Chapter 15
Hannalinde
With Carlijn’s influence, the days filled with laughter and evenings even more, and Hannalinde found she did not regret asking her to move in.
Rikard, who rarely participated in their game nights due to his obligations as Nadir, was eventually persuaded to invite Lucan to the eyrie, with Hanna’s promise that she would keep him in line while Rikard was at work.
Invariably, within an hour of sunset Lucan would appear, though never at a specific time.
He always arrived at the eyrie as though by coincidence, with a modest gift for Carlijn in tow, perhaps a small round of cheese or a new game piece.
Nothing inappropriate or too much like a lover’s gift, so Hanna could not object.
Tonight, it was a live cricket in a woven cage. He leaned in from the balcony and dangled it in front of Carlijn as a way of greeting.
She squealed with happiness, snatching it from him to examine more closely, and he grinned in triumph. “I wasn’t sure if human females like singing insects the way gargoyle females do.”
“They don’t,” Hannalinde told him, shuddering.
“This one does.” Carlijn held the cage to her ear and listened to the cricket chirp with an expression of delight so genuine that Hannalinde revised her understanding of her friend’s taste in both creatures and gifts.
“Good. It can serenade us while we play. Do say you’ll join us,” he begged Hannalinde. “It’s always more fun when you do.”
He was charming, she had to give him that.
Lucan was charming with Carlijn, of course, because he had an eye on bedding her.
He was charming with Hannalinde, too, though, complimenting her embroidery and asking after her health.
He was charming with Cléa, who purred audibly whenever he complimented her, and with Roul, who pressed food and mead on him.
It helped that he was tall and elegant, with curly hair that fell across his forehead and polished horns that caught every flicker of lamplight.
His whole personality and appearance made Hannalinde wonder if Rikard would be much the same if he hadn’t been wrecked by the war. If he’d laugh and flirt more readily.
To Lucan’s credit, he wasn’t the complete rake that Rikard had warned.
He listened to Carlijn with attentiveness, and he remembered everything she said and referenced it later, which was either a sign of genuine interest or a technique so polished it had become indistinguishable from the real thing.
He also had an incredible patience for games of dice, which Hannalinde did not share.
After a few rounds of play, she retreated to a comfortable corner, where she stitched and supervised their game until her lids grew heavy and she had to stifle a yawn.
Lucan chuckled at her unsuccessful attempt. “You can retire, dear Hannalinde. We’ll be quiet as mice out here.”
Carlijn caught Hannalinde’s eye across the table and raised her brows, begging silently for the chance to be alone with him.
Hannalinde shook her head. Absolutely not. Another yawn overtook her.
Carlijn shared a knowing smile with Lucan that Hannalinde didn’t miss. They were determined to outlast her.
Lucan glanced at the lamp and said something sharply in the Old Tongue. The three brown moths that had taken up residence in it scattered, their powdery wings dusting the table as they made their escape.
“What did you say to them?” Carlijn asked, leaning forward with fascination.
“I told them to mind their business.” He smiled, easy and unbothered. “Moths carry stories, and stories grow wings of their own. Best not to give them anything interesting to repeat.”
“Too late for that,” Carlijn said with a wicked tone.
She was unstoppable, but so was the sleep overtaking Hannalinde’s senses. She could not fend it off forever. Pregnancy had made it impossible to stay awake when she was exhausted, and Carlijn knew it.
They were consenting adults, she rationalized as she drowsed in and out. As in scaccus, there was only so much one could do to win when one was being outplayed.
If Carlijn was her opponent in the evenings, she was Hannalinde’s greatest ally during the day. This was the simple truth of Carlijn’s companionship, and Hannalinde held it close, knowing its value. She was kind and loyal and a good friend, above all else.
They sewed together in the mornings, Hannalinde’s needle churning out the fine, nearly invisible stitches she was known for, while Carlijn’s needle produced designs with more enthusiasm and impatience.
