Chapter Fifteen #2
While she advanced with care, Seraphina couldn’t stop her thoughts from racing.
The sergeant had been just in the end, letting Rune go.
Men like him rarely admitted they’d been wrong.
So, Rune had his freedom back. In a sense, he was freer than she was now, with the description of her face on wanted notices all over the city.
But he’d killed someone for her, which meant he’d given up his freedom for her.
They were both criminals, both fugitives, and they were stuck together.
The thought should have frightened her, but instead, she felt relief.
And that relief made her feel guilty. Her revenge plan had become his. She was a burden he didn’t deserve.
Another thing that shocked her was the way she sensed him move. Seraphina knew he didn’t do well in open spaces, but he seemed to be managing now, keeping up with her. That baffled her, because he’d refused to escape with her, but days later, when he’d been released, he’d found her in a crowd.
They reached the chandler’s shop near the western gate, and she led him through the front room, down the narrow hallway, to the little storage space she’d turned into a hideout. She knelt by the pile of broken furniture she’d been using for firewood and struck the tinder, coaxing a flame to life.
“Have you eaten?” she asked.
She pulled out a piece of bread she’d saved from yesterday and the jar of plum jam, which still had a little left clinging to the sides.
Rune reached for them without answering, dipping the bread directly into the jar and scraping the jam off with his fingers.
He ate ravenously, and she felt an invisible claw squeeze around her heart.
In the windowless cell, had they fed him at all?
“I’m sorry I don’t have more,” she said. “But I have this.”
She took out the kreuzers she’d earned singing and counted them one by one. There was enough to buy more food, maybe enough for a decent meal if she was strategic.
She stood.
“Stay here. I’ll go back to the market.”
“No,” Rune said, standing up as well. “They’re looking for you, but they’re not looking for me. I’m innocent now. Or at least, so they think.”
“How did you find me? How are you able to navigate the city? I know open spaces are hard for you.”
Seraphina knew she was doing it again – throwing questions at him, one after the other. And she knew he wasn’t good with questions. But so much had happened today, and her brain was on fire. She needed to understand, so she could reorient herself.
“I heard you sing,” he said. “I was released this morning, and the first thing I saw when I walked out of the prison was a notice with your description. I tried to force myself to go to the market, but it took hours. I stayed close to buildings, ducked into alcoves when it was too much. I had to stop so many times. But then I heard your voice. You were singing my songs. It was like your voice gave me strength, grounded my thoughts. I focused on you and only you, and I found you. Just in time, too. Hartmann spotted you the same moment I did.”
Seraphina felt heat rise to her face again. She bowed her head, not trusting herself to speak.
“Seraphina,” he said, his voice low. There was a hint of desperation in it that nestled right under her solar plexus. “You are my anchor. Before I heard your voice, I was ready to curl up in an alley and not move until night came. Or not move ever.”
A knot lodged in her throat. She bit her lip and nodded her head, because it was all she could manage. He made it sound like he couldn’t exist without her, not in this world, and it was true she’d once offered to be his guide. With his confession, he was asking her to make good on her promise.
She felt his hand on hers, and it took her a moment to realize he was trying to pry her fingers open. She let him take the coins.
“Wait for me,” he said. “I’ll bring food for both of us.”
“How? It will be hard for you, maybe impossible.”
How could she be his guide and his anchor, like he’d said, when she was a wanted person?
Anchor.
She liked the word more than she should have.
“I’ll know you’re waiting for me, and that will make me brave. I’ll think about your voice.”
Seraphina pressed her hand over her heart. Now she wished he would leave, so she could be alone with her thoughts. And at the same time, no, she didn’t want him to go. Rune was strong, basically invincible, but he was also vulnerable in ways people might take advantage of.
Before she could decide whether she wanted him to stay or go, she heard his footsteps cross the small room. She opened her mouth, and at first, only a gasp came out. Her hand reached for him, though he was already down the hall.
“Be careful,” she whispered.
What was she thinking? She shouldn’t have let him leave.
He didn’t know the city as well as she did, and the market would be maddening to him.
She was so fixated on the ways he was innocent and helpless, while also being aware that he was the strongest, most brutal, and frankly – as it had been proven to her today – the most dangerous person she knew, that she’d ended up paralyzed and in need of being saved and cared for.
Seraphina was a mess, and it wouldn’t do. If she didn’t make sense of her feelings quickly, she would become a liability to both of them.
She lowered herself next to the dwindling fire and fed it a few more pieces of furniture.
She listened to the flames grow and crackle as she started pulling every emotion she’d had in the past few hours to the forefront of her mind to analyze it with the devotion curators used when they studied and catalogued relics.