Chapter Thirty-One #2
Ger could not bring himself to look up, but he felt the warm grasp on his shoulder loosen. Even if he’d imagined it, Benan’s vicious delight told him enough of Jack’s reaction to make his tender stomach sink.
“Oh, he didn’t even tell you why, did he? Poor little kitchen mouse. He’s balls deep in that princess again—”
“Enough,” Marie snapped. “Get out.”
And finally, Benan did. But Gerard would not soon forget the look of pure hatred he levelled at them all as he backed slowly out the doorway. The raging fire in his beady eyes sent an echo of heat surging through Ger’s gut, and he gave another wild retch to a chorus of alarmed gasps.
“Right then, hero,” Marie sighed. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”
???
It bothered him a little that he was vain enough to think such a thing right now, but Ger couldn’t help it. He didn’t want Jack to see him like this. For a second time no less, cowering and breathless—and now covered in bodily fluids too.
Very bloody attractive. Who could resist?
They’d taken him to the staff privy at the back of the kitchen, given him water and a swill of mint solution to wash out the taste.
Then Marie had helped to peel his armour and uniform from him before whisking it off somewhere for cleaning.
He couldn’t look Jack in the eye as he accepted the soft, clean jumper the porter had found for him and pulled it on past his undershirt.
“Bit snug,” said Jack, tone flat. “The one downside to those big shoulders.”
Well, there was that, at least. Ger chanced a glance up at him through his sweat-damp hair, and at whatever Jack found on his face, his guarded expression softened.
“C’mere,” he said, and waved him over to the opposite wall of the dim bathroom, where a low stool was wedged into the corner.
Ger’s knees trembled as he sank to his seat, though his breath came easily enough now despite the slight ache from his overworked throat.
“You alright?” Jack asked.
Ger raised his brows. “Are you? I know he’s not the most reasonably minded, but to blatantly attack you like that in Marie’s kitchens—what was that about?”
The porter’s lips tugged up—grudgingly, but with undeniable amusement all the same.
“Well, he was hungry, and being roughly the size of a bear, our friend Benan believes his hunger to be a little more urgent than anyone else’s. He thinks I’m hoarding food.”
“That’s stupid.”
“That bit’s true, actually.” Jack grinned at the immediate shock that slackened Ger’s face.
“Half true. I’ve been foraging on my way to work.
Nuts and berries, that sort of thing, so I can have something on hand if it’s needed.
A lot of people have been struggling to get by with just the daily broth, so I hand out little parcels of them when I can.
He caught me delivering one to the gard’s quarters on his way to bed last night. ”
“A parcel for Benan?” He couldn’t help the incredulity that tightened his already sore throat, but Jack just rolled his eyes.
“For you, Ger.”
“Oh.”
The single syllable fell in a stupid sigh. He didn’t know what else to say. Jack had been thinking of him. Sneaking him food he’d spent time foraging in the bleak and ever-raging wilderness, when he had to be just as weak and cold as anyone else.
“Thank you,” he blurted, just a little too late.
“You’re welcome.”
He was still speaking in that flat, begrudging way meant to shut down further conversation—but Ger couldn’t help but notice that he was still standing here, too.
Quite close in fact, leaning against the opposite wall in this rather tight corner, his long legs just a breadth from Ger’s knees.
Waiting. Giving him a chance, even if he wasn’t going to make it easy to grasp it.
“You know it’s not true, right?” said Ger, eyes on his own hands where they curled over his knees. Try as he might, his lips faltered with each breath until the last few words were little more than a mumble. “About Adeline, I’m not—”
“I know you’re not.”
Ger looked up. Jack wasn’t smiling, but his face was softer; more open.
“Hard to be a person with eyes and miss the way she looks at the Merrow King. She’s not looking at anyone else like that, not anytime soon.”
“Neither am I,” said Ger at once.
Jack’s lips twitched, and he rolled them in between his teeth. Deliberately withholding his smile, but the instinct was there. Something was there, even now, and though he didn’t have a name for it, Ger found it gave him the courage to hold Jack’s eye a moment longer.
“I should thank you, too,” said Jack. “Never had anyone fight for my honour like that. I can’t say I didn’t enjoy it, to be honest.”
Ger’s heart flipped.
“I’d say the effect was ruined,” he edged, glancing down at his hands again. “Given what a shithead I was.”
“Just a bit,” Jack agreed brightly—but then he sighed. “Ruined a little more so because—”
His words cut off with a tightness that Ger felt in his own chest. When he looked up, Jack was studying him with his black brows furrowed. Then, slowly, he slid down the wall until he crouched close enough to meet Ger’s eye.
“I was scared for you,” he said. “Not because of Benan, don’t get me wrong. You held your own, and I’m sure you would’ve had it handled. I was scared because of what it did to you; the fear. The way it sort of takes over, all that panic.”
All that panic.
Ger swallowed. “I can cope.”
“Can you?”
It wasn’t an accusation; not a judgement. Jack’s eyes flickered between his, searching for something. It was with an odd flip in his chest that Ger realised what Jack wanted; understanding.
“I’ve been learning to,” Ger said slowly. “For as long as I can remember, really. Certain situations set me off, is all. It happens more often now. With the way things are, you know?”
“What sets you off?”
“Violence. Shouting sometimes, not always though. Usually just reminders of—”
His chest tightened in warning, as though even this was reminder enough.
His knuckles bleached as his grip on his knees tightened, but then Jack’s hand lay over his, and the warmth and callouses sent a jolt of sensation through him.
It was distracting, in just the right way.
Real as the bite of his hilt beneath his palm when he needed it most.
Jack prompted him softly, “Of?”
He took a deep, wheezing breath, then another, easier one.
“Of how I grew up.” He pushed on through a tightening chest, the words shuddering all the way up his throat.
“Who I grew up with. Out there, with Benan, it was the violence that got to me, but it was more than that. He was going to hurt you, and I knew I’d have to hurt him to get it to stop.
And last time I tried to protect someone else …
Goddess, this probably sounds so stupid.
I’m a Gard, it’s literally my entire job—”
“It doesn’t sound stupid,” Jack said. Said it so firmly that Ger knew they could leave it there if he wanted to. That it was enough for Jack.
But maybe it wasn’t enough for him.
Maybe that odd feeling in his chest was not a tightening, but a release. Years of tension loosened, the organs in his ribcage aching, shifting to fill the space.