The King Trials 2: Beyond.

~To Live With and To Live Without~

I breeze in with briskly. 

Kelan closes the door whilst giving me a thorough once over. "....Are you cold?"

"You mean this?" I pinch the flap of the hood that's attached to the oversized cloak. "Not wearing it by choice."

"When I awoke this morning, completed my on-sea routine. Solaris strode back inside our cabin and gawked at me like I was a stowaway, like he did not know me. Only to realise that there was something unrecognisable about me."

I snatch off the hood. I urgently bring all my  tresses to the front in search for the blackened patch. When I find it, I string it all out, the darkened lock that contaminated other strands. Now a sheet of my hair is a terrifying black.

"Solaris lent me his cloak." It even smells of him, if happiness had a smell. Quite like the aroma of a sun-bathed meadow in the summer, sweet with tinges of floral essences.

Alarm frenzies in his eyes, he starts walking backwards, reaching for the door handle. "I know you hold your gripes against Anthia. But perhaps she or her brother can merely examine you, to at least determine what it is that's inside of you."

"No—" I lunge for him. Mustering might, I try to heave him towards me. He doesn't budge. "If Zoar, an immortal with ancient and powerful magic, could not identify it, let alone heal me. Neither could they. Even the Kumentah just aloofly referenced to the malignancy like somehow only I can discover... a cure of some sorts."

He yields and allows me to guide him back. "There must be something I can do—that anyone can do. What if you do not find a worthy remedy—at least not in time?"

Driving earnestness into my words, I say, "I survived plenty. This too I shall overcome," I say purely to console him. "Besides, I am fortunate enough to have people to live for."

Those Cimmerian eyes, the crepuscule of night. His gaze grips me as palpable as his own embrace. He pulls me to him and enfolds me, arms roping round my waist. My entire body tingles with awareness. Every sense attuned to him, the tempo of my heart synchronising with his, feeling every enrapturing pulse.

"Though you were poisoned by a malignancy that was meant to weaken you. You still prevail. I can only hope to obtain half the strength you possess, even at your weakest."

My hand roams his chest. Tantalised by the harmony of his heartbeats. "A strength that you inspire. For you alone are stronger."

His head leans closer, he buries his face in the crook of my neck. "No." His breath shudders across my collarbone. "No, I am far from it. The mere thought of any harm befalling you would... destroy me. Something I could not live with. And you, my queen, I cannot live without."

I clench my eyes shut. I peel them open, the eyes of the night staring down at me, utterly under his thrall. He rests his forehead against my own, his breath ghosts over my lips.

"I cannot promise to a fate that I do not know. But what I can avow to is that I will fight. I will fight for a future I dream of. One that goes beyond the King Trials. A dream to be held by my father once more, to see my sister's smile and even to hear my mother's mithering. I long to reunify with my family but what I desire most—" I incline my head, my mouth nearing his. They graze his warm, plump lips.

He relinquishes himself from me like a beast yanked back by its chain. He looks away, hands balled at his side, the knob in his throat bopping. "Aurora," he utters painfully, his voice dense with emotion. "I—"

I lift a hand to silence him. I can endure much—heights of pain that were even unknown to me. But his constant, nebulous refusal is one I cannot bear.