Chapter Eighteen
WILDER
W ilder woke with a start, damp with perspiration, to find the fire still crackling and Thea thrashing on her bedroll, faint forks of lightning surging across her writhing body.
Panic gripped him at the sight of her anguish. Gods, he couldn’t leave her. Not this time.
He was at her side in a second. ‘Thea,’ he said gently. ‘Thea, wake up.’
She only contorted further, kicking the blanket back, bolts of magic inching down her legs.
Trying to rein in his distress, Wilder spoke louder this time. ‘Thea?’
The shirt she was wearing was drenched with sweat. Her hair had come loose from its braid and was plastered to her neck. She kept twisting, a soft cry of pain on her lips.
Wilder didn’t think. He reached out, his warm hands closing over her ice-cold, clammy skin. ‘Thea, it’s me. You have to wake up, you have to —’
Her fingers shot out, clamping around his arm with surprising strength.
Suddenly, the night sky was tipping and Wilder was on his back.
How?
Thea straddled him, eyes brimming with violence as she pressed a blade to the soft skin of his throat, her lip curled in a snarl. She was panting, her hair now loose and wild around her face as she stared down at him, no recognition in her eyes.
He considered disarming her for a second, but as the knife broke the first layer of skin, he wondered if he actually could.
Her lightning hadn’t hurt him when he’d touched her, but to be on the receiving end of a concentrated bolt would be another thing entirely.
He could feel the current beneath her skin, threatening to crackle into something more devastating.
Something that even Furies-given strength might not stand against.
‘ Thea, ’ he murmured softly instead, letting everything he felt for her coat her name on his tongue, hoping she heard those notes in his voice.
His apprentice blinked. Once, twice.
‘Thea…’
She loosed a breath and realisation dawned. ‘Wilder…’ She scrambled off him, clambering back in horror at the sight of the thin line of blood he could feel trailing down the column of his throat.
‘It’s alright,’ he told her. ‘I’m alright. You didn’t hurt me.’
‘I…’ she gasped, her whole body trembling. ‘I didn’t mean —’
Wilder went to her, wrapping his arms around her without hesitation. ‘You’re safe.’
But when she looked at him, her eyes were still filled with terror.
‘ I’m safe,’ he assured her.
She looked small and vulnerable on her bedroll, her chest still rising and falling in quick succession. Gods, it killed him to see her like that. He hated that he was the source of her anguish.
Gently, he pushed her back down and pulled the blanket up over her, averting his gaze from the thin material of her nightshirt. ‘Rest now.’
It took a long while for Thea’s breathing to steady, and all the while Wilder sat by her, his thumb stroking the back of her hand in reassuring circles.
Friends . They were friends . And friends were there for one another. Friends comforted each other. But the thunderous beat in his chest and the urge to breathe in her scent betrayed him.
He didn’t care. He brought her trembling body to his, hoping that his warmth would help steady her. He’d deal with the consequences of their friendship in the morning, but for now – for now he just wanted to be there for her.
And so Wilder held his apprentice through the night.
* * *
When Wilder woke to the watery rays of dawn and the low mist across the plains, Thea wasn’t beside him. She hadn’t gone far, though; she was there, a few yards away, going through her morning drills, drills he’d specified.
Her brows were knitted together in concentration, her eyes fierce with determination as she moved through each exercise with a refined precision that Wilder had never seen before in a Guardian.
She never flinched, never hesitated, never gave up, and Wilder couldn’t help the swell of pride in his chest at that.
But he noted the haunted look in her eyes, and the shadows beneath them.
Whatever terrors had dragged her from her sleep last night were still with her now.
Wilder wished there was something he could do to help her.
Luckily, there was.
That morning, he trained with her, correcting her form, showing her the best way to protect the more vulnerable parts of her body from strikes that might catch her off guard.
For once, Thea didn’t ask questions, didn’t try to rile him up as they worked.
She simply listened and implemented what he said.
It was unnerving.
She was quiet over breakfast as well, pushing her porridge around in her bowl without actually eating it. Distracted, she stood, as though she meant to pack up.
Not a chance. Wilder wasn’t having any of that. ‘I meant what I said when I first got back to Thezmarr,’ he said.
Thea looked up, as though surprised to find him there. ‘What?’
‘That you need to look after yourself. To keep yourself healthy.’
