20. Chapter Twenty Rhea
Chapter Twenty: Rhea
T he guard comes again the next night, and the next, until a week has passed of him visiting. I want to be embarrassed that I’m just now learning how to play what appear to be children’s games, but instead I find myself confused . Why does this guard want to spend time with me? The question gets louder in my mind each time we sit across from each other, and as a result, I find it difficult to speak at all around him. He isn’t bothered by it though, and the same is true for right now.
I nervously chew on my lip, a move his eyes get drawn to briefly before he turns his attention back to our game. Today, we are playing something called checkers. The board is a pattern of alternating black and white squares, and the pieces are circular and of the same colors. He contemplates his next move, elbow resting on the bent knee in front of him—no armor in sight.
Feeling awkward about the silence, I blurt out the only thing that comes to mind. “Why aren’t you wearing any armor?” My cheeks heat, but I keep my gaze on his and hope that the light of the torches behind him aren’t bright enough to reveal how flushed I am. “I just mean that if you’re the new night guard, shouldn’t you be wearing your armor?”
“Actually, I am not the new night guard,” he answers with a shake of his head. “I’m the new day guard. The old one got moved to the overnight position.”
I frown slightly in confusion. “If you aren’t working right now, then why are you here?” He chuckles as he watches me, making my confusion only grow as I wonder what he might find funny about what I said.
“I’m here because I want to be,” he replies, a broad smile gleaming back at me. My eyes narrow suspiciously, and his chuckle grows into a rich laugh. Annoyingly, I find that I like the sound. I should interrogate him again on why he’s here, or how he is even getting in the tower if it’s currently being guarded. But that isn’t what I ask.
“And are you— Have you been told what happened to the former night guard?” My voice is shaky—not from nerves this time, but from the mention of Alexi. The always-lingering sadness within me rushes to the forefront, mixing with my guilt until I’m overwhelmed and working my lower lip between my teeth once again.
His gaze drops down to my mouth, a slight frown forming the longer he looks. “Yes,” he answers hesitantly. “I know he was punished for stealing from the king.”
Sharp anger floods my veins as my teeth absentmindedly bite down harder on my lip. Lies. Just thinking about how the king painted the false story, that Alexi was the kind of man that would take from others, makes me feel sick to my stomach.
“You might want to stop chewing so harshly on your lip,” the guard says with a grimace, cutting into my thoughts.
“What?” I snap, my mind still reeling at the idea that everyone believes Alexi was the type of man who deserved to be punished by death.
“Your lip is bleeding.” A concerned look crosses his face as I bring my fingertips to my mouth, wincing when I see the small amount of blood coating them. In my anger, I hadn’t felt the tooth break through. “Do you have a cloth and warm water inside?” My brows knit together in confusion, and his mouth twists into a smirk before he answers my unspoken question, “So I can clean up your lip.”
“I can do it myself.”
“Let me help you,” he urges, lithely coming up to stand and extending a hand out to me.
Those four words widen the small fissure in the cold fortress around my heart, turning my breaths sharp as I stare at him. Let me help you. Has anyone ever offered that to me before? In any context?
My hesitancy doesn’t go unnoticed, and he quips, “Something tells me you don’t like having others help you.”
I snort at his assumption and reply, “My circumstances haven’t really led to many offerings of help to begin with.” I gesture around me like he’s forgotten that I’m no more than a woman imprisoned.
“I can stay out here and clean it if I make you uncomfortable.” His words are excruciatingly gentle, like how you would speak to an injured animal so as not to spook it. I wonder if that’s what I am to him.
“You don’t make me uncomfortable,” I respond, rolling my shoulders back as I tilt my face up. His lips widen into an almost-full smile, and gods help me, my heart lurches at the sight of it. The magic inside me responds as well, curling and coiling in what feels like excitement. I take his hand, allowing him to pull me up and trying to ignore the way his skin feels against mine. I let my hand linger a moment too long in his, or maybe he holds on to it a moment longer than he should, before we let go and I walk through the doorway. He doesn’t move to follow, and when I turn back to look at him, I realize he is waiting for permission to. “You can come in,” I say quietly. It’s an interesting thing, to invite someone into my space for the first time. Alexi was always welcome, but in the beginning, he showed up without me asking him to.
