Chapter 18 #2
I’m still basking in the afterglow of my feast when the chair beside me scrapes loudly against the floor.
I stiffen.
I’d already noticed that every other seat along the bar was conspicuously empty. I frown, irritation flickering. I’m not in the mood for company, least of all a hopeful suitor emboldened by ale and music.
“Hello,” a man says beside me.
I’m already preparing myself to fend off whatever clumsy flattery he’s worked up the courage to offer, but when I turn, the words die in my throat.
“Rollin?”
He smiles and nods, and though I only knew him briefly at the Aurevault, his face is etched too clearly into my memory for there to be any doubt.
“But how…” I stop myself, suddenly acutely aware of the darkened corner of the room, of the presence I know is watching even if I can’t quite see him.
I shift closer, angling my body so my back shields Rollin from view, and lower my voice.
“How are you here? Pax said you were… that you didn’t survive the night. ”
Rollin nods once. “I wouldn’t have,” he admits quietly. “I’m certain of that. But luckily, I didn’t have to.”
I lean in, studying him more closely now. He looks well. Color warms his cheeks. There’s flesh on his bones. Nothing like the hollow-eyed, exhausted miner I remember. “Then how did you escape?”
His mouth tilts into a small, knowing smile. “I didn’t,” he says. “Lord Luceran released me.”
For a heartbeat, I’m convinced I’ve misheard him. That the cold has crept into my ears and dulled my senses.
“He… released you?”
“I can’t explain it,” Rollin continues. “He came to me in the night, when I was certain I would freeze to death. He opened the cage, wrapped me in a fur, and put me into a carriage. He told me my service was complete. The carriage took me home.”
The words spin through my mind, over and over, until they begin to settle into something resembling sense. I glance over my shoulder, toward the shadows, where a flash of blue and gold gleams faintly in the darkness.
Those eyes have seen through my feeble attempt at shielding Rollin. But there is no anger in them. Because Rollin didn’t escape.
“That’s wonderful, Rollin. Where is your family now?”
He gestures across the room to a table near the hearth, where a woman and four young girls clap along with the music, laughter lighting their faces.
Just seeing them softens him entirely. His smile widens until it seems too large for his face. “We’re heading to Rethmar,” he says. “Starting over somewhere new.” He laughs softly. “Somewhere warm.”
Then his gaze drifts back toward the shadowed corner. “Do you think I should thank him? I never had the chance.”
I shake my head gently. “Probably best to keep your distance in case he changes his mind.”
Rollin considers that, then nods. “You’re right. Then I’ll thank you instead.”
“For what?” I ask, brow lifting.
“For speaking up for me when you didn’t have to.”
My chin dips, my shoulders sag. “Little good it did you.”
“Perhaps,” Rollin says quietly. “Perhaps not. All I know is that never before has Lord Luceran shown the kind of mercy he showed me that night, and I cannot help but wonder if it was your words that stirred it in him.”
“I doubt that very much,” I reply, a soft scoff threading through my voice. As if anything I said could have altered the will of a Fae lord. “But I am glad to see you free.”
“It seems you are as well,” he says.
“Not quite,” I tell him. “I’m going to visit my father.”
Rollin’s brow creases. “Just a visit?”
I nod. “Then I will return to Castle Frostwyn.”
His frown deepens. “And Lord Luceran is traveling with you?”
I nod again, still not fully registering why that might seem strange.
Rollin says nothing more, but his gaze drifts away, his mouth twisting into a faint, knowing half-smile.
“What?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “Nothing at all. It seems the spirit of kindness has taken Lord Luceran quite suddenly… and for no particular reason.”
I frown, keenly aware of the teasing edge beneath his words.
“I should return to my family,” he says then. “Safe travels to you.”
He moves back across the room, wrapping his wife and daughters in his arms, holding them as though they might vanish if he loosens his grip.
I turn on my stool, my gaze drawn back to the corner where Luceran sits.
His face remains hidden in shadow, but those eyes gleam like distant stars against a moonless sky. Why would he release Rollin after condemning him? It cannot be for the reason Rollin believes. There is no world in which my protest alone swayed a being like Luceran Frostwyn.
And yet.
What if it did?
What if my anguish cracked something open inside him, just enough to spare a life, to grant freedom instead of death? If so… what else might thaw if he allowed more of that frozen heart to feel?
I remain staring into the darkness, oblivious to anything but those eyes, and somehow that is enough to send warmth rippling through me.
