Chapter 29 #3
“Of course it did.” Everything about Rowan disturbed him in one way or another. “But I hired her to guide me to an old fort I think the witch has claimed as her nest. Two hundred cord for serving as guide. A bonus of two hundred for finding you.”
Daris cursed. “She was guiding you to the nest, this witch’s daughter whose mother you branded?”
Casrian winced. “It sounds bad, I know. What are the odds that we run into each other again here? Maybe we were brought together for a reason.”
“By whom and for what purpose? That’s the question. You trust her?”
God, did he? He didn’t know how the hell he felt about her. Confused, mostly. Protective. Lustful. Exasperated. Torn. Some uncomfortable mix of attraction and admiration and terror.
“It was use her or wait for reinforcements from the capital,” he said bluntly.
“She wasn’t overly enthusiastic about bringing me into the woods.
She didn’t lead me into a trap. We’ve run into witch-touched brigands and familiars.
A bear. She’s fought beside me for days.
She’s being well compensated for the risk and her time.
It was a good bargain for her. I trust her to hold up her end of it. ”
“Four hundred cord was a good bargain for her to walk into the Black Woods after a witch?”
“She needed the money.” And he’d planned to do more than just pay her four hundred cord. He’d wanted to save her from Toam. “I promised to help relocate her mother when this is over. And I changed my will, naming them as my heirs should I die before we get out.”
He wanted Daris to know what he’d done so there wouldn’t be any problems if he didn’t make it out. Daris just stared at him like he’d gone crazy.
“Do they know how much you’re worth to them dead?”
“I doubt it.”
She hadn’t asked and he hadn’t told her.
He was sometimes amazed at how much wealth he’d accumulated.
The townhouse, he’d inherited from his mother.
The estate was a gift from his father. The baronetcy was only a title with no land.
He’d saved one of the king’s nephews on that one.
He saved most of his pay. What did he have to spend it on?
He hadn’t lied to Rowan. He was a bastard who’d grown up in an orphanage.
He lived in the barracks when he was at the capital.
But he was also the captain of the finest patrol to serve the king, and that came with compensations.
He wasn’t wealthy, but he wasn’t poor either.
House Dain didn’t allow even its bastards to go about in rags.
Daris snorted. “Let’s hope she doesn’t find out before you can write a new will.”
He didn’t know if he would change it. He had no family and he owed Rowan and her mother. Maybe he’d add Asher’s child to the will if Asher did not survive.
“She’s pretty,” Daris said. “Her mother was too. I remember not liking the way the mayor looked at her.”
Casrian watched Rowan’s slender arms as she folded one of the bandages into a pad and placed it on the wound. “She’s too skinny. I think she’s malnourished.”
Daris made a noncommittal sound. “A girl that pretty can usually find a way to fill her belly.”
Casrian gave his friend a disgusted look. “Don’t talk about her like that.”
Daris searched his face. “I see.”
And damn it, he suspected that Daris actually did see some of what was going on in Casrian’s head.
They’d been friends a very long time and Daris was smart.
He was a younger son of the powerful House Kindan and often picked up on nuances that Casrian didn’t catch.
It was usually a valuable trait to have in his second. Except when it was directed at him.
He understood Daris’s misgivings. He shared most of them, or had, until he got to know Rowan better. Daris didn’t even know the worst parts.
Casrian still didn’t know if he believed her about the trees. The witchstone’s silence while she navigated through the woods said it wasn’t magic, but it was something. He suspected it was a quirk of her fae blood, but there were no fae around to ask.
He didn’t trust it. It was dangerous. All of the fae had died believing they were safe in their magic.
The Church would kill her if they knew.
But Rowan wasn’t evil. Frustrating. Prickly as a thistle.
Irritatingly intelligent. Stubbornly loyal even when it was to the wrong people.
She distrusted the king and the Church and witch hunters, everyone he was sworn to serve.
But she was fiercely protective of charm peddlers and drunkards.
She was unrefined and as bluntly crude as any soldier he’d ever served with.
She was a liar and fascinating and strange and impossible.
But she wasn’t evil.
“We’ll send her back with Sol,” he said finally. “It will take him a few days to get back on his feet anyway. She can direct the reinforcements our way when they reach the woods.”
Daris nodded, as if he were only accepting an order and hadn’t just forced Casrian’s hand. That’s what brothers were for, though, wasn’t it? To guard each other’s backs? Daris was his brother. Asher was his brother. Kenet too and all the rest. Whatever Rowan was to him…
There would be time to figure it out once everyone was safe.