The guard looks around slowly. At what, I’m not sure since the room is mostly empty with the exception of a few plants and pieces of furniture. I leave him there to make my way up the stairs and grab some washcloths. I note Bella on the bed, mostly tucked under the covers with her head just barely peeking out.
“It’s okay,” I whisper to her as I grab two cloths before I head back down the steps, my bare feet nearly silent on the metal. When I step off the stairs, I bump into the guard, whose dark figure blends almost entirely into the shadows. Only the small amount of moonlight coming in through the balcony doors glints off of his face.
“Whoa,” he says, hands coming to grip my elbows gently. “Are you okay?”
My hands grab onto his forearms to steady myself. “I’m sorry, I didn’t see you in the dark,” I rasp out. It’s his touch under my fingers, rather than stumbling into him, that squeezes the air from my lungs.
“Do you not have flame gems?” he inquires.
I cock my head to the side, my hair sliding across my back with the movement.
“What is a flame gem?” Though I can’t really see it, I can sense the guard’s eyes on me, even in the scant light.
He drops one of his hands from my elbow and uses the other to guide me towards the couch as he asks, “What do you do for light at night?”
“I light candles. Is that not what everyone else does?”
“No,” he answers softly, stopping us right in front of the tea table. “In the castle, there are flame gems that go in lamps and chandeliers. The sunlight charges them during the day so that they glow at night. One medium-sized gem would light most of this entire tower.”
“Oh.” A wave of humiliation rushes over me, followed by one of recognition. I had heard about flame gems—in some of the books I’d read. I didn’t believe they were real.
“The gems are rare to come by nowadays. They were easier to mine before the war and before the Spell was put in place. They come from the mountains of the Fae Kingdom.” He speaks tentatively, but I can’t help but hear the pity in his voice. I had never really thought about how I might not have the same basic amenities as the castle I’m attached to. I mostly focused on the larger things I wasn’t experiencing. Alexi certainly never mentioned anything about what I may be lacking in this tower. “Do you have something we can put water in?” he asks. I nod my head then realize he probably can’t see it in the dark.
“Yes, I have a bowl.”
“Perfect, can you grab it while I light these candles? I’d prefer to see your face while I work,” he adds, his warm fingers finally leaving my arm.
Despite feeling embarrassed, butterflies of a different nature flutter in my stomach. It’s ridiculous to feel this way. I walk to the sink by the door and fill up a small bowl with water while he works on lighting the pillar candles I have on the tea table. When they are all lit and I take a seat on the couch, I expect the guard to sit next to me. Instead, he gets down on one knee in front of me, taking a cloth and dipping it in the bowl of water I’ve set on the table.
“Let me know if this hurts,” he says softly. He moves to bring the hand not holding the cloth to my face, and I can’t help but flinch on instinct, the memory of another’s touch sending a burst of fear through my body. “I’m sorry.” He holds his hands up in front of him, where I can see them both clearly.
My head dips in embarrassment, and I wish I could explain that it isn’t him. It’s just the culmination of years of fearing anyone other than Alexi. I’ve tried so hard to suppress any sort of reaction when the king has his hands on me, but maybe this guard lowers my own shields more than I realized. More than it makes sense for him to.
“Hey, it’s okay. Do you want to do it yourself? I can just supervise,” he reassures lightly as he holds the cloth out to me, keeping both hands in front of him. I see his head dip as he attempts to pull my eyes back up to look at his face. I should take the cloth; I am more than capable of doing it myself. There’s just a part of me that is begging to let him do it. A selfish, guilt-ridden instinct that wants someone to take care of me for once. “What do you want, My Lady?”
