Chapter 8
MERESS
MERESS WAS NOT WHAT FELíNE imagined the Cozened stronghold to be. She’d anticipated a fortress of brick and stone teeming with the brutal efficiency of a traitorous military presence. Not the quiet beauty of a city woven from the surrounding forest.
She and Kal had rejoined an enthusiastic Penn and passed several additional sentries hidden among the foliage.
They traveled silently through a shallow glen entirely enclosed by the oppressive weald.
Then, as though sprouted from the very earth upon which it stood, the city appeared before them, unfurling like a rare flower within the protected heart of Stillwater Wood.
Felíne gazed in awe as buildings crafted from every kind of lumber surrounded her. Rich walnut. Strong, towering oak. Lovely, pale ash. Rustic pine. So many colors and textures. Felíne wanted to trail her fingers over each unique surface, her senses hungry, ready to devour every detail.
Trees had not been cleared for the construction of the establishments; they’d been bent, twisted, and integrated into the very architecture.
Monstrous, ancient sequoias had relinquished hollowed sections of their gargantuan trunks for the creation of grand homes.
The tangled, reaching arms of great sycamores clutched larger dwellings in their embrace.
Expansive willows draped their flowing cirrus strands over squat roofs and wide windows.
Felíne couldn’t fathom so many varied species of plant life growing in one place. Could never have dreamed of a city built with such consideration for cohesion. She’d walked among the holiest of temples and never witnessed such reverence.
“Something to behold, isn’t it?”
Kal’s quiet, rich timbre seemed to belong in the enchanting wood. His voice slid over her skin like the lazy caress of a falling velvet leaf.
“It’s…magical,” Felíne breathed. “How…Who built this?”
Kal surveyed the town. As in Cindamar, shurii displayed their first and second forms without reservation.
However, where the trade center’s occupants had possessed a tangible buzz of excited energy, the people here appeared at ease, their activities less hurried, more settled in the permanence of their environment and the safe shelter of the trees.
“Traitors to the crown,” he said. Felíne’s eyes snapped up. The black tide in Kal’s gaze held her in its thrall. “The Cozened.”
Dumbstruck, Felíne returned her attention to Meress and its people. Her father would forfeit his greatest treasures to witness the Cozened stronghold crushed under his boot, cut down by his blade.
This?
They passed a whimsical cottage cloistered behind a web of wild vines with a flower garden hugging its foundation. This was what the King and Queen of Asteros abhorred so vehemently?
“Monsters, aren’t we?”
Kal’s tone was light, but there was an edge to his expression. He watched her closely, measuring.
An evil blight, she’d once heard her father say.
“No,” Felíne admitted, beginning to understand. “I do not believe evil holds the capacity to cultivate such peace, such wonder.”
The lines of tension near Kal’s eyes eased as though her response loosened some unspoken tether inside of him.
He cared for this place. For these people.
And he worried that she would not see past their disloyalty to Asteros.
How could she not? Her perception had begun to shift the moment a terrifying, cloaked stranger dragged her from home and ripped away the veil through which she’d previously viewed the world.
That world was changed, and Felíne along with it.
A group of young shurii approached from their right, calling to Penn as they neared the stable. He bowed sheepishly to Felíne then bid them farewell, blue eyes laughing as he joined his friends. She watched his white-blond head disappear around the barn.
The stablemaster, a thin, reedy man named Bandor, greeted Kal warmly, smile too wide for his narrow face.
Felíne braced against the pinch of guilt as she remembered the last stablemaster she and Kal had called on.
She prayed her presence would not bring about the same fate for Bandor as it had for Brune.
Sig was led away, Kal shouldering their pack of belongings.
“Last time, you promised me pillows,” Felíne said, endeavoring to distract herself.
She subconsciously searched the faces of every shurii male that wandered by.
She couldn’t help wondering if one of them belonged to Rask, if her deepening well of deception was moments from evaporating.
“It seems we’ve upgraded to proper buildings, too. ”
“Oh? I thought you’d prefer a threadbare tent on the outskirts. Exposed to the elements and wilderness beasts…”
“Very funny.” Felíne made an effort to return Kal’s teasing smile. It fell short. “Is there an inn close by?” With the dense nature of the forest, it was difficult to discern just how large Meress was, how far its borders spread.
