Chapter Twenty-eight
WILDER
W ilder cursed Anya as he and Thea took to the passageways again, packs hoisted high on their backs, weapons strapped in place.
He had been on the move for the better part of a year, barely staying in the same spot for more than a single night at a time.
Now, he was on the road again, with more conflict on the immediate horizon.
‘You’re quiet,’ Thea ventured as their boots crunched over wet gravel.
‘I’m always quiet,’ Wilder countered, picking up the pace.
‘Horseshit. You were quiet when we first met because you were a grumpy bastard, but you warmed up after a time.’
‘I’m still a grumpy bastard.’
‘True,’ Thea said with a sideways glance at him. ‘What are you thinking?’
‘Honestly?’
‘Honestly.’
Wilder wanted to tell her that although they’d been intimate, although he’d held her hand, there was still an ache in his heart.
He’d hurt her, but she’d hurt him too. And now that her hunt for him was over, that hurt lingered even as the dust settled.
But it was too heavy a subject to unburden here and now.
Instead, he sighed. ‘I miss my fucking cabin.’
Thea’s head snapped in his direction and she looked at him in utter disbelief. ‘You can’t be serious.’
‘I’m deadly serious,’ he replied flatly.
‘We’re on the brink of war. We’re allying with shadow-wielding teenagers . Monsters with eight eyes and eight fucking legs are coming through the Veil, trying to kill us. And you miss your cabin?’
‘I don’t think you understand the gravity of the situation,’ he told her. ‘Can you imagine the state of my plants? I bet Malik hasn’t watered a single fucking thing.’
Though it hurt to mention his brother, it was worth it when Thea looked at him as though he’d grown two heads, before a smile broke across her face and she tipped her head back, laughing.
There wasn’t a more glorious sound.
Except for —
He promptly cut that thought off before it bloomed into something dangerous.
‘Glad you find my misery amusing, Apprentice.’
‘Am I really your apprentice anymore?’ she asked, still smiling.
Gods, he could look at that smile all day.
‘Tal called me his apprentice long after I passed the Great Rite,’ he told her. ‘Mainly just to piss me off.’
‘Isn’t that why you do it to me?’
‘Maybe.’
For a moment it was as it had been before, before everything had gone to shit.
A little reprieve, a little reminder of how easy, how comfortable it could be.
They hadn’t been alone since he’d brought her to climax with his fingers in the tent.
The very thought of it heated his blood even now.
But time was not on their side, if it ever had been.
They needed to keep moving, to secure a safe entry for Anya and the rest.
‘Who are we meeting, anyway?’ Thea asked, adjusting the straps of her pack and rolling her shoulders beneath its weight.
‘Allies.’
‘There’s the cryptic Warsword I know and…’ She trailed off. ‘Will Cal and Kipp be there?’
‘Yes, this is the meet point I told Torj about. They should be joining us there.’
The surge of relief was obvious on Thea’s face. Wilder knew that while she trusted the Bear Slayer with her friends, a part of her wouldn’t rest easy until she clapped eyes on them again herself. The sooner that happened, the better.
‘Last I heard, Torj was trying to get Esyllt onside, and Audra,’ he continued. ‘I get the feeling she’s been waiting for this for twenty years.’
‘Audra’s coming to… this meet point?’
Wilder shrugged. He didn’t want to get Thea’s hopes up, not about Audra or whoever else might show up. ‘I guess we’ll see.’
He’d asked Torj to put the word out discreetly, and to trusted friends of the guild only. It was time Thezmarr knew how deep its own corruption ran, and it was time for it to play its part in the war to come.
‘No more questions?’ he prompted.
Thea seemed to consider this before she spoke again. ‘I have endless questions,’ she told him slowly. ‘But I feel as though I no longer have the right to ask them…’
He hated the tentativeness in her tone, but he appreciated the raw honesty of her words, because he felt the same.
‘It’s guilt, among other things,’ he said quietly. ‘I feel it too.’
‘I don’t… I don’t know how to move past it.’
‘Little by little,’ he told her. ‘Perhaps we start with a question each, and go from there… What do you think?’
Thea glanced at the seemingly endless tunnel ahead. ‘I guess we have time.’
He huffed a laugh at that. ‘I guess so. You first.’
Thea was quiet for a time, but he didn’t press her.
At last, she looked at him and he saw that same sorrow in her eyes as before, the same regret beneath the surface. ‘Do you think we can go back to how it was?’
‘We’re not starting out small, then…’ he murmured.
She turned away, her gaze now trained ahead with militant focus.
