Chapter 58
HONOR
“Thank you, sweetheart.”
“I told you, Evandra. I’m happy to do it,” I said, washing up in the bucket beside her bed. I turned away from the window, wiping my hands on my dress. Saski had been kind enough to send clothing for me, but this dress was beginning to look like the one I’d worn in Astana.
“No one can possibly be happy cleaning an old lady’s ugly end,” Evandra laughed, a wheeze trickling out as she exhaled.
I chuckled, turning around to fuss with her blankets. “I’m happy to take care of you. Besides, you’ll always be indebted to me. How could you ever say no to the woman who wiped your bottom?”
She barked a laugh, but it soon devolved into an echoing cough, and I felt terrible for being the cause of it. Marella and I had promptly discarded Dewalt’s order to stay within the fortress, instead helping those who were unable to leave the shadow of it. Even if they weren’t the most pleasing of chores, they kept me from being idle. Evandra was kind, and she needed my help. Besides, she had plenty of gossip to share with me after people-watching out her window all day. If anybody could help me and Marella keep an eye out, it would be her.
“Since the girl isn’t with you, tell me true,” Evandra said, grabbing my wrist with an extraordinarily strong grasp. “They said the forestborn woman was likely dead. Why am I looking for her every day?”
The way she said the word irked me. Forestborn , as if it were a curse.
“They found quite a bit of her blood; you’re right. But it’s possible she was trying to use her magick. Or perhaps it was a ruse.”
Marella hadn’t been the one to tell me, but I’d looked into what she’d said about Aida. Her blood had covered the walls, more than Raj’s had. Aida had either put up a tremendous fight or a tremendous farce, and there was no way to know which it was unless we found her. The theory within the fortress was that Raj had fought back, and Aida had run off to die somewhere. When Fletcher finally arrived, in one piece and mostly healed from our attack, he’d confirmed what one of the higher ranking soldiers had said; her elven blood was splattered everywhere, but no magick lingered.
When given leave to clean it, Marella had rubbed her skin raw to rid her father’s den of both their blood. Marella’s desire to find Aida hadn’t lessened in the days I’d been here.
“Well, if she’s got that much sense to fake it, I’d think she’d have enough sense to stay away.”
I nodded, raising my eyebrows at her in agreement. But what else was there to do? With no body and no answers, Aida was our only hope for Marella to find closure.
“Ah, it seems they’re back,” Evandra said, nodding toward the window. Shoving past the corner of the bed so I could get a better look, I stumbled to the window facing the fortress. Sure enough, a soldier was tying blue fabric to his guard station.
“I have to go,” I said, leaning over and kissing the woman on the forehead before running from the room. Out the door, down the steps, and halfway down the street, I realized I’d left my bag of supplies. But I didn’t care.
Dewalt had been gone since the day we’d arrived in Nara’s Cove, and it had been a thorn in my foot the entire time. Though I’d prepared myself for his distance, I couldn’t pretend it hadn’t hurt when he left the way he did.
I knew it was silly.
I knew it wouldn’t be safe to drag me along, but I had supposed I’d have at least one more night with him before he went frigid. But that had been wishful thinking at best, arrogance at worst. Why would I be the one to cause him to change the way he viewed the world?
In my darkest of moments, I’d convinced myself that all he saw in me was conquest. The novice, unsullied by the touch of anyone but him, could feel like quite a prize. Though I’d managed to find sense, knowing that at the very least, he did care in his own way, the idea that I wasn’t enough for him lingered and soured in my stomach. As I rushed through the empty street, I rehearsed what I would say to him. My feelings on the matter were coarse distress, but even as I walked into the fortress behind a trickle of others seeking refuge, not a single unkind word came to mind.
I missed you. Did you miss me?
By the time I rapped on his door, I hadn’t been able to entirely dismiss such tenderhearted thoughts, but they soon left me. Moments passed, and I realized he was avoiding me. As I waited for him to answer, impatience heated my blood, bathing my bones in something wicked.
“Is it customary to not answer your door in a timely manner when you become a general?” I asked. When he didn’t answer, I knocked harder. “Or is it just easier to avoid complicated conversations?” Though I didn’t hear him, a shadow moved beneath the door, confirming his presence and his unwillingness to see me. Perhaps he was gathering his nerve to tell me I’d gotten the wrong idea about things, and that he would be ending whatever nonsense I convinced myself was more than it was. Saski’s words came to me, her insistence that fear ruled Dewalt’s actions, but I couldn’t bring myself to believe that. I was not worth such fraught decision-making.
Closing my eyes, I inhaled deeply. I would not allow myself to be made a fool, heartsick over the inattention of a man who had never given love freely. I deserved a boundless love, after everything I’d been through, and it was clear Dewalt couldn’t give me that. Not yet, anyway. But that wasn’t his fault.
“I have to stop by the armory and change someone’s bandages, but after that, I’ll be in my room. Whenever you want to talk, come find me,” I said, pressing my forehead to the door. Sighing, I spoke low enough I wasn’t sure he’d be able to hear me. “You really hurt my feelings, Walt.” I couldn’t afford to lose another person in my life, and so I would let Dewalt slip between my fingers. Forgiveness would choke my anger at the root as long as I could keep him near.
As I made my way into the courtyard, turning toward the armory, Marella called out from behind me. “Katherine’s waters broke!” she said, gesturing inside.
“Oh, skies,” I whispered, remembering that Katherine had many weeks left in her pregnancy. I murmured a prayer to Rhia, pleading for the safety of the babe. Since I’d left Astana, I’d grown more confident in my relationship with the goddess, and found myself seeking her comfort as I once had. I was learning it didn’t have to be all or nothing like I’d been taught my entire life.
With confidence and peace to define my own relationship with the gods, I’d found something that worked, and there was no small satisfaction in it for me. “Rhia, please show them mercy,” I murmured, grateful to serve her in a way which felt more true than anything I’d done under the Myriad.