill him for all he cared, as long as his mate saved Little Wild Rose.

“Can you save her?” he croaked.

Loren looked over his shoulder at Olivia and his grip loosened as his gaze fell on Rosalind. “What is that damned sorceress doing here?”

Vail growled at him for speaking about his female in such a disrespectful manner and Loren turned wide eyes on him, the shock in them increasing.

“No,” Loren whispered and shook his head.

“I need your help, Vail,” Olivia said, speaking over her mate, and pressed a wad of material against Rosalind’s chest.

“Anything.” He stared at his Little Wild Rose, willing her to keep fighting. She was strong. Brave. Stubborn. She couldn’t die.

“You have to answer my next question truthfully.” Olivia looked at him and he nodded. “Is Rosalind your ki’ara?”

Vail stilled and felt Loren’s fierce gaze on him, sensed his curiosity through their link.

He looked back at Rosalind. Brave Little Wild Rose. Beautiful Little Wild Rose.

His mate.

“Yes.”

Olivia smiled. “Have you bonded with her?”

He stilled again and frowned at her. “Why must you know?”

Rosalind moaned in pain, the sound tearing at him, compelling him to shirk his brother’s grip and go to her. He shoved Loren away, earning a growl from his brother, and was by her side a heartbeat later, kneeling on the bed and clasping her left hand.

“I am here, Little Wild Rose. You will be well again soon. I have brought you to Loren’s female. She is a doctor, remember? Your friend. She can save you.” He brushed his free fingers across her brow. It was damp and too warm, burning beneath his touch.

He looked across her at Olivia, silently imploring her to help Rosalind.

“You may have the power to do that yourself if you would answer my question,” she said.

He frowned at her, trying to understand what she was saying. He had no such power. He had tried to heal her and he had failed. Only nature’s power funnelled through him had given her a second chance, and that chance was slipping away while Olivia questioned him.

“Answer her,” Loren growled.

He nodded. “We are bonded.”

“Transfer her injuries to you.” Loren strode across the room and Vail could only blink at him. He could do such a thing? Loren seemed to read that question in his eyes and nodded. “It is a power all mated males have. You can take some of her injuries.”