Chapter 36
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
CHAY
“Rather than try to train a defensive horse, you should first gain its trust by existing alongside it without placing demands.”
~ How to Tame Your Brumby: A Collection of Raider’s Ban Wisdom
I let myself into the tower for what felt like the millionth time today, settling yet another basket of coal beside the dense logs deigned fit for the lady to burn. We kept the tower warm, to help Isolde, who Audrey reported was still doing well. I hadn’t seen her. I also hadn’t seen Audrey since yesterday morning, when she’d tried to use the Acting Steward’s influence to gather the merchants, and none had turned up.
I stoked the fire, then glanced up the stairs to her room. I hadn’t been up there since Isolde asked me to train Audrey in the sword, and she’d burst into tears. I struggled to match that woman against the one who’d broken a guardsman’s knee, then choked him until he was unconscious. And I struggled to match both of those people against the woman who’d lit up with joy as her horse charged toward the horizon when she’d dragged me out for a ride the other day.
The tower was silent.
I didn’t mind her quiet. It was broken by little sounds of her fidgeting, the rhythmic scratch of her quill as she traced strange patterns on scrap parchment, or the turn of pages. I’d had a lot of time to observe her.
I didn’t think she’d been noticing me much.
It had been a very long time since I’d walked halls like these, feeling distrustful glances and speculative looks being thrown my way. I’d gotten out of there, and I was getting out of here, too.
But I didn’t dislike the idea of getting out with someone this time.
Steeling myself, I went up the stairs with a quick, “Coming up,” in case she had her cushion out again. The thought made my steps lighter.
She was curled up in a pillow fortress in the center of her bed. It was late morning, and from someone I was reasonably confident rose with the sun, this was unusual behavior.
“Is there a problem?” she asked me.
There was no give in the woman. But that wasn’t right, either. I’d seen her be thoughtful. The way she had chosen a specific room for Ylva because of the sunshine, the time we’d stopped by and she’d shared her skeins of thread with one of the cooks, who was low on greens. She didn’t say nice things, but she did them.
“Sir?” Her formality was made even more devastating by the messy tumble of her hair and the blankets draped over her shoulders. In her hands, parchment rustled. Would she always “sir” me? I recalled her saying my name, but it felt like it was so long ago I couldn’t bring up the precise memory any longer.
“Are we in hiding?” I asked, maintaining my focus. “Because, if we are, I ought to lay in more coal.”
“What should you be hiding from?” Isolde asked from the other side of the door.
Beside that door was a chair still draped with the blanket Audrey must’ve wrapped herself in when she sat there to speak to Isolde. It was a familiar one, a dark green I’d seen her wear like a shawl a few times. A candle had burned out beside it, leaving behind a puddle of wax in the saucer.
Something about that made my heart ache.
What should we be hiding from? Everything. I looked into her whiskey eyes, and she looked straight through me, then dropped her gaze back to the words she’d been studying.
“Nothing’s changed,” Audrey told her, turning a page.
Fury gnawed at me. I was tied to this woman. “Should I exercise your horse?” I offered, because that at least would get me out of here, and her mare hadn’t been as middling as the chestnut she’d ridden through the orchard when we’d met.
“No.” She set her book aside heavily and flung an arm back with more drama than was necessary, sending a few pillows tumbling and breaking the surface of her bed. “I’m coming.”
“You don’t need to.” But I glanced at the cover of the tome as she shook herself free from her layers. The East Arcanloc Trade Company: A History.
“If I don’t need to, why are you here?” I had no answer for that except that I was tired of sitting in a silent room alone. She looked at me, blanket held tight around her shoulders, waiting.
“You’re the one who’s been agitating for action,” I reminded her.
She barely blinked. “So I do need to.”
“No, you don’t.” Her toes were bare. I could see the way her feet were positioned mostly by the way the blanket draped, but a few digits peeked out. There was something strange about that combative stance and those naked toes. “But I’ve been waiting for you, assuming today, like any other day, you’d appear and announce what it is we’re doing, and I’d be expected to trot after you like a good boy.”
“Did you hear that, Isolde?” she asked, laughter in her voice as she turned away from me. “He’s a good boy.”
