Chapter 57
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
CHAY
“Forgiveness is not earned, it is gifted.” ~ Matri’sion proverb
W hether it was because I was sick or because my lady had warmed more than just my cock last night, it was harder to dismiss reality and drift in a fantasy. The trip back to the monolith felt like it took all day, but the sun was barely high enough to burn the frost off the ground.
I should’ve offered to come alone. I should’ve, but I hadn’t wanted to be away from her. Not when she was so vulnerable.
As soon as we arrived, my first task was to remove the poor beekeeper from Audrey’s horse. Without prompting, she spent time soothing her unsettled mount.
It gave me the opportunity to arrange some of the branches I’d hauled nearby in a haphazard pyre. The task wasn’t one I’d ever done alone. I didn’t know how much wood I’d need nor how much tinder to prepare. But I knew I didn’t have time to worry about it.
If she was right, it’d have to work fast otherwise it wouldn’t have stopped that wave she was so sure had really struck the land.
All I was sure of was that she wouldn’t return to somewhere warm until this was done.
She appeared at my side, arms loaded with smaller pieces of kindling that she began to arrange beside me.
“Should’ve brought some dry wood,” I said, just to have something to say.
“You can go get some?” she offered me. “I can continue here. You could empty Storm’s bags, and?—”
A chill went through me. “No.” I shook my head. “Sorry to cut you off.” But I wasn’t entertaining the idea of separating from her. There was no way she was leaving my sight. The gold in her eyes had shrunk to a small ring of color around her pupils. Already her skin had a gray cast. “I think this’ll about do. If it works, we can build it higher.”
She accepted that with a nod, looking at the monolith to one side of the pyre. “Do you think he’s close enough to it?”
The poor man’s hip was bumped up against the rock. “I believe so.”
“If this doesn’t work, we could bring back some others,” she said, fumbling the tinder with her gloves on.
If it didn’t work, we were going somewhere as warm as the Steppes in the summer, and I was unwrapping all of my solstice gift, then letting her sleep all night in my arms. “Perhaps.” I could always trial her ideas while she slept somewhere secure. I stripped the gloves off my hands, taking the flint from her and ignoring the gray cast to my own nails. The pain wasn’t too bad yet. I’d be okay to do another trip, if I prepared well.
If this didn’t work, I didn’t know that it’d be worth doing another trip, but hope was important. And I could give her that.
The fire crackled to life, and she crouched down before it, huddled deep in her cloak. I moved around, making sure each point I’d laid was lit to reduce the chance of the whole thing failing due to my knowledge of pyres, then crouched beside her to cut some of the wind.
She leaned into me, and my heart swelled. I took her into my arms, wrapping my cloak around her shoulders. We could’ve been riding. There was no point waiting and watching the kindling burn. But I didn’t try to hasten her out.
“You ever think about all the points in your life you made the wrong turn?” she asked me quietly.
Even in the last season I’d made more mistakes than I could count. “I try not to worry on them, but sometimes, yes.” I expected her to respond with some admission or question. When she didn’t, and we just sat together watching the fire climbing slowly over the damp kindling, I began to worry. There was one obvious turn she’d made very recently. “Are you rethinking what happened last night?”
She glanced over, eyes wide with shock. The fine veins around her eyes were clear beneath her skin, and I struggled not to react to that.
How many more days did I have being able to serve her?
“No. Somewhat.” My heart lurched, but she was frowning. “You mentioned difficulty saying no. I think…I think it’s also hard to ask for things?”
Relief rushed through me. “Does it help if I tell you I’d like you to ask for things?”
“No.”
I nodded and realized my heart was racing but settling down now. By the One, that was an adrenaline rush I hadn’t needed. “Is there a time when it’s easier to talk?”
Her eyes were back on the pyre, but I could still make out her shrug. “On the horses was easy. In advance. When—things aren’t happening.”
The image of her panting breaths and arched back lodged firmly in my brain. She hadn’t been talking then, that was for sure. Hunger swept through me, and I turned my attention firmly to the pyre. You are not getting hard while you burn a man. “We’ll chat on the way back, then.” It’d be a good lead-up to unwrapping my gift. “But that’s what made it a wrong turn? Not asking for what you wanted?”
“Oh, it wasn’t wrong, as much as it was not absolutely everything I’ve ever had drift through my head. ” She shrugged again. “I didn’t mean to confuse you. I’ve no complaints. Quite the opposite. I had a lot of fun. I just wish I’d done more, experienced more, and slept less.”
I was definitely getting hard while I burned a man. I hoped he’d understand. “So that question wasn’t prompted by last night?”
“No. No, of course not.” She put her hand on my knee. The flames were small, but the smoke billowed mightily. “There’ve been a lot of times in life I could’ve walked from the paved road. I never took them. Well, not until very recently, I suppose.” Her voice trailed off, and her hand moved off my knee. She hunched down, the picture of failure.
The icy wind crept into the tiny gaps between the threads of my clothes, working its way into my flesh. We sat in a heavy silence that felt right for the side of a pyre.
I should’ve been with Kadan, complaining about sand and playing darts, helping him recover from his injury and keeping his head whole while he supported a rebellion. I could clearly remember Luca’s dismissal as he’d spoken of Ylva’s strength, and the moment after Callum and I had spotted Audrey struggling in Mikus’ arms.