My eyes finally lift to meet his. “You can do it,” I whisper. His eyes hold mine for a moment, their smoky concentration on me overwhelming. I’m warm and breathless, and it makes exactly zero sense.
“Okay.” He moves slowly, keeping eye contact with me the entire time as he lifts the cloth up to my face again.
“Is it alright if I hold the side of your face to keep you steady?” he asks. I nod, watching him do exactly that, keeping his touch featherlight as his fingers brush against my cheek. The warm cloth touches my lip as he works to clean the blood off. A gentle tension in the air brackets us, not awkward or strained but sweet and tender—kind.
Despite knowing I’ll get caught for it, I can’t stop the way I study him. His features are nearly artistic in their beauty. The distinct thought that he is too good-looking to be a guard runs through my mind for a fleeting moment. My fingers unexplainably twitch with the urge to run through his thick, wavy hair. His dark eyes dart up to my own—his nostrils flaring just slightly—and then they look back down at my mouth. But he doesn’t stop his unhurried touch.
I have to work to keep my breathing even, taking slow, calculated breaths. I get a hint of something I’ve never smelled before. It isn’t floral, but it reminds me of early autumn mornings when the trees around the castle start changing colors. There is a different aroma in the air at that time of year. Was it the trees? Or the grass? Whatever it is, this guard smells similar.
Needing to fill the silence, I ask a question that I’ve been curious about when he moves the cloth to dip it back into the water. “Aren’t you worried about being caught up here?”
His gaze meets mine again as he shrugs. “Not particularly.” He slowly lowers the hand that was cradling my face. The skin there feels cold now in the absence of his touch. “There,” he says, placing the wet cloth down and picking up the dry one to dab at my lip. His brows furrow suddenly as he examines the spot.
“What is it?” I bring my own fingers up to touch my bottom lip, noticing the soreness is already gone.
“There should be a mark where the blood was coming from, but I don’t—”
“Maybe it wasn’t as bad as you thought,” I interject, pinching my lips together in an attempt to hide them.
I have no doubt that my magic healed the cut made from my tooth already, and I don’t exactly know if I should be in awe of or terrified by the prospect of it working on its own accord so quickly. And without being noticed. He simply nods his head and places the dry cloth back on the table. I try to read him, to see if he is wondering why my lip doesn’t hold a single mark, but he shows no sign of perplexity. In fact, I’m sure I must look more confused than he does.
“How do you know Tienne and Erica?” he asks, sitting down with his knees bent in front of him and feet flat on the floor. The question catches me by surprise.
“They came to the tower and cleaned me up after Alexi died.” There is a significant wobble of my voice when I say his name. I can feel my emotions fighting to get to the surface, trying to break free of those spaces within me where I’ve allowed them to dwell. With a squeeze of my fists and a deep breath, I am able to push it all down again.
The guard observes me from his place on the floor, face nearly unreadable except for the sympathy reflecting in his eyes. Sounding genuine, he says, “I’m sorry,” He doesn’t move to adjust his position or fidget; he just looks at me with understanding. “For what happened to him and for what you’ve had to endure,” he continues.
I can feel the tears welling behind my eyes, fortresses inside me shaking from the acknowledgment of what I’ve been through. I need the conversation to keep moving before I fall apart in front of him. “How do you know them?”
“I guess they have been in charge of putting together your supply boxes for years. Your previous guard—Alexi—was actually pretty adamant that they were the only ones to do it.” His words convey reverence, as if knowing just how much it means to me to hear that Alexi trusted them. “When I took over the position, they made it clear that I was to only come to them with anything you might need. They are intense, but I like them.” He chuckles lightly at the thought of them.
My eyes linger on him, the bewilderment at him being here, talking with me and taking care of me, bubbles up until I can’t help the words that escape. “Why are you here? Why are you being so nice to me?”
A breeze from the open balcony door blows in, causing shadows cast by the candle flames to dance on the stone walls.