Kal watched her, mirth fading, head tilted the way it often did when he was puzzling through something. “There is an inn. Not far. But I wasn’t planning on taking you there.”
She arched a brow in question. “Then where will we stay?”
His stare intensified, gold fragments flashing in its depths, and heat crept up Felíne’s neck. “Why are you looking at me like that?” she asked. “What did I say?”
“You said we.”
She swallowed. “And?”
“Your brother keeps a house here,” he said carefully. “As do I.”
Felíne wondered if she’d ever stop saying things in na?veté that painted her into dangerous corners. “So, naturally, I’d stay with…my brother.” She paused. Then whispered, “You’re still looking at me, Kal.”
He blinked, gilded treasures settling back to the inky bottoms of their respective pools. “Sorry,” he said. “You distracted me.” Another brief tilt of his lips. “I was picturing you in my house.”
In my room. My bed.
He hadn’t said those things, Felíne’s imagination had, but her cheeks flamed as though they’d been spoken aloud.
Kal missed nothing, but he spared her further humiliation by keeping additional thoughts to himself. “Come,” he said, nodding over his shoulder. “There’s a tavern close that Rask frequents. The barkeep will know where he is.”
The tavern in question was a wide, two-story, eclectic building crafted of a mishmash of materials. Its central structure was heavy mahogany wood that looked to have been added onto over the years, with whatever textiles happened to be available at the time, and no thought given to symmetry.
Kal led Felíne through an arched doorway and was greeted by the few occupants who shot curious glances her way.
Her skin crawled with tension, and she expected any one of the strangers to identify her artifice and proclaim her a liar.
She anchored herself to an empty table, stomach twisting itself into knots of increasing anxiety while she waited for Kal to finish speaking to the barkeep.
“He’s not here,” Kal relayed when he returned to her side a few minutes later. “He left yesterday for a hunting outpost several hours’ ride north.”
Felíne’s breath left her on a shaky exhale.
“Are you hungry? We can stay and eat if you like.”
Felíne shook her head. If she put anything into her stomach just then, it was liable not to stay. Kal nodded and led her out of the tavern, back into the afternoon light.
“Well,” Kal said, running a hand over his head, tousling the curls. “I’m surprised he’s not here to greet us, but I can show you to his house in the meantime. You can rest a while and settle in.”
He strode into the city, and Felíne followed along numbly.
Meress was special, its unique woodland charm having initially piqued her every interest. Just then, however, Felíne found it impossible to appreciate her environment for the serpentine apprehension that coiled insidiously tighter, choking any other emotion or intrigue.
Twenty minutes later, Kal stopped before a collection of homes in the depths of Meress, not far from the busier business center. He stood before one simple, unadorned house, indistinguishable from the others around it.
“This is Rask’s house?” Felíne’s voice came out strained as she assessed the nondescript brown door. It may as well have been the gateway to hell.
Kal nodded. “There is a spare key wedged behind the loose board just left of the step.”
He made to retrieve it for her but paused when he realized she hadn’t stepped a foot off the street. She couldn’t. Felíne was rooted like one of the ancient oaks, refusing to toe even an inch toward the stranger’s threshold.
Kal returned to her, leaving the key in its hiding place. He studied her frozen face and tilted her chin up with a gently curved finger. “If I had to guess, Kitty Harless, I’d say you had some reservations about reuniting with your brother.”
Damn him. Felíne’s facade was cracking at the edges, pieces of her great lie slowly chipping away. And Kal was far too perceptive. She was running out of time.
“I’m nervous,” she admitted, hoping the fraction of truth and understatement of the century wouldn’t garner suspicion. Her imploring gaze collided with Kal’s carefully reserved one before flicking back to Rask’s house. “I…I don’t want to stay there.”
A pair of shallow lines appeared between Kal’s stern brows. He glanced back toward his friend’s empty home, then grasped Felíne’s trembling hand, his rough, steadfast fingers folding firmly over hers.
“Come on,” he said. “Looks like I’m taking you home, after all.”