‘Thea,’ he said, pulling her to a stop, waiting until those stormy eyes met his. ‘I don’t think we can go back…’ he said slowly, trying to choose his words carefully.
‘Then what —’
‘I don’t want to go back,’ he said, more firmly this time. ‘Not back to what we once were. But I want to go forward, to what we could be.’
The words hung between them, and Wilder had never felt so naked, so vulnerable in all his life. But he was done with half-truths and lies. He was done with wearing whatever mask suited the occasion. She had asked for honesty more than once, and so honesty was what he would give.
He felt her exhale before she nodded. ‘And you? What’s your question?’
There were a million things he wished to know, a million more he wished they could have spent the past year uncovering together, but in this moment, he needed to ask a question not for him, but for the fate of the midrealms.
He motioned for them to keep walking, holding the torch out before them, illuminating the rocky path ahead.
‘Has there been any sign of your magic?’
Thea didn’t break her stride, but he sensed her hesitation. ‘That’s your question?’
‘That’s my question.’
For a moment there was no sound but for the drip of moisture from the cave walls and their footsteps.
‘The answer’s no. No magic,’ she said at last. ‘Sorry to disappoint you.’
‘You haven’t,’ Wilder replied.
But the sigh that escaped her told him that she didn’t believe it.
‘They were counting on having another storm wielder at their disposal, weren’t they?’ she asked.
‘It was discussed.’
‘At length, I’m sure,’ she said, sounding resigned.
‘So?’ he challenged. ‘Fuck them.’
She raised a brow. ‘Fuck them? The rebel forces you’ve broken your vows and about a hundred laws to ally with?’
‘I’m yet to make my peace with all that,’ he admitted. ‘But yes. That’s how I feel. You’re more than your magic, Thea. You’re more than any one thing. And fuck anyone who says otherwise.’
A small smile tempted her lips, and Wilder had to take pride in that.
‘Have they tried Wren? Although her last meeting with our dear older sister didn’t go so well,’ Thea ventured.
‘I don’t know. There are some things Anya won’t share with the likes of me.’
‘Because of me?’
‘Something like that.’
‘Sorry to keep you from the inner circle.’
Wilder shrugged. ‘Sometimes it’s nice not to be in the thick of all the bullshit.’
‘I don’t believe you for one moment, Warsword,’ she quipped, sounding a little lighter. ‘So, Dratos is something else…’
‘Oh?’ Wilder quirked a brow in her direction. ‘He caught your eye, did he?’
‘Jealous?’
‘A lesser man might be.’
‘But you’re not a lesser man.’
‘Not last time I checked, Princess.’
They rounded a corner, and the distinct scent of fermenting liquor hit Wilder’s nostrils.
‘We’re nearly there,’ he told Thea.
‘Already?’
‘We weren’t going far. Just cross your fingers we can slip in unnoticed.’
‘I don’t know if you realise this about yourself, but you’re not exactly the average citizen of Aveum. Isn’t the entire military might of the midrealms out hunting for you as we speak?’
‘Which is why you’re going in first.’ Wilder shoved the torch into the nearby sconce and felt his way along the wall until he found the divot.
‘Where are we?’ Thea asked.
Wilder pushed the hidden door inward with his shoulder, the hinges rusted with disuse. Snatching up the torch again, he stepped inside, motioning for Thea to follow.
Her brow furrowed at the sight of various casks and shelves of dark bottles covered in dust. ‘You’ve brought me to a cellar,’ she said blankly.
Wilder couldn’t help but grin. ‘Not just any cellar.’
‘No?’ Thea scoffed. ‘I’d hate for the rebel forces to meet in a less-than-average crawl space…’
Wilder laughed. ‘It’s far more than that. This is the cellar to one of the best taverns in the midrealms.’
He located the staircase leading up to a trapdoor, waiting for Thea at the top. And when she joined him, he lifted the door, light flooding the cellar.
‘Welcome to the Singing Hare, Thea.’
Her eyes widened, and in an instant, she yanked the trapdoor back down, muting the noise of fiddles and chatter from above.
‘Are you fucking mad?’ she exclaimed. ‘You want to just walk into a fucking pub, when —’
‘No,’ he said calmly. ‘ You’re going to walk into the fucking pub. I’m going to follow. At a distance, until we know it’s safe. Then I’m going to buy you a drink.’
Thea glared at him. ‘You’re a Warsword of Thezmarr and that’s the best plan you can come up with?’
‘Got anything better, Apprentice?’
She made a noise of irritation. ‘At least wait until it’s less busy.’
‘This is less busy.’
‘Furies save me,’ she muttered, readying herself. ‘Fine. Here goes nothing.’
