Chapter 25
Iwoke up alone, feeling deeply rested despite my midnight stroll. Harthon was gone, but his musky scent lingered in the blankets, an affirmation that I hadn’t dreamt the events of the night.
As to what those events meant, I hadn’t a clue.
Men and women could share intimate moments without any meaning at all. Some did it only for physical release or distraction. But the way my insides stretched and tickled when I thought of him now told me that was not the case—for me, anyway.
It was nothing more than attraction and comradery, though. It couldn’t be, because with all that Harthon and I had to deal with at the moment, with the constant risk of death, it would be plain foolish to yearn for anything more.
All the time I’d spent worrying for Merelda was plenty to know that caring for someone in this world weakened you.
And I doubted that Harthon, with all of his strength, would ever allow himself to be burdened with any relationship beyond friendship.
Out of all of us, he couldn’t afford to have a weakness.
And yet I still worried about how he would act today. Would he pretend it hadn’t happened? Sweep it under the rug and keep his distance like he had the last time? And if he did, what would I do?
Training with Callen was a sound distraction, but two hours later, anxiety nagged at me as Stefano accompanied me to the stables.
Harthon was already saddling his horse when we arrived, dressed in his usual tunic, leathers, and cloak, his sword holstered at his back and a series of daggers strapped to his chest. No one else was readying a horse.
“Thanks, Stefano. We’ll meet you when we return,” Harthon said, turning and addressing my current lifeline.
Stefano left, and Harthon’s warm gaze landed on me, traveling up my body before reaching my face. A knowing smile curled his lips. “Sleep well?” he asked, and I knew then that he wasn’t going to ignore me as he had the last time.
Absolutely. “It was fine.” I cleared my throat and headed to my mare’s stall, trying to sink into the comfort of the stable’s familiar scent of sweet hay and horse.
While I’d only been learning to ride for a week, I’d already grown somewhat attached to the space and the agreeable mare that Jac had assigned to me.
“I wouldn’t name her if I were you. It’s important to connect with your horse, but don’t fall in love. They always die in battle,” he’d warned me in that matter-of-fact way of his.
It was only another reminder that relationships were tangled, painful thickets.
“If those delicate little snores were any indication, I’d venture to say it was better than fine.”
His low words came over the stall walls, and I nearly tripped and dropped the saddle. Delicate little snores? “I don’t snore.”
Flustered, my fingers fumbled for the straps, and I mentally thanked the mare for being so damn calm. Serious Harthon was easy to handle. Teasing Harthon always turned my face into some hue of crimson.
“Are any of your men coming with us?” I asked, trying to steer the conversation away from our night together.
“No. We can handle anything we come across around the city center.”
We can handle, not I can handle.
I couldn’t help but be pleased by the fact that I was maybe becoming more of an asset than a burden.
The goal of my training was to be able to hold my own, and I was getting better at it.
Even Callen had been surprised at my progress this morning, and it was in no small part thanks to Stefano’s extra help. Soon, I’d start working with weapons.
“You don’t think we’ll go that far?” I asked, leading the mare over to Harthon, adjusting my cloak. It wasn’t terribly cold today, but riding brought a biting wind chill. Sharing the saddle with Harthon all those days had brought me far more warmth than I knew to appreciate at the time.
“We aren’t packing overnight supplies, so the day will naturally limit us. Are you feeling drawn to the south right now?”
I’d felt the pull within me ever since I woke up, but it was faint, almost as if it were a memory. It was nothing like the unquestionable need that’d had me following the ball of light in my dream.
When I told him this, he simply nodded, mounted his horse, and confidently said, “Let’s see how far we get.”
We drew attention as we left the Citadel’s inner walls and navigated the rest of the city.
Amidst the bows, everyone greeted Harthon with his title or some other formality, but to my surprise, some extended those greetings to me.
Not all who regarded me did so with the wariness and fear I’d grown used to.
Harthon must have noticed this too, because when we finally exited the city gates, he said, “It’s because of what you did at the end of the justice hearing. Word spread. They respect you more.”
