25. It’s Mutual
It’s Mutual
Faren
In the wee hours of morning, Faren and Mariana exited the Lark with their armor and weapons strapped in place. The night was clear and harsh, with ice beneath their boots and a spray of stars overhead. Cold air stung Faren’s cheeks and burned his lungs, shocking him awake.
Nestled on that corner bench, Faren and Mariana had talked late into the night.
Three rounds had sent him to bed loose-limbed and fuzzy headed.
He hadn’t slept. He couldn’t, what with the echoes of their conversation still ringing in his head—the thrill of her unexpected honesty—and the sensation of her hand on his leg lingering in the recesses of his magic.
As he’d stared at the ceiling in the dark, bargaining with himself for just an hour of rest, all he could do was picture her.
The dazzling depth of her eyes, watching him.
The wry tilt of her head throwing shadows across the feline angles of her face.
The wrinkle in her forehead when she debated whether or not to speak honestly or deflect his prying questions with a joke.
The way the scar on her lip stretched when she smirked at him.
She’d left him with an ache that was more than just captivation or lust. It had felt worryingly, catastrophically like real desire. A heat in his veins that even the present chill couldn’t fully extinguish.
Mariana, on the other hand, was currently as brisk as the weather.
Did she regret opening up to him? Did their closeness in the Lark seem as disastrous to her as it had to Faren?
He tried to ignore it, to focus on their grim task, but as they skirted the old remains of a charred barn on the edge of town, he couldn’t help but ruminate on the meaning of her chilliness.
“Did you sleep?” Faren asked, trying to break through the crust of ice that had formed between them overnight.
Mariana lifted a shoulder in a half-shrug. “A little,” she replied. “You?”
“A little.” The raspiness of his voice belied the lie.
Frozen grass crunched under their boots. It felt strange to leave their horses in the stable, but Mariana had assured him that tracking a Morta was best done on foot.
“The beds were nice though,” Faren commented.
“Sure.”
“You aren’t still drunk, are you?”
Mariana’s brow arched. “What? No. I wasn’t drunk.”
“Tipsy, then?”
“Faren.”
“Because if you were inebriated—in any sense of the word—it would be irresponsible to continue,” he reasoned. “I’d have no choice but to insist we abandon our abomination hunt and return to the warm inn with the cozy beds to sleep it off.”
Catching on, her mouth quirked up. “You Mighty Knights are all the same—soft.”
He opened his mouth, about to make a crude joke.
“—and don’t tell me you’re hard when it counts. It’s too early for cock jokes.”
He raised his palms with mock innocence. “You’re the one who brought up my cock.”
Her mouth dropped open, her gaze fleeing to the old barn, the night sky, anywhere but him.
Faren grinned so hard it hurt. “You’re one to talk,” he teased. “Do you not recall the nooks and crannies conversation in Yar? Don’t get shy on me, now, Maiden Morta Killer.”
She rolled her eyes. “Let’s just focus on our task, shall we?”
“Whatever you’d like,” he purred.
Their silence was more amiable after that, filled with the steady rhythm of their breathing.
Soon, they reached the pinnacle of the hill west of Brine.
The moon was waning, spilling cool light onto the frost-crusted landscape, making everything glitter.
Coppiced hazel trees dotted the sloped field ahead, with the pines of the Western Wood forming a jagged wall in the distance.
Faren suspected the copses would provide adequate cover as they approached the Morta’s hideout.
If the monster was even nearby. He couldn’t for the life of him spot any trace of it. “Do you have a sense of where it’s gone?” Faren whispered.
Mariana rested her palm on the pommel of her sword—Windthorn, he thought with satisfaction. “That way,” she said, pointing.
Faren peered out across the pastureland, seeing no clues. “How can you tell?”
“It’s hard to explain.” Her jaw pulsed. “There’s this slight but insistent tug that comes from my Oath magic, leading me to a…
trace of eeriness that the monsters leave behind.
Sort of like a shiver you get when a cold breeze stirs.
” She squinted. “There’s also the scent of upturned soil, that way.
The unnatural silence, where there should be nocturnal animals chattering.
” She stepped closer, a little in front of him, bidding him to look down her arm at where she was pointing.
“And see that grass there? It’s trampled. ”
It was hard to spot in the dark, but with her help, he saw it: a path in the grass where there was no frost, no illumination of moonlight, too wide for the average deer to have carved.