“Why wouldn’t I be nice to you?” he counters, looking genuinely confused.
“Because no one besides Alexi is nice to me. He was the only one who cared ab—” I falter, taking a breath. “Can you just please tell me why you’re here?” I’m desperate to understand the reason why this normal man wastes his evenings with me, ones where he isn’t even duty-bound to do so.
“I told you. You weren’t what I was expecting,” he says like it answers the question. When I gesture for him to continue, he huffs out a laugh and adds, “I was intrigued by you that day. You’re something of a… myth around the castle. People know you exist, but the king has done a good job of making it sound like you’ve almost gone insane from grief.”
Shame slams into me at his words, flattening me like a boulder let loose from the top of a hill. I’m nothing more than a joke to him and everyone else in the castle.
“I see,” I say through gritted teeth. “You’re here to report back to the others.” The anger in me feels dark this time, like a beast waking up from hibernation. I stand up from the couch and move to the opposite side of the tea table, away from the guard. My chest lifts and falls as my breathing starts to pick up. This makes so much more sense. He isn’t here because of kindness or whatever other sweet emotion I thought to conjure up.
“Wait, I didn’t— Fuck, I didn’t mean it like that.” He scrambles to get the words out, jumping up much more swiftly than I did. Somehow this makes me even angrier, considering he is so much bigger than I am and was starting from the floor. He moves to take a step closer, but I counter by stepping back, nearly moving onto the balcony.
“I think you should go. You have plenty to report back on now. What with my inability to button my own dresses and my stupidity in not knowing that flame gems are real. You can even tell everyone how I didn’t know how to play children’s games!” My eyes water as my hands fist at my sides, nails digging into my palms. I hate feeling this way, like a naive fool. I hate that the first person to give me an ounce of attention was only doing so as a joke and that I didn’t realize until it was too late.
“Please, you don’t understand. I misspoke—”
“Get. Out.” The breach he had created near my heart earlier with his caring words and actions frosts back over. I can almost see it, the shadowy ice swirling around inside of me and snuffing out the normally glowing and warm magic there.
The guard opens his mouth again to speak in protest but is interrupted by a deep growl rumbling through the tower. The hairs on the back of my neck stand as I look behind him to where Bella prowls down the stairs. She rounds the final spiral and jumps over the remaining few steps, landing in a crouched position on the ground. Her canines glisten in the moonlight as she snarls at the guard, that deep rumble from her throat so dominant that I swear I feel it rattle my brain.
I do not fear her—never her—but I know it will be messy if she attacks this guard on my behalf. Slowly, I walk towards her, backing the guard up at the same time. Bella stalks around him, mirroring each of his steps with one of her own until she is facing him with me at her side.
“Holy shit, that’s a huge fox,” he whispers, hands raised in front of him as he freezes in place.
“She will not attack you if you leave,” I snap. The guard’s wide eyes bounce back and forth between Bella and I before he swallows and begins to back up. Reaching behind him blindly, he opens the door and pauses there. Bella releases another warning growl as my hand rests on the top of her head. The guard surveys Bella again before moving his gaze back over to me.
There isn’t as much fear there as I expect. No, my gut says that there looks to be something like amazement in his eyes. That can’t be possible, however, because he should only care enough to tell the king that I’m keeping a fox up here. If King Dolian finds out, he will kill Bella. Another death will be on my hands, and I will be truly alone this time. When the tears well, I let them fall onto my cheeks, the fear of losing my last friend too much to fight off. I take a step in front of Bella, trying to partially hide her as I clutch onto the fur at her neck. The guard’s gaze drops down to what he can see of Bella, his brows drawing in slightly in concentration.
“My Lady, I meant no disrespect to you and I apologize. Your secret,” he says as he pointedly brings his eyes back to mine, “is safe with me.” With a nod, he steps back onto the landing and closes the door behind him. A chill runs through me as Bella nudges her nose against my leg. My cheeks puff with air before I blow it out, my hands shaky in front of me.
