Page 67 of Keeping a Nymph’s Heart

He held her close again, inhaling deeply as he seemed to choke back his own sob. “How’d you manage to get us here?”

Orla told him about dragging him through the border and getting the hippogryph to fly them to his mother’s cabin, updating him on the past several days and the vigil she kept over him. When she told him that it had been a week since they arrived, he let out a low whistle.

“It takes a while sometimes. The healing.” He rubbed his face in her hair again, seeming to relish in the fact that they had both somehow made it through their ordeal. “That’s not even the longest it’s taken me. Once, it took a full fortnight for me to regain consciousness, and even longer before I could walk.”

She couldn’t imagine what she would have done if he had stayed unconscious for that long. Probably gone mad with worry.

“What happened?” she asked.

“Hmm?”

“When you were unconscious for that long. What happened?” Owain released a sigh, muscles tensing as he thought.

“How about I make you some tea, and I’ll tell you.”

Chapter Forty-Six

They sat across from each other on the small circular kitchen table, neither one of them speaking as they looked down at their cups of lavender tea. Owain didn’t know where to start. He hadn’t told Orla the full truth because a part of him feared her rejection. He had never been wanted in his life, not really.

His mother loved him, but her life would have been easier if she hadn’t fallen pregnant by his father. His father had never wanted him at all, choosing to ignore his existence until he was five. Owain’s life was a litany of being reminded that he was not good enough. If he bore himself to Orla and she rejected him, he didn’t know what he would do.

Finally, after a long moment of silence, Owain began to speak.

“At the hot spring, before the hellhounds showed up, you asked me what things you still didn’t know.” Orla nodded in acknowledgment.

“I haven’t been fully honest with you about what led me to Imsil. Yes, it’s true I was tasked with killing you. Aengus was supposed to go but he died before he could do it himself. But it was my idea to reach out to the palace and have you requested as our guard. I told myself that it would be easier to kill you if I was around you more, but that wasn’t the full truth. Really, I wanted to get to know you. To see for myself if you were as vile as everyone in Edam says, because that wasn’t how I saw you, and I had to know if I was right about you.” At last, Owain looked up from his tea to gaze at Orla. Her brows were knitted in confusion.

“Right about me?” she questioned.

“You know I was there that day at Fontina.” She stiffened at the mention of the place. Her eyes creased with what Owain could only assume were conflicted emotions about his role in Rhyan’s death.

He continued. “I was sent to protect Gwayne’s back. I wasn’t Edam’s best warrior, but my father knew I would do anything to get his respect, including protecting my vicious brother. He wanted me to use my power to protect him. So I did what I was told. I kept the weather warm to put the Emmentalian army at a disadvantage. I fought at his back for much of the battle, prepared to heal him if any harm had befallen him. But then I saw you.” Owain shifted in his seat as he recounted that day.

“Of course I had heard of you. Even in Edam you had become a legend at that point, but I had never seen you. Seeing the way you fought, the way you moved, was nothing short of mesmerizing. Hells, I was so caught up in seeing you that I stopped moving all together. The middle of a battlefield, and I was standing stock-still like a fool. I was so enraptured by you that I didn’t see Gwayne move on you until it was too late. He was at your back, ready to strike, and that’s when I released those bolts of lightning. I panicked. I had only glimpsed you for mere moments, and I knew I was in the presence of a goddess. How could I watch as my worthless brother ended the life of someone so powerful and bewitching?”

Orla continued to peer at him, her face unreadable.

“When I released the lightning, you froze, and it was the first moment I actually got to see your face. I was struck dumb. In that moment, I knew I would follow you to the ends of the earth if you’d only let me. But Gwayne took advantage of your hesitancy and made to strike you from behind. Rhyan was there. He blocked his blow but lost his own blade in his haste to defend you.

“That lightning strike was never meant to distract you; it was meant to distract Gwayne. But the result was the same. Rhyan died because of my actions, and you can never know how truly sorry I am that I caused you that pain.” Owain’s voice cracked as he looked into Orla’s eyes. Tears shone in both their gazes. “I saw the look of devastation on your face when you realized he was gone, and then I felt it. My body was ripped apart by thorns the size of branches.”

Owain remembered that moment, staring at Orla’s face twisted in pain as she screamed over Rhyan’s lifeless body.

“I should have been afraid. I was bleeding so much and in so much pain I thought I would die right there on that battlefield. But I wasn’t afraid. I looked at you and the destruction you had caused, and I thought I was gazing upon the face of Amara herself. I did the only thing I could think to do when looking upon the face of a goddess. I prayed. Prayed that you would take me with you wherever you would go. I knew that if you held dominion over my next life that it would be an honor to follow you into the abyss. I would be your most faithful worshiper if only to have the pleasure of being near you. As soon as I had the thought everything went black.”

“I’m no goddess, Owain,” Orla whispered, shifting uncomfortably in her seat.

“Maybe not literally, but you are no less worthy of adoration. And no less divine.” The corners of his mouth turned up in a small smile.

“Then a fortnight later, I woke up, my wounds nearly all healed. Everyone was saying what a monster you were. That you killed your own men just to defeat us. Just for glory. But that wasn’t what I remembered. I remembered your pain and your grief. I remembered the tender way you held Rhyan as he died. So when it came time to end your life, I had to know. Maybe I dreamed all those things about you, and you really were a monster. But nothing could be further from the truth. You were more than the person I saw on that battlefield. And as I got to know the rich tapestry of who Orla is, I couldn’t help but love you.”

Orla’s breath caught.

“I love you, Orla. I think I have loved you from the moment I saw you on that battlefield. I know I betrayed your trust. I know I have hurt you, but if you let me, I will spend the rest of my long life worshiping you. Cherishing you. And proving to you how sorry I am. If you let me, I will keep your heart in this life and in the abyss beyond.”

* * *

He waited for her to say something. To move. But for what felt like an eternity, she just sat there looking at him. He let out a deep exhale, shoulders slumping as he prepared for her to reject him. But what happened next elated him.