33. So much for my sanctuary
SO MUCH FOR MY SANCTUARY
ENORA
Islept better than I had in weeks—months, maybe. The sort of joyous, not moving an inch for hours on end, dead to the world sleep that was a damn rare treat.
And even when I did finally come to, I wasn’t mad in the least.
How could I be when it let me admire the serenely sleeping man I’d dreamed of waking up beside for years? Sated. A little sore—from more than just the beating I’d taken in my trial. Still very much giddy from the bodily bliss he brought me all night.
I never could’ve complained.
There was so much peace written all over his sleeping face, it made my chest ache.
His softly bowed lips parted, just a little. The crease between his brows was nothing but a faint line. Even his eyepatch had slipped up a little, exposing more dark veining and scars that decorated the hollow of his eye.
That made my chest ache a lot, and I tried not to let my attention linger on it. He’d tell me one day, I hoped, what had left him so badly maimed, but I wouldn’t pry.
He must have been as exhausted as I was, though, because his eyepatch hadn’t moved an inch the entire night before.
Not after I had my hands in his hair endlessly, raking my nails over his scalp and tangling my fingers in his strands. I’d assumed he used magic to keep it so well secured, and this only confirmed my suspicion. So sated and drained, he’d let his hold on his magic slip in my presence.
My aching heart welcomed a beat of rakish pride.
As much as I felt the urge to keep lying there with him, soaking in the image I never thought I’d see, another urge crept up on me that was wholly inarguable—my poor bladder.
I wasn’t sure if it was really morning or not yet—not with how there didn’t seem to be a source of natural light anywhere in Jasper’s room—but a scattered few nytefire lanterns, throwing pale-blue light from their glass, gave me plenty to work with.
With as gentle a touch as I could manage, I lifted Jasper’s hand from its anchor on my waist and set it on the mattress between us. He made a soft huff of a noise and curled further in on himself.
I remembered seeing my clothing end up somewhere toward the foot of the bed, so I slipped off and tiptoed around, picking up the first object that resembled a shirt.
A small win—it was actually mine.
The hem rolled down to the tops of my thighs as I crept back towards the half-open door beside the bed. I glanced back quickly to confirm Jasper was still asleep before I stepped inside the bathroom and gently closed the door behind me.
Of course, every surface inside was immaculate. I wasn’t sure why I’d thought some part of the last fifteen years would change that staunch part of him.
Not a single dish of soap or bottle of bath tonic out of place. Every towel folded or hung with care. Two eyepatches lay on the counter, set out with identical precision.
I gave him the benefit of not rooting through his drawers, but I knew they’d be the same.
I made quick work of relieving my protesting bladder and splashed a little water on my face before I slipped back out into Jasper’s room. He was still sound asleep, and I refused to entertain the idea of disturbing that.
There was plenty else for me to distract myself with while he got the sleep I was sure he desperately needed, if the dark circle that graced his hale eye was anything to go off.
Just like his bathroom, the rest of his room was spotless and organized to an awe-inspiring degree. The bed looked so starkly out of place, with its rumpled sheets and discarded clothes at its foot. I could only imagine how neatly made it was before Jasper dumped me on it.
A full wall of bookcases sprawled out to one side of the dim space, and I couldn’t read the spines on most of them—both from their weathering and the languages they were written in.
The few I could make out came as little surprise—magic, magic, and more magic.
Bargains and plane stepping.
Syphoning and healing.
Illusions and elemental manipulation.
A few historical records were spread between them too, and I didn’t dare touch the glass and metal trinkets dotted amongst the shelves.
A small drafting desk broke up the wall of vast knowledge, and when I peered behind the curtains hanging above it, I found a boarded window.
I’d ask about his aversion to daylight another time.
I pulled out the small chair and sat down, running my fingers over the stack of notebooks squared off to one side.
My goal wasn’t to snoop, but I lifted back the cover of the top one, just enough to glimpse the edge of a page, and I smiled.
His writing was still the same.
He was still the same in so many ways.
I leaned back and looked over the weathered books, the fascinating trinkets, and the endless knowledge.
When Jasper was still Kieran, and we were so foolishly na?ve, this was everything he had ever dreamed of attaining. A high mage with his personal trove of invaluable goods, of knowledge others could not fathom the meaning of.
But, goddess above, what cost had he paid to achieve those dreams?