“I’ve never heard you make that noise before, Bells,” I whisper, kneeling down to look at her. Her golden eyes stare back while I wipe the tears from my face and then wrap my arms around her neck. I breathe her in for a moment before I stand and we walk side-by-side back up to the loft.
I snuggle under the covers of my bed, the large window to my right opened to let the night air in. Bella curls into me, her head resting on my thigh. My hand lazily moves back and forth over her soft fur until her breathing grows heavy and small snores fill the silence of the tower. Maybe the caring side of the guard wasn’t all an act and that means he won’t actually tell the king about Bella. At least, I have the hope that he won’t.
“The moon may have the stars, but at least I have you,” I whisper before laying my hand flat on her back and closing my eyes.
I awake the next morning to a familiar scraping noise at the door. When it stops, I get out of bed carefully—so as to not disturb Bella—and make my way down the stairs. The sun is just barely cresting over the horizon, the vibrant golden colors of the dawn sky just starting to peek past the midnight blues from the previous night. I retrieve the folded up paper laying on the floor.
MY LADY,
I KNOW THAT YOU DO NOT OWE ME THE CHANCE TO EXPLAIN, BUT I WOULD LIKE TO TRY TO DO SO ANYWAY. I’M SORRY FOR INSINUATING THAT I WAS MERELY VISITING YOU TO FEED SOME INNATE CURIOSITY OR TO brING GOSSIP BACK TO THE GUARDS. THE TRUTH IS, SINCE THE MOMENT I SAW YOU (MORE APPROPRIATELY, SINCE THE MOMENT YOU STARTLED ME), I HAVE NOT BEEN ABLE TO STOP THINKING ABOUT YOU.
NOT BECAUSE YOU’RE HERE FOR MY ENTERTAINMENT OR ANYONE ELSE’S, BUT BECAUSE—AS I’VE MENTIONED BEFORE—YOU ARE NOTHING LIKE WHAT I EXPECTED, AND I’D BE LYING IF I SAID I WASN’T DYING TO KNOW MORE ABOUT YOU. SO, I OFFER A PROPOSITION: TOMORROW NIGHT I WOULD LIKE TO brING YOU MY FAVORITE DESSERT FROM VITOUR. IF YOU ARE FEELING GENEROUS ENOUGH TO GIVE ME A SECOND CHANCE, PLACE A NOTE OUTSIDE YOUR DOOR AFTER THE SUN SETS TONIGHT.
PLEASE KNOW THAT I HOLD YOU TO NO OBLIGATION. MY APOLOGY STANDS NO MATTER WHAT YOU DECIDE.
SINCERELY,
FLYNN
Flynn. The guard’s name is Flynn. I reread the note an embarrassing number of times before folding it back up and walking to the couch to take a seat, laying the note down in my lap. Is it insane of me to actually think this guard is interested in getting to know me? Or am I falling prey to someone who will take advantage of me the first opportunity that he gets? Am I so hopelessly desperate for a friend that I’m willing to risk everything with a King’s Guardsman whose only known attribute is that he’s been nice to me? My knees draw up on the couch as I hug them to my chest, indecision warring inside me. Then again, his knowledge as a guard could be invaluable to helping me escape. The blood oath prevents him from helping outright, but what if I can get information from him somehow? Maybe pretending to be his friend will be enough to get him to unknowingly help me or give me an opening to do it on my own.
I spend most of the day wondering about what I should do and if I should respond. When the sun starts to set in the sky, I grab a small pot of ink and a quill and set them on the tea table—sitting cross-legged on the floor next to it. I also grab extra paper, as it has been a while since I’ve written anything and I’m sure I need to practice. My first few attempts are sloppy at best, but eventually, my writing is neat enough to start. Just as the sun is crossing the horizon, with a candle lit next to me for extra light, I write my letter to Flynn.
Dear Flynn,
I accept your offering of treats as well as your apology. Also, I am not your Lady.
Cordially,
Rhea