They sewed lingerie for Carlijn’s trousseau and traveling garments for her honeymoon.
They made Hanna some nursing gowns for after the birth and things the baby might need: bibs and swaddling clothes and knotted dolls to gnaw upon while teeth were growing in.
“Do you think it will have pointed teeth like them, or more like ours?” Carlijn asked, pausing with a half-finished doll in her lap.
“I suppose it doesn’t matter.”
“It will matter aplenty when they’re latched upon your nipple!”
Hannalinde laughed and threw a cushion at her. “If you’re thinking about that, you’re bored with sewing.”
Carlijn agreed, so they put away the sewing things and played scaccus on the dining table instead. Hannalinde was more skilled, but Carlijn was a reckless player who sacrificed pieces with abandon and occasionally won through sheer audacity, which seemed to be what kept her from complete boredom.
After demolishing the midday tray, they ventured into the city together, carefully descending the Tower ladders and navigating the streets arm-in-arm.
Carlijn’s presence transformed these outings from endurance tests into something approaching pleasure.
Where Hannalinde quailed under the hostile stares and whispers, Carlijn stared back.
Her deflection worked like a shield, allowing them both passage through the markets without incident.
Carlijn still had a monthly allowance from her father, but Hannalinde did not have many coins to spend, just a few leftover from the mercer’s daughter’s veil she’d stitched months ago.
But she had enough to purchase some little things to add to her own happiness.
Sweet William seeds to plant on the balcony.
A skein of yellow-green silk to set off the fine blue one she hadn’t yet worked up the courage to use.
Ginger tonic to settle her stomach after large meals and rosewater to put behind her ears.
The next day, a dish of coins appeared in the nesting chamber, placed among her combs and perfumes so she could not miss it.
She glanced at her husband’s frozen form.
They had come from him, of course. She thanked him even though he could not hear her and used the money sparingly, but each time she removed coins they were replaced the next day without comment.
Carlijn, who had never been an early riser, was delighted that the Tower’s social life happened after dark.
She naturally began staying up later and sleeping later into the mornings.
Hannalinde, whose days had been structured around available light for her stitching for nine years, found her own routine changing, too.
At first, she stayed up to supervise Carlijn’s flirtations with Lucan, but their games and conversations extended so far into the night that she could not rise in time to breakfast with Rikard before the sun rose.
She woke to his stony, worried-looking face above hers as he roosted beside their nest.
“Good morning, husband,” she murmured, stretching in the furs. It really was the most luxurious bed she’d ever slept in, and she liked waking up to his protective posture. She had lost almost all fear of her true mate, sleeping in Rikard’s nest.
That night, he lingered after their shared meal rather than rushing to his office.
He waited until after his parents left for a skyball and Carlijn discreetly excused herself before moving to a seat closer to Hannalinde.
She was about to ask him if he had the day off when he blurted out, “Are you feeling well?”
She shifted on her bench. “Well” was a relative term these days. The child was very active, her belly was becoming unwieldy, and sometimes a nerve pinched in her lower back. But she could not complain to him. Surely his scars pinched and pulled much more. “Well enough. Why do you ask?”
“You did not rise to dine with me before daysleep. I thought perhaps you were ill.” He frowned at the table. He was pouting, she realized. He’d missed her and thought she’d rather sleep than spend time with him.
A soft laugh slipped out of her. “I meant to get up, but I stayed up too late making sure your friend didn’t take advantage of Carlijn!”
Rikard glowered even more. “I will forbid him from further visits.”
“Oh, don’t! She enjoys it too much. It will all end soon enough when the baby comes. I doubt he’ll feel like flirting when he’s being serenaded by the screams of an infant.”
He seemed unconvinced and stayed until Lucan appeared on the balcony with a bag of fragrant roasted chestnuts and a bottle of mead. He nearly dropped it when he saw Rikard perched beside Hannalinde.
