Chapter 22
T he space of calm that immediately follows chaos is a strange one. A mercurial moment of intense emotions and nuanced realizations. Like the recognition that time moves like cool honey when you are afraid. Fear makes everything slow and thick. Moments of joy, however, are more like sugar. Small, precious, and easily scattered. That knowledge made the realm seem crueler, and the truth became painfully evident when Emer began to hear the growing sounds of the town. To them, there was not a body in the alley nearby.
Their day was measured in sugar.
Her nose scrunched under her hood at the scent of the blood still clinging to her. A wealth of gore concealed with a simple cloak.
Returning to the more populated streets, Emer tilted her head slightly and glared at those who passed from beneath her hood. The suspicious glint she had so often observed in Calder’s eyes was now heavily reflected in her own. Shared features that resulted from the same lessons learned.
One: men grunt when they die.
Two: painful moments linger.
Her grip on Calder tightened. Once the monster she ran from, now the one who led her from harm. Calder squeezed her hand back.
“What?” she asked, blinking in confusion.
“I said you need to get on the horse,” he repeated, his brow furrowed with concern.
“Horse?” she asked, only to realize that they were back at the stable.
Her thoughts were heavy and her movements slow. It was a weight Calder recognized and one that seemed to grow heavier every time he witnessed the darkness of the Isle attempting to blot out the light of the tender-hearted girl who did not belong there.
Impatience had him gripping her waist and hoisting her on a horse she soon realized was Danu rather than Aven. He quickly situated himself in the saddle behind her.
They did not acknowledge that their bodies suddenly made contact in more places than they did not. His chest pressed into her back, his thighs cradled hers, and his arms rested at her sides.
Calder looked down at the way his body caged her. Protective. Claiming.
The next thing that wanted her would have to pry her from his damn lap—the fucking Elders included. Perhaps not the sanest response, but he had learned if there was space between them, it would be exploited. The logical solution, then, would be to have no space. Even with a set of reins in either hand, he kept one arm wrapped around her.
When he drew in a tired breath, he pressed further against her, but she did not move, and he wondered if the contact was as grounding for her as it was for him. When her muscles relaxed and she nestled into him, he had his answer.
He drank in her rain-like scent mixed with the tang he knew all too well. Like forget-me-nots watered with blood.
“I won’t run again,” she said quietly.
“I will not give you a reason to run,” he replied, voice flat but words warm.
The back of Emer’s head rolled rhythmically with the horse’s stride, and although her eyes were heavy, her mind would not allow her the peace she needed for sleep.
She tried to focus on how Calder’s chest rose, fell against her back, and counted his heartbeats. The more she focused on him, the more her body relaxed, and soon, she felt herself drifting off. She raised her hand to rub her eyes but paused to take in the blood coating her hands.
“I need to get this off,” she confessed.
Calder flinched slightly as though her voice after the extended silence had caught him off guard. “It’s the middle of the night and too cold for you to get wet,” he protested.
Emer sat up, turning to look at him over her shoulder. The bare hint of moonlight caught her eyes, illuminating the melancholy that consumed them. Despite his better judgment, he steered them off the path and towards the trees until he heard the bubbling sounds of the creek.
After dismounting Danu, Calder tapped his hand against her thigh and held her waist as he brought her down in front of him. “Are you sure you are okay?” he asked with a subtle tilt of his head, his hands still gripping her tightly.
“Would you be disappointed in me if I said I wasn’t sure?” she returned.
With a soft smile, he backed away. “Not something I am capable of, I’m afraid.”
Kneeling before the stream, he cupped his hands and washed the blood from his face. He may not have the same conflicted feelings regarding the violent acts they had committed, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t exhausted.
From beneath the sound of trickling water, he heard Emer hiss as she knelt next to him, discovering one of the many new bruises she had earned from her fight. Her nose wrinkled and she felt the resistance of the blood that had dried on her face. Mercifully, when she leaned over the water, the night concealed the worst of it and revealed only a dark shape rippling with the water. It seemed she would not have to face herself tonight.
Reaching towards the stream, she frowned, finding the cleansing water was not within her grasp. A glare replaced her frown as she repositioned her body, digging her hip into the grass and stretching her legs out in the opposite direction of her arms to balance her weight. Her fingers danced over the water and she growled.
Calder paused to watch her.
“If you don’t let me help you, I will be retrieving you from the water. Again ,” he chastised with a knowing smirk.
Even though she ignored his warning, she pressed a hand further into the grass to fight against the pull tipping her over the embankment.
