Chapter 60
Allie
My second knock was just as gentle as the first and met with the exact same sharp silence.
“Nadya, you can’t seal yourself from the rest of the world,” I murmured, hoping I was doing the right thing.
I’d always felt a bit off-kilter in my interactions with her, like I didn’t know what would set her off, but Geryll’s passing made every word that much more important.
I couldn’t let her wallow in her room, with the pain and festering thoughts.
Ryker had yanked me out of that state, it was my turn to attempt the same remedy.
Another knock.
More silence.
“If you don’t want to talk to me, I can get Mrs. Thornbrew,” I tried again. “Or anyone else. Or just come down for some breakfast–”
“She’s not there.” Dax’s voice broke the suffocating stillness, making me flinch.
He pushed himself away from the corner of the corridor and strutted toward me.
“How long have you been standing there?” I asked.
Damn those feet of his. He could sneak into Xamor’s war room without the god’s hounds noticing.
“Enough that your teeth left indents in your bottom lip from all that restless chewing.” He raised his brows, but there was a glumness to his usual energy. “You know you do that?”
Heat rose in my cheeks. When Ryker had pointed it out, it had been like a caress, loving a little quirk, not blasting a light on it. It only reminded me he was gone.
“Yes,” I said tersely and nodded at Nadya’s door. “How do you know?”
“So glad you asked.” He crouched, but hesitated at the last moment. “Don’t let anyone know about this little trick. Dara still wonders how I could tell when she was sneaking out late at night. I want to maintain my aura of mystery.”
I sighed. The twins and their strange relationship. “Fine.”
He dragged his fingers along the stone, picking up two white strands of hair I wouldn’t have ever noticed. “I stick one of them to every door during my, shall we say, promenades.”
“Every door?”
“Why would I seal yours when I can hear your delicate feet stomping against my ceiling?” He stood up.
“The fortress gets swept twice every single day. Six in the morning and six in the evening, never a second later. If the strands are or are not on the door or on the floor, I can track people’s movements without having to follow each and every one of them. ”
“That’s–” More brilliant than it looked at first glance. “Really helpful.”
“Vylkor’s an early riser, but Nadya beats him on that front. Mrs. Thornbrew leaves her room about three times per night, I’m thinking bladder issues. I suspect two warriors on the ground floor are having an odd affair and three of them don’t get up in time.”
“You’re deviously brilliant.”
“Thank you,” he said simply. No gloating, no grinning. Just twisting the thick, shiny strands between his fingers.
I gawked. “Is that troll fur?”
“So much stronger than any human locks I’ve ever come across.”
I crossed my hands in front of my chest. “And you just went there to ask them nicely for help and they agreed to give it to you?”
“I lack your interspecies eloquence. But I can pick up discarded fur like anybody else–I think some people call it cleaning?” he said, though his voice lacked that joyful lilt. “We shed, they shed, but theirs is better. I’m taking an entire sack of it when I leave.”
I sighed again. “Fine.”
He frowned. “No Dax, that’s almost stealing?”
“I’m not in the mood for fighting today.” I stared at Nadya’s door. “You have any idea where she is?”
“Probably prowling the deserted streets. She seems like the type to choose isolation instead of talking.” He tapped his fingers on his thigh before hesitantly placing a hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry about Geryll.”
I closed my eyes as another stab of pain raced through me.
“It’s–it doesn’t make sense,” was all I could say through my tightening throat.
He swallowed thickly. “Death rarely does.”
“He was so young.” I shook my head. “It’s not fair.”
“It’s not,” he said gently. “Nothing that has happened in the last few months is fair.”
“No, it’s not.” I rolled my shoulders back. “Now let’s go dig into those memories of yours and hopefully find something–anything–that can help us.”
“My last three remaining truth serum vials and I are at your service.”
“Three?” I gulped.
“Yes. Maybe I can convince your Commander to bring in more ingredients.”
“He–he already left,” I said, feeling hollow.
As soon as the first rays of dawn had shimmered through my windows, he’d gotten up, face still set in stone. We’d fallen into a restful sleep and woke up tangled in each other’s arms, our breaths merging together just like the flow of feelings we couldn’t halt.
We’d exchanged no words, only glances, as he’d gotten ready for war once more. Daggers in his baldric, furs on his shoulders, no life or spark in his eyes.
His fingers had lingered on Geryll’s shield.
“I’ll guard it,” I’d said.
“Thank you,” he’d sighed. “You’ve guarded the crater, now this. I’ve asked so much of you.”
“Not you. Life. I volunteered for the inevitable.” I’d stood up straight in bed, but didn’t dare leave it. If I did, I might have wrapped my arms around him and asked him not to leave again.
“Still.” He sighed. “These sacrifices wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t been in your life.”
“You bear the battlefield, I bear protecting the crater. It’s what we have to do.” I fisted the sheets to keep my hands from shaking. “For now. A time will come when I have to ask sacrifices from you. And I will ask.”
He’d turned then, a flicker of eagerness breaking the hollowness in his eyes. “It would be my absolute pleasure.”
“Then live, so I can profit off you.”
A corner of his mouth lifted for the barest moment, the first rays of sun brushing against the side of his face, making him look like a fallen god. “I will try my very best, Huntress.”
“I’ll keep you to that, Commander.”
The moment he’d left, my room and heart turned cold. I’d jumped out of bed a second later, unable to stand still and face the emptiness alone, and I’d been moving ever since.
“That was fast,” Dax said.
“That’s what’s needed.” I sighed. “Better make the most of those vials.”
Dax wrapped his arm around my shoulders as we walked up the stairs, our steps echoing in the unusually silent fortress. “We’re very close, I can feel it.”
At least he had hope.
All I could feel was a growing sense of discouragement–and a hum I now recognized as Ryker’s presence right at the outskirts of my mind.
Steady and unintrusive, it was no wonder I hadn’t been aware he was right there, all this time.
I focused on that calm, strange point, not truly knowing what to do with it. But I was curious and yearning, so I did.
He felt…mad?
No.
Annoyed?
Yes.
As long as no stronger emotions radiated from his side, I could sigh in relief. But what could make Ryker annoyed on the battlefield, of all things?