Chapter 27
twenty-seven
Ididn’t know how long I waited in the cottage, but long enough to begin worrying. The pain had grown until it pulsated across my thigh and down my calf. I’d done the best job I could, wrapping it with a rag to staunch the bleeding. But it did nothing for the pain.
So I limped and rested until I dared check the windows. The faint ring of sun, while still hidden behind the melancholic gray, had moved. Yet still no sign of Aelen.
My heart pounded ever faster, and I paced until the pain became nothing more than a faint nagging against my abysmal thoughts. I couldn’t continue to wait for Aelen to return, but I was hesitant to run to the stables and make a nuisance of myself.
With every passing minute, I lost hours of light, and I wanted to be able to say goodbye before nightfall came.
So, in a fit of desperation, I dragged myself from the cottage toward his hovel. If he’s not there, then I’ll try the stables, as much as I’d prefer to avoid them. But remaining here was no longer an option.
The closer I limped to his house, the more I hoped he’d be there to look at my wound.
The walk alone made me bleed through the rag, now stained scarlet.
I tried not to look down as I approached his leaning house, knocking once, twice, and a third.
The fourth was a forceful rap, and the fifth, I pounded on the rotted wood.
Pound.
Pound.
Snap.
The rusted hinges gave way just enough, and the door hung slightly ajar. When I pressed it, it swung open with a scraping creak.
“Aelen,” I called through the darkened threshold. No response.
I shouldn’t go in Aelen’s house. I was well aware of how violating that would be, but I’d be leaving in a matter of hours, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t curious.
Aelen was many things, but most of an enigma. So at the chance to pry into the inner workings of his mind, and peer into his life and home, I convinced myself I should look inside before accepting he wasn’t here, and ventured ahead.
It was smaller inside than the exterior had led me to believe, almost a single room.
The only source of light came from the small pane at the very back, letting in a lone beam that illuminated not only the floating motes but the thick layer of dust coating everything.
From the broken-down bed to the rotting, bowing chests and dressers.
Even the hearth's ancient ash contained dust.
Everything about this place was dilapidated. Dead. Had Aelen ever slept here? It didn’t seem like anyone had in decades.
The only thing that looked recent was a single, gilt jewelry box, sitting on a broken chest of drawers. The wan light shimmered off it's filigree like a catching candle.
I shouldn’t have looked. In my heart and soul, I knew it belonged to him. I should’ve kept my hands well away from it. But I couldn’t. My fingers screamed to tip it open. And I did.
The silver clasp came undone easily. I expected music to play.
But there was no joyous melody, only a grating silence, and then a gasp—mine.
A small amulet lay inside, which I picked up with a trembling hand.
It spun on the broken chain, the horrid beam illuminating the sigil of Ovatar, surrounding the mark of the Ifrei.
The same necklace I wore to Deldren’s coronation. The very same torn from me in the cell.
Aelen took this.
I dropped it like I’d been burned, and nearly fell from my feet, just catching myself on the windowsill. But out of the pane, something was wrong. Just outside, was a bent, weeping tree. As gnarled as the others. But on the lowest branch, there was a rope, and hanging from it.
Nenlyn.
His eyes were bloodied masses, and I tried to rip my gaze from them, force myself to run, but I couldn’t. I stared as his corpse swayed in the wind.
Aelen killed him.
I screamed until it shredded my throat, and the shadows all around shuddered and twisted. My feet unbolted, and I ran. The searing in my thigh was pushed the back of my mind as I shot to the cottage.
I need a cloak. One single cloak, so I don’t freeze to death when I take to the skies.
Get the cloak.
Beg Maelindiir.
Leave.
I wanted to keep myself together, hold my seams where they were, but my eyes stung with tears. Betrayed by own body. The ice whipped at my face as I increased my pace, no longer keeping to the paths and running straight through the tree line.
They bent, whipping against my leathers and tearing at my face, and just as I turned the bend—Aelen stood before me, taking my wrist. My heart thundered in my ears, and the color drained from me until I matched the snow beneath my boots.
“Why are you running through the forest? You’re going to get yourself killed.”
I fumbled for excuses, but his grip on my wrist only tightened.
Make an excuse quickly before he puts you in a coffin. He lied. He killed. Nenlyn’s dead.
His look bored a hole into me like a thin, prying knife. Tick, tock, tick, tock.