I gave a small smile at that, falling into a trot beside Harthon as we skirted the city.
Riding had yet to feel natural, and I didn’t control my mare with nearly as much grace as Harthon, who rode as if one with his animal.
But I could steer, stop, and speed into trots and gallops—plenty to get by.
According to Jac, it was far more than most could do at my stage.
The hills and valley that I knew from the tower’s window finally appeared around the curve of the city walls.
My body hummed in response, and relief came at the sensation.
The last thing I’d wanted was to waste our time venturing out of the city.
It still wasn’t as strong as my feeling in the dream, but it was as if I were standing at the base of the tower’s stairs.
We descended into the valley’s tall yellow grasses, and I twisted to find Harthon watching me. “You feel it now, don’t you?”
I nodded, wondering how he knew.
“The gold in your eyes looks brighter,” he observed, and I wished I had a mirror.
I’d never looked at my eyes when I felt the tug. Then again, I never made it a point to study them in general. While my brown irises were long gone, it was still startling to see such unnatural colors on my face. It still felt like they belonged to a stranger, not to me.
I often wondered if they’d be changed forever. Part of me thought they’d turn back to brown once I led Harthon through the tunnels, and I hoped that was the case, even if Harthon thought these eyes were pretty.
As we approached the base of the hills sometime later, we slowed to a walk, giving us a respite before tackling the looming incline. The break was more for me than Harthon, my muscles not used to riding at such a pace for so long.
“We’re still waiting for a window to get to Merelda and Marsik,” Harthon said, clearly displeased with the slow progress.
“How will you know when it’s the right time to go?”
“When Koerlyn doesn’t have so many of his people crawling our borders.
Sneaking through his Territory would be easy for our men, but sneaking out with two untrained people is the difficulty.
Our spies suspect he’ll relax patrols soon, given that we aren’t attacking at the moment.
If we have to, we’ll circle around using the ocean, but it’s a long journey, and the weather this time of year is unpredictable. ”
I wished we could get to them sooner, but the last thing I wanted was for his men to die because of poor timing. Harthon was doing everything he could, prioritizing them while juggling the other crises stacked high on his plate.
“Do you like being Princeps?” I asked.
He seemed so surprised by the question, I wondered if he’d ever been asked it before. I supposed it was safe to assume all Princepes enjoyed their positions, considering the comfort, power, and wealth that usually came with it. But Harthon wasn’t like all Princepes.
“It’s more about duty than liking.”
“You made yourself into Fourth’s Princeps, but you feel like you’re forced into this role?” I didn’t mean the question as a challenge; it was just curiosity.
“I know how it sounds. It seems like I had a choice, but sometimes, the world lays a path for you that you cannot refuse. You’re given a duty to others, whether you intended to have it or not, and you can’t say no. If you do, you’re a worthless coward.”
Just as I had to lead Harthon into the Domus, to the lifesaving resources there, because no one else could. A little more than a week ago, I wouldn’t have understood him.
A little more than a week ago, you were all but a worthless coward.
“What made you realize you have this duty?”
Harthon glanced over, gauging me before returning his sights to the hill ahead. “My father was a bad man. He led a mercenary group, and I grew up as part of them. We did a lot of Tamen’s dirty bidding, and we terrorized people.”
Caught off guard, I schooled my features.
He was unveiling his past. I had deduced that he’d had a difficult childhood, his reaction to the looter boy clearly giving that away.
But when he mentioned his father and Tamen, there was a loathing in his voice that pointed to hatred and horror.
He didn’t elaborate on what dirty bidding meant, but I couldn’t ask him to.
This wasn’t something he spoke lightly about.
It wasn’t something he’d spoken at all about. For some reason, he was willing to now.
Without me even asking, he offered even more. “I grew up in the devastation caused by corruption. I witnessed suffering more horrible than most can imagine. I…participated in it. Caused some of it.” Raw guilt weighed the confession.
“You were a child. You’re blameless,” I reminded him. He was the furthest thing from a terrorizing mercenary. Whatever he was forced into as a child, when he was powerless and didn’t know any better, wasn’t his fault.