I saw bargain marks on his back last night, and ones decorating his legs, too. Whether he’d entirely lost his eye, I didn’t know, but something horrific had happened to him there, and to his hand in a lesser degree.
They reeked of magical mishaps to me, but maybe that was the fearful, Odessan part of my mind speaking.
“Enora.”
I glanced back at the bed.
Jasper hadn’t moved an inch, and I might’ve been more tired than I thought still. Either I’d heard my name or a gust of wind, but neither seemed likely in Jasper’s dark, silent, sealed-up bedroom.
“…she will come as I go…”
Tension prickled up my spine, and I stood, putting my back to the wall of bookshelves.
Across the room, a flicker of light, skewed more vibrant green-blue than the lanterns, poured out from under a shut door. It was smaller than the others, and its surface was painted with runes I couldn’t see well in the dim light—not that I stood a chance of understanding them, anyway.
The part of my mind that was more than a little freaked out desperately hoped they said, ‘No Girls Allowed’, even though I had a distinct feeling that was not the case.
Still, I couldn’t help but take careful steps across the room.
“…a bride bathed in fire…”
Just a few steps from the door, the air grew thick. Not with moisture, but an ashy taste that filled my lungs in the worst way.
My breath came in a shaky burst, and gooseflesh rippled across my arms and legs. The green-blue light seeping out from beneath the door flickered, interrupted by shadows that looked an awful lot like pacing footsteps.
“…to bear a bloody crown…”
I lifted my splayed hand and pressed it to the door.
A set of runes crackled, and a bite seared through my skin like the touch of a red-hot branding iron. I stumbled backwards with a sharp breath, clutching my hand to my chest.
Bitter ash cleared from the air, and the light beneath the door died out.
Still, I stared at it.
“Nor?” came a hoarse drawl that had my attention snapping back.
Jasper was sitting up in bed, head tipped.
“Sorry.” I forced a smile. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”
There was no point in telling him to go back to sleep, because he was already pulling on his pants and padding over to me.
Goddess, he was bedraggled in the best way.
Sheet creases lined one half of his chest, a few even trailing up his face, and his snow-white strands were strewn in all directions.
He fixed me with a lazy smile before he turned me around, wrapping his arms around my middle and pulling my back firmly against his chest.
“Good morning,” he murmured, with a kiss pressed to my shoulder that made me wobble in place. “Were you snooping through my things while I was asleep?”
I tsked. “Never. Just…appreciating.”
He let out a chuckle. “Like you used to appreciate things from your father’s office, right? And the council chamber?”
Well, there was no point in arguing that.
“Exactly.” I settled back against him. “What’s through that door?”
Jasper hesitated. “It’s my…workshop. And there is a connection to a vein of life source down there. Not a place to be wandering alone without a keen understanding of magic.”
“Ah. Noted. I just—” I couldn’t remember why I was standing in front of the rune-painted door anymore. “Never mind.”
“Couldn’t sleep?” Jasper seemed as eager as I was to switch the topic.
I turned in his hold and looped my arms around his neck. “My arm was numb, and I had to take a leak, both a terrible tragedy. I was having the best sleep of my life.”
His chuckle came as a warm puff against my skin. “That makes two of us. And if I recall, you were given a full day for respite, right?”
“Right…”
He pulled me back a couple of steps, a wry smile on his face. “Then I think that is many hours of the best sleep of our lives we have ahead of us.”
It looked like his love of sleep hadn’t changed either, but even that warm nostalgia couldn’t fight off a flicker of unease that kicked up in my stomach.
“Won’t someone wonder where you are?” I refused to give substance to who might wonder where he was. “Do high mages even get respite days?”
“So many questions so early,” he chided.
They didn’t stop him from continuing to pull me back towards the bed, one resisted step at a time.
“If you’re worried that…someone is going to interrupt us, you do not need to be.
I have no pressing duties. No council meetings.
No arcane obligations. And my quarters are warded. ”
As if I weighed nothing, Jasper hauled me up, guiding my knees astride his hips as he sat on the end of the bed.
“Because of your workshop?”
“That’s one reason.”
I tilted my head at him. “And the other?”
“I despise unexpected visitors.”
Well, at least that hadn’t changed either.
“That’s all well and good,” I chuckled as I clasped his face between my hands. His pupil dilated as I held his gaze, swallowing up the moss-green, and his fingers pressed into my hips. “But if I only get to spend a day with you like this, I’d like to spend it awake.”