Chapter 70
CHAPTER SEVENTY
T he woman’s screams echoed in my head the rest of the day. Her husband’s, too, for that matter.
I got through the motions of training with my men and finishing up business around the estate before it was time to head back to my and Rowan’s rooms. When I reached our door, I paused for a moment, bracing myself to face her again.
She might have stood publicly by my side earlier, but she had also watched me exile and brand a man for the egregious crime of refusing to murder children. I wasn’t sure how I felt about his choice.
The children had died anyway, and his family had paid for his conscience.
But part of me was almost jealous, in spite of the branding and the pain and the life I knew he would have to live now, because it was a stand I had never been able to take.
Who knew how many more innocents my father might harm if I weren’t here to stay his hand? Even in Lochlann, I had worked constantly to subtly counteract his orders, though this one had obviously slipped through the cracks.
I supposed I could just add the screams from today to the rest of those that haunted me.
“Van?” Yuriy’s voice cut into my thoughts.
Kirill must have gone home to his wife for the day.
I gave my cousin a tired look, and he returned it with one of understanding. We had all been forced to make decisions that ate away at our souls, even Yuriy, at only seventeen.
Nodding in return, I finally pushed open the door.
Rowan was sitting in the window seat near our bed, staring out at the mountains. Her crimson curls fell freely down her back, and she was wearing her black-and-white tartan nightclothes.
She turned when I entered, her green gaze assessing me. Wanting to talk about literally anything but what happened earlier, I gave her outfit a once over.
“Interesting dinner attire,” I commented, though even I heard the hollow sound to my voice.
“I thought perhaps we could have dinner sent to our rooms?” Rowan mentioned in a neutral tone.
I raised my eyebrows. “As tempting as that sounds, we have--”
“Dinner with the lords,” she finished, a ghost of a smirk on her lips. “Taras told me. He also said it wasn’t completely necessary, so... I could ask him to convey our regrets. And we could relax here.”
I opened my mouth to argue, then closed it. I didn’t really need to have dinner with the lords tonight so much as I hadn’t been prepared to face Rowan’s judgment about the Unclanning.
But she didn’t appear to have any.
“That...would be preferable,” I admitted.
She nodded, then went to the door to tell Yuriy while I unbuttoned my coat. I hung my clothes up one by one, and Rowan shook her head.
“You know, you could just put them on the chair for now.”
I looked over to where her dress from earlier was flung casually over one of the sitting room chairs, her shoes kicked haphazardly next to them.
“Why does your for now always seem to stretch on into forever?” I asked, though I couldn’t quite inject my usual amount of amusement into my voice.
She played along, but her subdued tone told me she read my mood accurately. “You told me you wanted my clothes on your bedroom floor.”
“That part didn’t count, because we both knew I was lying.” My lips tilted up at the corners, barely.
“But you said you would put up with it,” she said in a singsong voice. Any lingering amusement vanished when she took in my features again. “You’ve been up for hours, Evander. Come lie down before dinner.”
It never ceased to strike me, how well she could read me when so few people could. I was tired. For that matter, she looked like she could use a nap, too. Her skin was pale enough to make out bluish circles underneath her eyes.
So I obliged her, joining her in our enormous bed. Neither of us spoke for a moment, but she slid closer to me, putting a tentative hand in my hair.
“When I would have a bad day,” she said quietly, running her fingers through the short strands. “My mother would always bring pastries, and then she would comb her hands through my curls, like this.”
Back and forth, she wound her fingernails in different patterns on my head. It was oddly and unexpectedly comforting, a comfort I knew I didn’t deserve today, but I couldn’t bring myself to tell her to stop.
“I know how you feel about pastries, though.” She gave a small smile, but it faded quickly.
Her fingers came down to my shoulders, running along my chest. I wasn’t sure anyone had ever taken care of me like this.
I didn’t remember my mother at all, and my father was hardly the nurturing kind. Ava...didn’t bear thinking about. Taras's and Yuriy’s mother was kind, but distant, even with them.
And today, of all days…
“Why today?” I couldn’t help but ask her.
She leaned over, pressing her lips against one of the scars that crept around my shoulder before she answered.
“Because I know, even though you’ll never say it, how hard that was for you.”
“Not as hard as it was for Vasily,” I muttered.
“Maybe not,” she allowed. “But that doesn’t change the effect it had on you .”
I shook my head in bewilderment.
“What?” she asked.
“I suppose I should be grateful that you watched me brand a man today and you care in spite of that, but it’s...surprising.” To say the least.
“Is that what you think?” She lifted her head, her questioning gaze boring directly into mine. “That I love you in spite of what you had to do today?”
I stilled, not sure where she was going with this.
“Evander,” she said earnestly. “I don’t love you in spite of who you are or who you’ve had to be. I love you because of those things. I love you for the strength you have to make difficult decisions for the good of your people, even when it kills you. It’s what makes you a good leader…”
She paused, discernment bleeding into her features. “Even if it doesn’t feel that way on days like today.”
I was stunned into silence.
I hadn’t realized how badly I needed to hear her say that until she did.
All this time, some part of me had believed, especially since she got here, that she had fallen in love with the version of me at the cabin, or even in Lochlann, with the person I didn’t have the luxury of being at the estate.
That she was...disappointed at the husband she wound up with, compared to the one she expected.
But once again, I had managed to underestimate her.
She pressed another kiss on my shoulder, against the scars that I rarely let anyone see, let alone touch, before she spoke again.
“I’m not going anywhere, even when things are difficult and complicated.” Rowan moved then, lying next to me, her hand once again going to run through my hair. “We’re in this together now, right?”
I brought my hand up to her face, tracing the outline of her rounded cheekbones to her pointed, stubborn chin. She kept saying we were in this together, but after a lifetime of handling things alone, I hadn’t really let myself believe her.
I was starting to now.
“Yes.” My voice came out a quiet rasp. “We’re in this together.”
“Promise me you’ll remember that.” Her face was close enough to mine that our breaths were mingling together, her eyes shining with rare sincerity instead of the cheeky mischief that was usually there.
And there was nothing I could have denied her in that moment.
“I promise,” I told her.
More than anything, I wanted that to be true.