“I was looking for you,” I exclaimed, trembling and raspy.
“You’re shaking.”
“It’s cold,” I replied. Not a lie.
I searched across his face, but all I found was pain. Where was the person who held me? Loved me? Was that all a lie?
Is he all a lie?
He wrapped an unyielding arm around me and thrust me toward the cottage. “Let’s get you inside so I can look at your leg.”
My eyes trained on the swords still sheathed at his hip, and I bit my tongue. My silence was vile poison, but the words that needed to be said would be a knife across my throat.
And my blade was back in the stable, lying somewhere in the hay.
Aelen gave me no out and ushered me inside. He threw a quick wave to the fire, stoking it until the odor of ash and soot filled the air. The silence was broken by the staggered crackling in the hearth and his oblivious, placid expression.
He pulled out a chair for me, and the long sound of the feet scraping against planking grated on my ears. He tugged me into it, though I fought, before he began prodding at my leg.
“This is a vicious wound. I warned you to be careful around the I’phri. They see you as outsiders.”
You killed him. You hung him.
I searched once more for words, but all that came was accusations and variations of how could you? and I loved you.
I fought the shudders as he worked on my puncture with the tenderest of hands.
I avoided his eyes when he spread the warm healing across my thigh.
While he cleaned the blood and grime away, I glimpsed his bright sapphire—the same color of the pooled orbs the demon bore.
The color of ice and magic. How did I not know? How stupid could I be?
When he finished healing me, his eyes flashed upward, pinning me in his gaze. I couldn’t fall into his spell now. I had to go. If I stayed any longer, I might end up in a tree, too.
How could I be so stupid to trust him?
“You’re unusually quiet. Is everything alright?” he offered, rising.
“Yes,” I replied far too quickly, eliciting a frown and a cocked brow from him. But he merely shook his head and caught the edge of the table.
“Are you chilly? You’re still shaking.”
My heart thundered, knocking painfully in my chest. It ached as my gaze flicked across the room for any out, landing longingly on the door. I couldn’t just get up and walk out. I certainly couldn’t run, either. And by the door hung the cloak, in the same place it always was.
“I’m cold,” I blurted. “Could I have the cloak, please?”
He studied me but nodded, grabbed it, and handed it to me. I wasted no time draping and tying it.
He took the seat beside me and tried to pull me closer, but I glanced over my shoulder.
At the closed door that led to the bedroom.
He kept it closed to keep the chill away.
But just behind that small door was a window—and a weapon.
I’d kept that knife in there since the moment Aelen gave me a new blade.
“I found something you might enjoy,” he said, tugging something from his pocket and flashing it for me. A deck of cards. Nenyln’s deck of cards. Ice shot through my veins, and my pulse increased.
“How thoughtful,” I whispered, trying desperately not to let my voice break.
He shuffled the deck. “Would you like to play?”
“Certainly,” I squeaked.
He knitted his brows but began handing me cards. “Are you alright? You still seem unwell. I know the I’phri must have given you a scare…” he trailed off and gave me a genuine look that flipped my guts.
I shot my head around, staring at him. Now was the time for the perfect face I’d mastered in the castle, placid nothingness. Give him nothing. No fear. No anger. Nothing at all.
Without a word, I pulled a card. Ace of knights, one of the best cards in the game, but combined with every remaining one in my hand, I’d lose. But with my best poker face, I smiled warmly, eliciting a soft blush on his cheeks.
“I assume that’s bad for me.”
“I’ll never tell,” I replied through gritted teeth. “I need to get a quilt. I’m still rather cold. I think I lost a lot of blood.” The perfect lie, but I laced my tone with a hint of arousal. Anything to get his guard down.
He jerked up from his cards. “I should get it.”
“I can get it. There’s no need.” I said, jumping up before he could.
My leg ached, but not so badly that I was bleeding out or limping horribly.
I fought off the pain and made my way into the room, shutting the door as quickly as possible.
I felt around for my hidden blade. The shadows licked and shivered in the corners, vibrating uncomfortably, but I ignored them.
He’d investigate why I shut the door sooner rather than later. I had minutes to mere seconds to flee.
With a loud and forced cough to cover the noise, I lifted the thin bedframe and pushed it against the wall, just below my iced-over escape hatch. The seedy, rusted light of sunset trickled through the uneven, warped pane, and I coughed again, using the hilt to crack it.