‘I am —’
‘You’re not eating enough.’ Wilder reached across to the pot over the embers and spooned another scoop of porridge into the bowl she’d left on the ground. ‘We’re not leaving till you eat that.’
‘You can’t be serious.’
‘Oh, I’m deadly serious.’
Thea stared at him for a moment. ‘You’re insufferable.’
Wilder matched her stare, hardening his expression. ‘This is the least of it. Eat up. I don’t want to be here all day.’
He held in his sigh of relief as Thea sat back down with a huff and began to eat again.
* * *
As the days passed, Wilder realised that the woman riding beside him was not the same shieldbearer who had once travelled with him to and from Harenth, sneaking glances at him, studying the way he moved.
Gods, back then she had tested his patience to no end with her stream of questions and her eagerness.
She’d worn him down, though, and eventually, she’d found a weak spot in his armour. She’d seen him – the real him.
And what she’d seen hadn’t scared her. Instead, Thea had given him a gift… She’d shared herself with him. She’d found her place under his skin and in his heart, and there she’d stayed, despite whatever vows they’d made.
The Thea beside him now was different, distant in a way she hadn’t been with him before. It hurt, being shut out. No doubt she still battled with whatever had found her in her dreams, but as the sun grew higher and they rode towards Delmira, Wilder could stand the silence no longer.
‘What can I do?’ he asked her softly. ‘Do you want to talk about the nightmare bothering you?’
Thea’s gaze slid to his, sadness lingering there. ‘It’s not the nightmare that’s bothering me.’
‘What, then?’
Her trembling intake of breath told him he had no idea how close to tears she was. He’d never seen her cry before… How was that possible after everything they’d been through together?
‘I could have hurt you…’ she murmured. ‘Just like Audra said. My magic was out of my control. I overpowered you. I had a dagger to your —’
‘You didn’t hurt me.’
She gave the knife scratch on his neck a pointed look. ‘Didn’t I?’
Wilder couldn’t stand the vulnerability in her eyes, couldn’t stand the thought of being the one to cause such pain. He did the only thing he could think of. He winked at her, and laughed as he touched a hand to the minor cut. ‘This? This is practically foreplay.’
Thea slowly blinked at him. ‘You’re sick.’
He offered a lazy grin. ‘If only you knew.’
Thea shook her head in disbelief, but he could have sworn the shadows behind her gaze retreated a little and a smile played at the corner of her mouth.
His heart lifted at that, revelling in the knowledge that he had the power to banish her monsters.
That he was the one to make her smile. Then his thoughts went south.
Gods, that mouth… He wanted her to do wicked things with that mouth.
Friends, he reminded himself.
‘The road is a far better training ground for a Warsword than the fortress,’ he heard himself say.
Thea didn’t speak, but he saw her tense with interest at his words.
‘I spent much of my apprenticeship travelling with Talemir,’ he ventured, knowing her curiosity about his mentor was near irrepressible. ‘He taught me everything I know. Well, almost everything.’
He was rambling now – why?
Her gaze slid to his. ‘And will you teach me everything you know?’ There was a glimmer of challenge in those eyes.
He loosed a breath. There you are, Princess . ‘Yes.’
‘Then by all means, Warsword, if we’re going to fit your lifetime of lessons into my next two and a half years, you’d best start now.’
Her words were like a deep slice to his gut, and inwardly he cursed that fucking fate stone around her neck and the bitch of a seer who’d given it to her.
But he didn’t let Thea see him falter, didn’t let her see that pain. ‘I hope you’re going to listen for once, Apprentice ,’ he said.
* * *
They didn’t stop to rest as morning bloomed before them.
Instead, Wilder embarked on a series of lessons he’d learnt from both Talemir and Malik over the earlier years of his own apprenticeship.
He had already taught Thea how to shoot game with a bow and arrow, but as they rode across the plains and ridges, he went over the fundamentals anyway, before moving on to how to hunt and track through various terrains with different weapons.
The same rules could be applied for monster hunting.
He had to stop himself from grinning like a fool as they worked their way through the finer points of his lessons.
For beyond everything he knew about Thea – her beauty, her sharp tongue, her determination – he thoroughly enjoyed her company.
She made him laugh, made him want to participate in the world around him, not just carve out wraith hearts alone in the dark.
Even the silence between them was easy and comfortable; each other’s company was more than enough, and words weren’t always needed.