“What a dreadful thing to be so good at,” he mused.
The wind kicked up, causing a couple strands of her hair to catch in Faren’s stubble. Standing like this—with her back to his front—all he’d have to do to kiss her neck would be to bend down.
Mariana glanced over her shoulder at him, shrugged, then stepped away. “Mastering dreadful skills has kept me alive,” she pointed out. “You, too.”
He swallowed thickly. “Not a complaint,” he said. “So, what now?”
“I can’t tell exactly where it’s hiding,” she said. “We’ll have to approach carefully and see if we can find any signs of movement.”
“You’re the boss, Ana.”
He expected her to roll her eyes again, but her expression turned pensive. “Not Ana,” she corrected. “Not out here.”
The comment saddened him. But there was a distinct difference between the woman warming her feet by her parents’ hearth and the toughened knight out here, tracking a monster.
There was also a difference between the Mariana of now and the one of just four hours ago.
Faren admired the Valiant version, but there was something uniquely alluring about Mariana two ciders in, her smooth skin flushed from the warmth of the pub as she pretended not to notice him fiddling with her hair.
Perhaps it was because she didn’t allow everyone to see that side of her—the soft side. The unguarded side.
But she’d allowed him to see it. And he…wanted to see more.
Without another word, Mariana started down the hill, her steps slow and methodical.
Faren followed, moving just as intentionally.
The grade was steep, the frozen mud uneven, pocked with livestock tracks.
In the icy stillness, it was hard not to make a sound: grass snapped as they cut their path, their armor and buckles clinked, the ends of his cloak wafted noisily in the frigid breeze.
Halfway down the hill, Mariana’s hand went to his breastplate, barring him from walking farther. She tilted her head, listening to—or perhaps sensing—something Faren couldn’t detect. He held his breath and waited, observing her observing the land.
Then, just as abruptly as she’d stopped, she adjusted their course, leading him into a nearby thicket of twiggy hazel trees and thorny wild rose bushes.
“We’ll wait here,” Mariana whispered. “But we need to hide.”
She dropped to her knees, then belly, taking cover behind a pile of half-decayed branches within the copse.
After a beat of hesitation, Faren joined her, propping himself up on his forearms to peer out through the tangle of vegetation.
They had a clear view of the Western Wood and the trampled grass leading into the forest.
Faren let out a slow, silent sigh. The ground was hard, and the edges of his armor dug into his clavicles, hip bones, wrists.
He smelled decaying leaves and tried not to think about all the spiders lurking in the wood pile.
Moisture soon seeped through his trousers and the sleeves of his shirt, chilling his knees and elbows.
He used his magic to diminish the discomfort, but that didn’t address his unease with the task at hand.
“What do we do once it emerges?” Faren whispered. “Observe? Confront?”
“We can’t let it go free,” Mariana said.
“Will we be using that potion you’ve been carrying around?”
“Depends.”
They were lying close, shoulder to shoulder. His gaze slid to hers, and her face was barely more than a shadow in the dark thicket. “On?”
“Trust.”
“Care to elaborate?”
“Mutual trust.”
He loosed a bemused breath. “You’re not giving me much to work with, here.”
She shifted her elbows, adjusting her body on the unforgiving ground. A slice of moonlight cut across her face, illuminating one cheekbone, the side of her nose, a portion of her full mouth.
Without answer, she worried her bottom lip, clearly debating the issue in her mind.
“Is your hesitation about my Oath or about me?” he asked.
“Are you not a product of your Oath?”
He bumped her shoulder with his own. “I like to believe I possess a little more nuance than that.”
She stared into his eyes, as if she could spot the lie if it was indeed somewhere inside him. Her delicate brows pinched together. “Fucking Fates, you really want to know?” She dropped her voice, until even the wind and the rustle of the bare branches surrounding them were louder. “Lord Haron is—”
She coughed—choked. Her eyes widened, watering, and she tried to speak again—but descended into a fit of coughing, which she smothered with her hand. “Fuck,” she muttered, rubbing at her Oath tattoo. “Fuck, I can’t.”
Realization formed in Faren’s chest, crystalizing, making each breath feel jagged. So, she did know something. Something about the Lord that Faren—a Mighty Knight—was not permitted to know.
He had the sinking sense that if he were to learn the secret, it would impact his loyalty and duty.
The thought was unsettling. He had half a mind to play a guessing game with her, to try and suss out the answers, but Oath magic was powerful, and he didn’t want to risk cornering her into breaking her Oath.