“I don’t recall seeing such a thing, but I’ve obviously missed a lot,” Isolde said, the honey dripping off her words.
In front of me, Audrey tossed the blanket to the side. Her nightgown wasn’t like the ones back in ’Ban, shorn off at the knees. I’m sure Thomas would be scandalized that I knew the regional differences between women’s nightclothes.
I bet he wouldn’t like to know that the extra length didn’t hide the curve of her ass beneath the cloth as she leaned forward. She didn’t pop her hips to accentuate the movement, rummaging through ribbons, jewelry, pins, and pots. Embers blew to life low in my belly. The fabric stretched over her back. She had strong shoulders with defined musculature that I wanted to explore. Impatient fingers unraveled the tie in her hair, and I was jolted back in time to the tourney I never should’ve fought in.
She’d helped me accomplish a dream without being gutted. I don’t know that I’d ever shown her gratitude for that.
As they had then, her fingers tangled up in the auburn strands. I watched as she tore the tie free and broken wisps of hair fell to the floor. She muttered in annoyance, shaking it free. I fought not to grab her hands and force them to still.
I fought not to bury my face in her hair and pull that ass against me.
“If you’re trying to convince me you’re a lost pup,” she said, and I was torn from my thoughts, “you’ve failed.” She glanced over her shoulder, but I was already on the move, my feet like slabs of meat at the end of wooden stilts as I tried to navigate back down the stairs. There was something, though, some flicker on her face as I left. Guilt.
I got to the common room and braced myself against the fire, which may as well have been my post for the hours I’d spent there. This time, I didn’t need its warmth.
Don’t go there. She’s the Duke’s daughter . You killed children for her.
That could be true, and she could have an amazing ass. The quality of her curves would never cancel out her personality.
Anyway, it was probably a breach of my oath to fuck her, because there’s no way word wouldn’t get out, and it wouldn’t do harm.
Her hands hadn’t been impatient when she’d caught me up in her limbs in the orchard. They weren’t impatient on her horse’s reins, or when they lingered over the corner of whatever she was studying. Why were they so impatient in her own hair?
As she appeared, pinning her cloak at her throat, I resisted the urge to offer to assist her with it.
“We’ll go to the kitchens first and take Ylva a hot meal, then see if the Captain has returned.” The Captain was either dead somewhere, finding the bottom of his tankard, or sleeping off attempts to accomplish those things. She opened the door and held it for me to pass. “If I can’t find him, I’m going to start talking to anyone who’s there to figure out who’s drawing up the roster. I need to make sure Thomas is given rest time. We’ll probably be headed there tomorrow, but I don’t know right now.” The thought of visiting the field hospital wasn’t the worst. I closed up the tower and walked beside her. “I’ve got three primary issues right now. Military, medical, and economic. I’m putting them in that order of priority because that’s the order they’ll kill us.”
That was a lot of information. She must’ve been feeling bad. “Where does Ylva fit?”
“Pleasure,” she said, without a hint of shame or any further explanation.
I didn’t see it, myself. Ylva was too sharp, too sly, too unbending. And I suspected she wouldn’t bat a lash while she cut our throats.
“She’s using you,” I pointed out.
“I imagine we’re using each other,” Audrey agreed. “Isn’t that how people work?”
The thought was disturbing. “Not good ones.”
She tossed me a pitying glance. “If everyone is happy with the trade, then you’re still using each other.”
“Is that what you’re learning from the history of the East Arcanloc Trade Company?”
“You can laugh, but a lot of strategies used in trade seem like they’re useful in life.” She shrugged her cloak a bit higher, then picked absently at a nail. “Similar tactics are used in relationships as they are in large organizations. But no, I didn’t learn that so recently. Do you want to know about the EACo, as it’s become known?”
She looked at me as if she genuinely thought I might say yes.
“No.”
I expected a flicker of disappointment or disapproval. Instead, I saw nothing but acceptance, as if it wasn’t just the anticipated answer but the correct one.
She swept into the kitchens ahead of me, and I was left staring after her, feeling like we were both failing a trial.