Perhaps it is the heat of the inn. Or the ale. Or the satisfaction of a full belly.
Or perhaps it is simply happiness.
My foot begins to tap before I realize it, keeping time as the music quickens. Boots pound harder against the floor, the rhythm intensifies, and the musicians attack their instruments with renewed passion, sound filling every corner of my head.
Before I know it, I’m on my feet.
My hips sway instinctively as I gather a corner of my dress in my hand, fabric swirling as I step toward the dance floor. Laughter greets me. Hands clap in welcome. Voices rise in harmony as the music carries us all.
I spin, arms lifting, skirts flaring as the world blurs into color and sound and movement, turning faster and faster until there is nothing left but rhythm and joy.
Then everything shifts.
The spinning halts, sudden and breath-stealing, and arms slide firmly around my waist, pulling me forward until I am pressed flush against a hard chest. Cold meets warmth, his chill brushing against the heat racing through me, and the contrast sends a sharp shiver down my spine.
I look up.
Luceran’s eyes lock onto mine as he moves with me, slow at first, as though testing the rhythm between us. His hands are tight at my waist, holding me exactly where he wants me. He does not look away. He does not blink.
The pace builds.
He moves faster now, guiding me through the steps, but never loosening his hold, never allowing even the smallest distance between us.
Slowly, cautiously, I lift my hands and loop them around his neck, barely able to reach, my fingers brushing cold skin and silk-soft hair.
My breath catches. My face must be a picture of disbelief, because I can scarcely comprehend what is happening even as my body responds to it.
And then he smiles.
Not a faint curve of amusement or an irritating smirk.
A real smile.
And in that moment, with music surging around us and bodies moving in time, with his hands steady at my waist and my heart racing far too fast, we are no longer simply standing together.
We are dancing.
The music surges, faster and louder, the rhythm driving harder through the room until the floorboards shudder beneath our feet.
Luceran moves with it effortlessly, guiding me through turns and steps that are far less polite than anything I’ve ever danced before. There is no careful distance, no ceremony in the way he holds me. His hands stay firm at my waist as the pace quickens, as the heat coils tighter in my chest.
I feel everything.
The hard breadth of his shoulders beneath my palms. The strength in his neck as I cling there, the tendons flexing with every movement. The faint ridges of runes etched into his skin beneath the thin fabric of his shirt.
There is want in the way he dances. He aches for it, and he does not bother to pretend otherwise.
Around us, the inn has changed. The laughter has softened into murmurs, voices threading through the music as eyes linger and whisper. I hear speculation and disbelief. I hear his name and the word pet spoken more than once, but it all fades beneath the roar of blood in my ears.
Then, without warning, he lifts me.
His arms slide beneath me, strong and sure, tucking beneath my backside as he raises me with infuriating ease until our eyes meet. The crowd gasps, but Luceran pays them no mind. He turns slowly, far too slowly for the frantic beat of the music.
The world slows.
The music stretches thin, distorts, then disappears entirely, until it feels as though there is nothing left but the two of us, my heart hammering so violently I swear he must feel it.
He leans in.
So close that his lips hover a breath from mine.
“It’s time to go,” he says.
The room crashes back into existence all at once.
The stares, the silence, the sudden awareness of myself.
Of how my dress has ridden up where he holds me.
Of the heat flooding my skin, my cheeks flushed crimson.
Of the buttons at my bodice that have somehow come undone, the swell of my breast visible beneath the loosened fabric.
“Put me down,” I hiss, tucking my hair back with trembling fingers. “Now.”
“As you wish,” he replies.
He lowers me slowly. Excruciatingly so. I feel every solid plane of him beneath his shirt as my body slides down, every hard ridge and line, until my boots finally touch the floor.
I might as well still be airborne.
My knees threaten to give way as he looks down at me, and in that moment I feel painfully small, because he knows. He knows exactly what he has done to me.
It was deliberate.
But why?
Why would he do this? Why would he make me feel like this?
“I will pay the innkeeper,” he says calmly, “and wait for you in the carriage, should you wish to… freshen up.”
The way he says it.
The way his gaze drags over me, dishevelled, flushed, undone, leaves no doubt that he sees every detail.
Then he turns his back on me.
He does exactly as he says, coins clinking softly as he settles the bill, before ducking beneath the doorway and stepping back into the cold night, leaving me rooted to the floor.
Unable to move.
Unable to breathe.
The ghost of his touch still lingering on my skin.