Chapter 28 #2
He swallowed. Then, grabbing the blankets, he pulled those up around her instead, careful to tuck them close against her body while keeping his own arms on the outside. But he felt fully conscious of the delicate shape of her underneath, pressed up against his own unbuttoned torso.
He remained like so for what felt like a long while.
The light from the thaumatic bulb seemed overly harsh, so he leaned over at one point and yanked the chain, plunging the room into gloom.
He sat a while longer, the silence broken only by Luna’s agonized breathing and the hiss and pop of the radiator.
Darkness seemed to close in, tighter and more inescapable by the minute.
He closed his eyes rather than look at it.
Finally, his lips moved, whispering into the silence: “I love you.”
The words slipped out from him like a confession: simultaneously guilty and sacred.
He loved her.
Had loved her from the very moment he first set eyes on her.
Oh, he could argue that it was just her beauty which affected him so profoundly. That powerful attraction had addled his senses. Nothing more.
But he knew the truth. It was far more than mere outward appearance which struck him in that life-changing instant.
It was more like recognition than anything—an understanding that went beyond conscious thought, beyond reason or logic.
As though the song of his soul heard the song of hers and recognized there a harmony it was always destined to find.
Love at first sight? Ha! Not long ago he would have mocked the very idea.
But that was before.
Before he met Luna Talbot.
Before he realized the truth.
“I suppose that’s it then,” he murmured. Closing his eyes, he rested his cheek against the top of her head. “I love you. And I need you to live. Not because I need you to love me back, no. No. I just need you to be happy. Whole. Safe.”
How could he ever have mistaken what he’d felt for Jastira with this?
How could he have believed that grasping, desperate, controlling lust had anything to do with real love?
He’d been so focused on keeping her, on pleasing her, on making himself into something she would deign to favor with her kisses and attention.
But it had been entirely about his desires. His need to keep her in his life.
That wasn’t how he felt about Luna.
Yes, he needed her—needed her with every fiber of his being. It was just that his needing didn’t matter all that much anymore.
Nigel turned his head, let his mouth rest against her hair.
He didn’t kiss her. He couldn’t do that.
Not without her knowing, without her wanting, without her asking.
It would be wrong. So he simply leaned his mouth against her and breathed in the chamomile-lavender scent which clung to her even now, underneath the funk of fever and sickness and sweat.
Then he lifted his mouth a fraction and whispered, “Please, Miss Talbot. If you care about me at all, even a little . . .”
He couldn’t finish that sentence. To finish it would be to acknowledge the fear even now gnawing in his gut.
He wasn’t brave enough for that. He’d faced down the Shadowbane Lady at the height of her power.
He’d peered into the roiling depths of the Dire Dimensions, commanded demons with a word, even as they sought to rip his very soul from his fleshly frame.
Those things and more he’d done without batting an eye.
But this? This was true terror. And he trembled before it.
“Please, Miss Talbot,” he whispered again, rocking her gently in his arms. “Please . . . please . . .”
Chantry bells began to ring. Far away—twelve strokes.
Somewhere, the Green Yule’s Eve service was reaching its crescendo as worshippers ushered in the holy day with songs of praise and thanksgiving.
Nigel ought to be there himself. Standing in the pews, hymnal in hand, alongside his smiling, singing employee, who’d invited him to join her. That’s how it should be.
Instead, here they were. Together. His arms wrapped around her as she shivered and burned and shivered again.
And as the bells rolled out their song, distant and haunting and yet, somehow, full of power, Nigel bowed his head and did something he couldn’t remember doing in all the years of his life. He prayed.
“Green Mother,” he whispered, the words uncertain on his lips, “she is Your faithful servant. If ever a soul deserved Your mercy, it is she. Save her, Green Mother. Heal her body. I beg of You. Heal her, and I’ll . . . I’ll . . . I’ll do anything.”
No answering voice fell from heaven. The far-off chantry bells tolled out their last notes and died away in soft echoes, leaving the garret room silent and close and dark.
Then, suddenly, Luna’s hoarse voice whispered close to his ear: “Merry Green Yule, Mr. Grimm.”
Nigel’s heart leaped. He looked down at her, drawing away a little to try to see her face in the near-darkness. “Miss Talbot?” he gasped. “Miss Talbot, do you know me?”
She tilted her head back a little. In the dim glow of moonlight eking its way through both clouds and the grimy window, he saw her glassy eyes gleaming in her pale face. Her lips, dry and cracked, moved. “Sing to me.”
“What?”
“Sing ‘In the Still of Winter’s Night.’ For Green Yule.” She sighed heavily and rested her head back on his shoulder again, shuddering in his arms. “It’s my favorite.”
Nigel grimaced. But he’d promised the Green Mother anything, hadn’t he?
He placed a hand on Luna’s forehead, feeling the heat of fever radiating out from her, and wracked his brain for memories of song lyrics, of Green Yules long ago, never celebrated, barely acknowledged.
But the words were there. Woven into the fabric of his life.
And, for the first time, on this dark, dreadful night, he felt the need for them.
“In the still of winter's night,
Where the frost begins to play,
Like a whisper of love, a gleam of light
Hails the hope of dawning day.
Hear our laughter fill the air,
As the snowflakes gently fall.
Together we will rise and share
Green Yule Spirit to one and all.”
His voice was nothing much. He could carry a tune; that’s the most that could be said for his singing.
But he thought he saw Luna’s mouth curve in the smallest, faintest of smiles.
By the time the last words fell from his lips, she seemed to be sleeping, and—dared he hope it? —breathing a little easier.
Nigel gently tucked a strand of limp hair behind her ear. Then, closing his eyes, he rested his cheek on the top of her head once more.
“Merry Green Yule, Luna,” he whispered.