He forced a smile, instead. “Not to worry,” he said. “We were bound to find the boundaries of our Oaths at some point.”
Mariana was still coughing, head bowed, back convulsing against the straps of her breastplate. When she looked up at him again, coming out of her fit, there was anger and pleading in her eyes—an enraged sort of apology, as if she were caught between two impossible choices.
The expression did something to him. It was like water breaking through a dam, erasing all trace of the structures of before.
Suddenly, Faren wasn’t thinking about his knighthood, or the Lord, or even the Morta lurking not a mile from where they lay—he was thinking only of the woman beside him. How wrong he’d been about her.
A lock of hair had fallen across her forehead and Faren didn’t think—he reached out, tucking it behind her ear, careful to keep his touch purposeful, so he didn’t irritate her sensitive skin. Her hair was soft, and when his thumb brushed her temple, he found that her skin was soft, too.
His attention slipped to her mouth, to the pale scar that cut from the left side of her nose through the swell of her upper lip.
In the dim, patchwork light of the moon through the hazel branches, the scar was like a silver thread in the dark, leading him.
With a brief flash of longing, Faren imagined what it would feel like against his lips, on the tip of his tongue.
He wondered why he was still resisting finding out.
Mariana did not move a muscle, except to lean—ever so slightly—into the palm of his hand.
Inexplicably inviting. Irresistible. He cupped her jaw more purposefully, using his thumb to tilt her chin up, holding her firm.
The pads of his fingers dragged along the nape of her neck, inquisitive, and her skin pebbled under his touch.
Feeling her respond positively to him—it sent his nerves scattering, his magic flaring, his pulse throbbing.
Why wasn’t she pulling away? Why wasn’t she stabbing him? Why were her goosebumps as flustering as foreplay?
He could feel the heat of her breath on his cheeks, quick and silken, and he was close—so fucking close—to forsaking everything he’d known before this moment just for a taste of her. He leaned a little closer.
Then a great crack rent the air.
Faren released Mariana abruptly, and the two of them looked out at the Western Wood to see the Morta emerging, breaking branches as it stumbled out of the forest like a drunkard.
Faren cleared his throat, trying to clear away the headiness of whatever had just transpired between them, his lips still tingling with want. “Have you decided about the potion yet?” he asked hoarsely.
She shook her head, looking vaguely whiplashed.
“Any tips for fighting this thing? I don’t want to fuck up again.”
That made her crack a smile. “Go for its tendons: wrists, knees, neck if you can.” She rose to her feet. “And get close. It has considerable reach, so it’s not as dexterous up close.”
Faren pushed up off the ground. “Understood.”
Mariana unsheathed her sword. Faren moved for the edge of the thicket, reaching back for Mercy’s hilt—then he paused, waiting for Mariana to make the call to battle. She rolled her shoulders, and with the movement, transformed from Mariana into the Maiden Morta Killer. Confident, vicious, deadly.
As they waited for the Morta to amble in their direction—the direction of town—Faren thought of what he’d learned in Yar, about the Valiant’s request for assistance and the Lord’s callous refusal.
He thought of the dead animals, the broken windows, the missing townsfolk.
He thought of Mariana’s rage, her hatred for his Order, her principled nature, her good heart.
His mission was to gather information, but he realized now that the case he’d been building wasn’t the one he’d been tasked to report. Day by day, fight after fight, he’d been building a case in favor of the woman beside him—and it felt worrying like a case against his own Lord. His own loyalty.
Yet Faren couldn’t ignore the signs. The Lord knew about the Morta.
The Lord had condemned an entire town to ruin.
The Lord sentenced an eleven-year-old girl to almost certain death out of vengeance.
He’d known Lord Haron could be quick-tempered, but how could Faren support a ruler who was willfully cruel to the realm and the citizens that Faren was bound by Oath to protect?
Oderin had bid him to follow his morals on this mission, and here he was, doing exactly that, only to find that they were leading him away from the duty he knew.
Toward Mariana.
“For what it’s worth,” Faren said, “I trust you.” He glanced through the hazel branches at the nearing monster. “But if you don’t trust me,” he went on, “just say the word and I’ll look the other way. You do what you must.”
Mariana stared at him, then nodded, hefting her sword, readying to intercept the abomination’s path. “On my count,” she said.
“On your count,” he agreed.