Calder pushed himself up and moved to kneel behind her, pulling her up and rearranging her so that his arms were on either side of her. With his fingers around her wrists, he guided her hands under the water and meticulously washed them.
The realm grew quiet as she watched him work. The bloodlust still stirring in his veins made them thick and raised as they snaked up his wrist and disappeared under his rolled-up sleeves.
For a moment, Emer glimpsed a contentment she did not realize her nervous soul could experience and knew it could quickly become something she craved. The foreign sensation was quickly overshadowed by guilt. Her purpose remained the same, and while she was sinking into a man’s embrace, her father was likely in bed an ocean away, sinking further away from them all.
She straightened her spine, and Calder pulled her back from the embankment, positioning her so they faced each other. Emer closed her eyes against the shiver that rolled through her as Calder worked to remove the blood from her face with gentle strokes.
“Still okay?” he asked.
“It could have been worse,” Emer sighed, slumping forward slightly .
“That isn’t what I asked. The threat of what could have been does not take away from the wounds of what was,” he said sternly.
“What does it matter?” she asked him, exhaustion heavy in her voice.
Calder’s hand hovered over her shoulder before ghosting across the skin of her collarbone, his hands eclipsing that of the man who left marks where his fingers had dug into her skin. “He bruised you. It matters.”
Emer brought her hand up, covering his where it had settled. “They will fade. I will not,” she vowed.
“Of all the men I have watched bleed, he may be my favorite,” he spat, eyes darkening.
“Truth be told. I’m surprised you only killed the one,” Emer confessed.
“If I thought we had time, I would have slaughtered all three,” he gritted out.
A breathy sound had his eyes snapping at hers, and she let out a laugh that quickly smothered to a giggle.
“Not a joke,” he spat.
Even dripping in vitriol and spoken so harshly, it was practically unintelligible, she only giggled harder.
“Do you intend to fight every beast from here to the Well?” she asked teasingly.
“If necessary,” he answered, standing up and helping her to her feet. “You know,” he said thoughtfully as he held her arm to the side and appraised her. She shifted on her feet as his eyes traveled from head to toe, taking in the ale, blood, and dirt. Her previously white tunic was now stained from various transgressions, but he studied the fabric as if looking at a fine dress. “You look more and more like a Morvran each day,” he commented, satisfied with his surveying.
Emer looked down and grimaced at the unsavory colors, now bleeding together from the water like a gory watercolor. She had thought his affinity for all-black clothing related to his role as Sea Raven, but now she realized it was more practical.
“I look savage,” she huffed.
“I believe that is what I said,” he replied with a wolfish grin.
She pulled her hand from his and crossed her arms against the cold of the night air.
“We both know I will never look like a Morvran, no matter how blood-covered or sharply accessorized I am,” she argued.
“Perhaps you are right. You blush far too easily,” he said with a shrug, though Emer caught a glimpse of a smile as he turned.
“It’s a shame you did not come to the Isle for recreation. Extended time with the Morvran clan would be quite transformative ,” he mused.
She could not help but feel a twinge of disappointment at his remark. Admittedly, she hadn’t considered anything other than reaching the Well, including what would happen afterward—willfully ignoring that her plans required her to eventually say goodbye to the man who had been her constant companion.
“I suppose it is for the best. This place does not require long to dull bright things that don’t belong here,” he spoke in a faintly somber voice.
While she was confident any emotion in his words was related to his mother, she could not help but let the last of them linger.
Don ’ t belong here.
It wasn’t meant to wound her. It was simply the truth. He had witnessed firsthand what happened when a vibrant soul was brought to a dark place. His father coveted the light his mother brought here, and Calder would forever blame him for letting the shadows consume her. It was the vice of protectors that they believed they could guard what they coveted. It was also a fallacy.
Emer pulled at her tunic, attempting to distance the chilled fabric and her skin. She gritted her teeth from the chattering she felt emanating from her bones, but despite her efforts, Calder’s eyes narrowed as he watched her .
“Cold?” His tone was accusatory.
Even wearing her cloak once more, she couldn’t seem to find warmth in any part of her body.
“N-no,” she stuttered.
“Yeah, okay,” he said with a mocking nod. “Given we had to leave town before I could secure the rest of the supplies we needed. We are going to have to get creative,” he explained.
“Creative?” she echoed warily.
“Steal. We are going to need to steal.”
Emer stepped back and looked around as if the minnows in the creek would turn them in. “From who?”
Holding her stare, he answered.
“The Morvran clan.”