If I could do it all again, knowing what I did now, I’d need to go back further. I’d grab her in the orchard, kidnap her. She could hate me. She could even kill me. But Luca would have his bride, Kadan would have a suitable replacement king, and she’d be safe.
Her head rested on my shoulder. The thought of delivering her to Luca made my blood boil, and not from the oath. But what was the alternative? Send her to the Matri’sion tribes and never see her?
I was a selfish man.
“We should get back,” I told her.
“He isn’t burning yet,” she objected. “Fire cleanses.”
There was no way she could know that. The smoke was too thick, a consequence of the wet, green wood and the leaves that caught and flared. “Regardless,” I said, wishing I could feed her hope rather than stifle it, “I’m required to look after you. You are sort of important to me.”
She straightened like I’d sworn at her, standing. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”
My gut twisted. I wanted to snatch her back and hold her close. I stood, too. “I’m not.”
She shook her head. “Of course you are. That’s only fair. It’s okay.” But it wasn’t. I couldn’t see her mouth or her brow. I couldn’t hear her breath to judge if it had caught at all, but I knew.
I knew, because her heart was too big to not feel horrible about it.
She turned to glance toward the horses, folding her arms hard beneath her breasts. I could see tiny black threads beneath that thin, almost translucent skin. I’d be free soon and the thought left me feeling hollow. “I’m sorry for a lot of things, Audrey. But if we do end up dying here, I won’t be sorry to be with you.”
When she looked at me, her eyes were almost entirely black and sheened with tears. “I’m sorry you’re here. But—I’m glad, too.”
My heart felt heavy. I opened my arms, and she came in close, her hands clasped protectively over her chest. She rested her head on my shoulder and shook with silent tears. The answering grief in me burned my throat as I held her.
Circumstances had led us here, but we’d made choices along the way. We always did. And I was proud of a few of mine. I listened to the crackle of the fire, her quick, rasping breaths, and her muffled sobs.
Grand promises crowded in my mouth, but she wasn’t the sort to be soothed by make-believe. There was little I could give her except some small joys. There was no future and no hope.
But I did have something. “My pledge to you, freely given,” I told her, breathing the words through her scarf and hood. “Is the exact same as the one I gave you under threat of execution, Audrey. You’ve got me, until my heart no longer beats.”
She stiffened in my arms, shaking her head. Rejecting my words. I didn’t let myself worry about that hurt. Saying yes was hard. Saying no was hard. But this wasn’t a situation where either was needed.
“You don’t get to choose what I do with my heart,” I told her, injecting some humor into my voice, hoping she might hear it, not the tears. “It’s mine to give, and I’ve chosen to give it to you. You can decide what you do with it, but it’s yours, regardless.”
She stepped back, wiping her face. Her breath shook. Her hands did, too. “We should go. This isn’t helping us.” The words were thick with well-earned sorrow. “I don’t know if we ought to go to the keep, or…or…” I thought of that cold, foreboding castle that held only pain. “Can you please choose?” she asked, the words wavering, her eyes fixed over my shoulder.
The air didn’t want to squeeze into my lungs. I lifted my hand to my chest, pressing it over my heart as I bowed. “Yes, my lady.”
“Don’t do that,” she pleaded, shaking her head violently. “Don’t do that, please, Chay. Please.”
“Why?” I asked, the ache in my bones mirrored in my heart. I didn’t want to die with doubt in my mind. Better to face the truth.
“Are you—” she pressed a hand to her mouth. “This isn’t about you, Chay. You don’t bow to a woman who’s failed at everything. You don’t toss your life away for?—”
“You worry about what you do,” I told her, cutting over her tirade before it could gather momentum. “And trust me to make my own choices.”
She fell silent, looking off into the distance with an expression that hurt to try to decipher. Before I could, the wind changed direction. Her cloak flurried toward me, and the smoke came a moment after, burning my eyes and coating my throat.
As I went to move her toward the horses, I caught the whiff of burning fabric. She coughed, her hand on my arm, and dragged me clear. Flames leapt where they hadn’t before.
And every ache in my body vanished.
She made a noise like she’d been gut-punched, and I whirled her around, my heart in my throat.
Big, whiskey-colored eyes looked at me. The black lines faded as I watched, and healthy color rushed in. Energy coursed through my limbs, like I’d just had sunlight poured into my very veins. I drew in a deep breath and realized I could breathe without pain.
She reached toward me, fresh tears spilling from her eyes. “Chay,” she said. “Chay. Your face. Your face. Do you feel it?”
I lifted a hand to my face, disoriented. “You’re better.”
“ You’re better,” she said on a sob. “The One, the Wife, and the Son, Chay— you’re better!” And she tore the scarf from her face, laughing as she wept. Her fingers were on my jaw like I was a god and she a newly found believer. And I felt like one.
My world spun. We were going to be okay. But it had nothing at all to do with Barloc and his deities.
Her hands were on my face, pulling me close. I met her lips, cool from the wind and wet from tears. And our hearts kept beating as I lifted her and spun her around, glorying in our strength.