Without another word of warning, the hatch was opened again and Thea emerged from the cellar, moving gracefully and confidently, as though she had been to the Singing Hare a hundred times before.
Wilder waited a few moments before he followed, drawing his hood up over his face and adjusting the fall of his cloak to hide the swords at his belt.
The Singing Hare was exactly as it had been the last time he’d visited – warm and raucous and welcoming. Somewhere in the next room, a pair of fiddles crafted a merry melody, while the crowd clapped and no doubt danced along.
He emerged from the back room, spotting Thea lingering by the bar. The place was rammed with patrons, so busy in fact that Wilder couldn’t move an inch without brushing up against someone. He could feel Thea’s gaze as he crossed the space, trained on him until he came to stand at her side.
‘What’s your poison, Princess?’ Wilder asked, signalling to the bartender.
But he didn’t get to hear Thea’s drink order, because someone bumped into him from behind, knocking his hood back from his face. And the man behind the bar froze, dishrag in hand, eyes narrowing at the sight of Wilder.
‘I know you,’ the barkeep said, sliding the rag and empty tankard he was holding onto the counter. ‘You’re that fallen Warsword…’
The music stopped, the chatter ceased, and everyone was suddenly looking at Wilder.
He grimaced, particularly as he saw several burly men get to their feet, clearly thinking of being heroes for a night. Beside him, Thea was doing the same as he was – assessing their odds. There was no way they’d leave this place without killing countless people.
Silence throbbed through the tavern, and Wilder shifted on his feet, judging the distance to the exit, gauging just how close the quarters were and how to do the least amount of damage —
Someone cracked their knuckles. A chair screeched as it was pushed back across the stone floor. The distinct note of steel singing as it left its sheath rang out.
‘Told you this was a bad idea,’ Thea muttered, her hand drifting to the grip of her sword.
‘What’s that?’ The barkeep’s voice cut through the tense quiet. He was pointing at Wilder’s chest.
Exchanging a baffled look with Thea, Wilder glanced down. ‘What?’
To his surprise, the barman approached, leaning across the counter and tugging at something in his pocket.
Wilder baulked. ‘What the fuck?’
‘ I’m asking the questions…’ The man pointed again. ‘What’s that?’
Shaking his head in disbelief, Wilder spotted the faded yellow square of fabric sticking out of his breast pocket, recognising it as the piece of cloth Kipp had given him to wipe his bleeding nose weeks ago.
‘What’s it look like?’ he snapped, balling his fists. ‘It’s a handkerchief, you fucking idiot.’
‘Where’d you get it?’ the man asked, glancing at the patrons who had closed in around them.
‘A friend. What does it matter?’ Wilder replied, growing even more irate as the man pulled the material completely from his shirt pocket and spread it across his dirty palm, staring at the embroidered fox in the corner in wonder.
What the actual fuck? Wilder thought, completely bewildered.
The barman waved the piece of fabric at him as though he would understand its significance. ‘You’re friends with the Son of the Fox?’
Wilder stared at him. Was this man even speaking the common tongue? ‘What?’
The man waved the kerchief at him again. ‘You’re friends with Kipp Snowden?’
Thea was suddenly pushing his clenched fists back down to his sides, a broad smile on her face. ‘Yes,’ she told him. ‘We are.’
‘Is that so?’ the barman replied thoughtfully. ‘Because a friend of Kipp is a friend of mine. No questions asked.’
‘We’re definitely friends with Kipp,’ Thea said.
‘Prove it.’
Wilder gaped at Thea as she sized up the barman, folding her arms over her chest. ‘He’ll annoy you to tears. He’s got a massive mouth, he’s always eating, and he never pays for anything.’
The bartender stared at her. A moment passed, then two.
And then the man’s expression changed entirely as he slapped the counter with the flat of his palm and burst into a rumbling belly laugh. ‘So you do know him.’ He reached across and clasped Wilder heartily on the shoulder. ‘Why didn’t you bloody well say so?’
As Wilder gawked, utterly speechless at the turn of events, the man tucked Kipp’s kerchief back in Wilder’s pocket and motioned for the patrons to go back to their business, for the music to continue.
‘I’m Everard, owner of this fine establishment,’ he declared, before he addressed a server.
‘Bring out the boar. And the wine! And the tart! And the…’
He walked away shouting orders, gesturing flippantly with his hands.
Slowly, Wilder looked to Thea, stunned.
Her smile was radiant. And then she tipped her head back and laughed, deep and rich and melodic.
It was the most beautiful sound he’d ever heard.