Chapter 3 #2
I could no longer see the hole I’d blasted through the tower wall, which is probably why the room felt reasonably warm.
The rug where Caelum had been lying the last time I’d seen him had been removed, probably because it had been soaked in his blood.
A different rug covered that part of the stone, dyed a rich emerald green, with gold threads in a labyrinth pattern at the center.
Someone had changed his sheets.
The black ones I remembered from that morning were now gold.
The silk cover of the duvet was now the same color green as the new rug.
I still held my hands out in front of me, sparking with my magic, when I saw the mage crouched by Caelum’s desk.
Before I looked up to absorb his face, I saw only that he held a book in one hand, and that his other hand was outstretched, with a similar fire crackling around his bare skin under his rolled-up sleeves.
We met gazes, and I saw all the tension leave that handsome face at once.
“Leda,” he gasped.
He lowered his arm, letting out a relieved, anxiety-filled exhale. I saw his hand shaking, sweat standing out on his forehead.
“Amun’s fat, slimy cock,” he exclaimed next, relief still suffusing his voice as he rose to his full height and straightened.
“You scared every drop of blood out of my veins, witch. I thought for certain I was about to be disintegrated. I couldn’t think of a single other person who’d be up here, at least so quietly, apart from one of those frothing, bloodthirsty fanatics, looking for blood. ”
I lowered my own arm, staring at the other mage in shock.
“Alaric.”
The reality of him being there hit into me only then. Before I could stop it, I burst into tears. I think I must have been smiling too, because he grinned at me, his shoulders relaxing for real, despite the strain in his face.
I ran up to him then, and threw my arms around him. I squeezed him tightly, and felt him hold me even more tightly back.
“Oh my god,” I managed, only after holding him for at least a few minutes. “Why didn’t you tell me you were back?”
He only squeezed me more tightly, right before he picked me up and swung me briefly in a circle, making me laugh. I laughed again when he did it a second time, then wiggled to free myself of his grasp so I could look at him.
When he set me down, his eyes looked bright. Mine were still watery, too.
“I didn’t think you’d be here,” he said, wiping his eyes. He waved vaguely around at the tower room. “I don’t mean here. I mean at Malcroix. I thought you’d surely be gone over the break. I mean, why wouldn’t you be?”
I scoffed as I wiped my own eyes. “They told me you might be coming. You thought I’d leave you here by yourself? Over Yule?”
“Who told you?” he demanded, still staring at me with bright eyes.
“Forsooth.”
The tension in his eyes faded slightly as he turned over my answer.
I noticed for the first time how thin he was, how much his clothes hung on him, clothes that had fit him like a glove over the summer when I’d last seen him wear them.
His skin looked overly pale, and I still saw his hands shaking, his face muscles twitching in ways they normally didn’t.
He looked absolutely exhausted, and borderline malnourished.
He also looked like he might be on the verge of a panic attack.
“They didn’t tell you I’d be here?” I asked, forcing a smile.
He scoffed, and I saw him make an effort to school his expression into calm.
“No,” he said after that pause, his voice mock-haughty.
“I haven’t seen Forsooth, but I’m not shocked he’d know a thing that no one at all was supposed to know.
He’s always been more than a bit spooky.
” Thinking, he added, “I suppose your hot, Praecuri cousin might’ve told him.
Or perhaps someone in G.O.R.E. told someone here. ”
He gave me a look that had enough sadness in it, it shocked me.
“I hope you’re lying,” he said accusingly. “I really, really hope you didn’t stay in this drafty, frigid, gloomy, definitely-haunted castle just for me. There have to be a million places you could have spent Yule and the holiday that would have been better than here, Leda.”
I smiled back with an effort, and shoved his arm lightly.
“Name one,” I said loftily, trying not to react to what I felt on his aura. It was hard not to touch him, to not keep reassuring myself he was safe, and real.
Alaric rolled his eyes.
He then promptly counted off places with his fingers.
“Rook’s place in Malibu,” he began shortly, gazing up at the ceiling.
“Harringbone’s outside of Bath. Whatever palatial estate belonging to that dishy Hollywood god you’ve got following you around like a sexy, well-hung puppy.
Mocking’s chateau outside Paris. Darragh’s castle outside Edinburgh…
but my vote would’ve been with the well-hung puppy, frankly.
In addition to the side benefits, I happen to know his father’s got homes in Tokyo, Hawaii, and California.
And probably London and the French Riviera, too. ”
I smacked his arm, laughing.
“Nope, nope, nope, and NOPE,” I said. “And Luc’s decided to stay behind too, by the way, so at least one of those options wasn’t on the table.” I looked around and made my voice a touch lighter. “Bones isn’t back? You’re here alone?”
Alaric blinked, then looked around, seeming to remember where we were.
When he looked back at me, his eyes looked shrewd.
“What are you doing up here, Leda?” he asked.
I hesitated as I thought about how to answer that, then rolled my eyes.
“Visiting the scene of the crime, of course,” I told him loftily.
“Don’t you read the news, Greythorne? I wanted to dance naked where I defeated my sworn enemy, and revel in the royal blood I spilt.
” Looking around at the repaired walls, I shrugged, voice flat.
“Also, I need to make sure I’ve got enough of my patented, mind-altering potions in stock, to feed Bones when he arrives back from hospital.
How else will I convince him to murder the King and destroy all of the remaining royal bloodlines in my name? ”
Alaric snorted a half-laugh.
Even so, a vague nervousness flickered in his hazel irises.
He never stopped looking at me, and I felt a pain in my chest at the mixture of emotions I saw flicker through his eyes. Relief, disbelief, uneasiness, exhaustion, hope, affection, more relief, more exhaustion––they rotated in a bewildering carousel.
“I saw the light,” I explained in my regular voice, when he continued to stare. I looked up at the place where the hole in the stone had been repaired. “Did you do that? Is that why you’re up here? Fixing the place before Bones comes home?”
Alaric’s expression grew openly curious after I said that, too.
“How about a drink?” He reached for my hand tentatively, squeezed it, and gave me a cautious smile.
“I did make a fire. And Cal’s got the good stuff in here somewhere.
” He squeezed my hand a second time, and met my gaze.
“I think we have a lot to talk about, lovely Leda. And no way in the ten realms of hell am I having that conversation sober.”