He recovered quickly. “Are you joining us tonight? I brought enough mead for all of us!”
“I must attend my duties, but part of my duty is to remind you to conduct yourself with honor,” Rikard said stiffly, sounding more like a disapproving father than a friend.
“He always does!” Carlijn chimed in defensively, eyes round at the possibility that her fun might be ruined.
Lucan grinned broadly, looping his arm around her so the mead pressed against the side of her bosom. “I always do.”
Rikard’s skeptical gaze narrowed at the two of them, and Hannalinde hurriedly jumped in before he said something he might regret.
“He has been nothing but a gentleman. And I do feel safer with him here, when you cannot be.” She could not say the reason why aloud, but he had to understand.
She did not know when her tormenter would come for her. It could be any time the sun was down.
“Very well,” he said gruffly. Turning to Lucan, he added, “If my mate tires of having you in our eyrie, then so will I.”
“Understood,” Lucan said quickly, squeezing Carlijn closer. He seemed to have genuine affection for her. Carlijn’s regard for him was obviously growing, too. Perhaps Rikard was right to separate them before it went too far.
“Can I speak to you privately?” she asked him. His brows lifted before he jerked his head in a nod and led her to their nesting chamber, closing the door behind him.
“What is it, wife?”
Warmth spilled through her at the word. She did not expect to be so affected, as she was always conscious that their arrangement was one of practicality, not feeling. He was being factual, she reminded herself, so she tried not to read too much into it.
She sighed. “Our friends have grown very close. I worry their attachment may interfere with her eventual marriage.”
“You seemed eager enough to defend his presence when I wished to separate them,” Rikard said dryly.
She nodded, her breath coming faster as the dark pressure in her skull increased.
“It was a selfish impulse. I was clinging to the sense of safety Lucan’s presence provides.
I can still feel, sometimes, in my mind that I’m being…
” She ran out of air and struggled to draw another panicked breath. “Sought.”
He reached for her and his clawed fingers slipped to the back of her skull, his thumb stroking the spot behind her ear. “Here?”
She jerked a nod, unable to speak. He had never touched her so intimately, nor stood so close.
Not since their wedding day when he’d carried her from the courtyard to the Tower and reached beneath her skirts to tie them up.
Why was she thinking about that now? Perhaps because she was feeling things beneath her skirts.
Warm and wonderful things that almost canceled out the darkness inside her head.
“There are ways to block it out,” he murmured, still stroking the spot gingerly, like he would the head of a dove.
“How?” she gasped, dizzy with hope and his proximity. “How can I make it go away?”
“You can’t, but you can build a kind of mental fortification around it.
At first, it won’t last long. But if you consistently rebuild it, it can become something close to permanent.
We gargoyles call them mind walls. They are quite useful when you don’t wish to feel or remember something.
” His voice had turned bitter, his gaze distant and unfocused.
“As in war,” she guessed.
“Yes. I have many. The masons offered to demolish them and restore my memories after they rebuilt my body, but I declined. Whatever happened in the past can stay there. I do not wish to recall the source of every scar, even if there is some lesson in it.”
Tentatively, she reached out to trace the deep one that pulled his mouth to the side. “I understand. Some things we don’t need to relive.”
He gave a curt nod, his focus returning to her face as he dropped his hand. She echoed his movement, missing the contact instantly. He cleared his throat. “I will teach you what I can about how to defend your mind from him.”
“Thank you,” she said, eyes welling with gratitude. He didn’t like it when she thanked him, but she had to for something like this.
The lamplight carved his scarred features into sharp relief, and his eyes, dark and deep-set beneath his heavy brow, held something warm.
“You should sleep,” he said. “Let the two of them live with their own choices.”
She nodded, smiling to herself. “Then I will surely wake early enough to breakfast with you when you get home.”
“Until then.” He turned to leave, his shadow falling across her, bridging the ever-narrowing space between them. “Good night, wife.”