Chapter 36
The next time, I awaken slowly. My toes are cold, but the rest of me is surprisingly warm. My eyes flutter open, and I realise I’m not the first to rouse myself from sleep, as I inadvertently stare into Kyor’s icy blue gaze.
‘Morning,’ I mumble.
‘A morning I get thanks to you. You saved my life, Rose.’ His voice is clear, strong. The dreamy quality has gone, and I’m thankful for it. Each word he spoke with that loose tongue of his was a word given without his full consent, and the fewer of those the better.
I wave away his thanks, aware that one of my legs lies across him. I should want to move it away, but I don’t.
The last thing I want is to somehow hurt his healing shoulder. That’s what I tell myself anyway.
‘You would have done the same for me,’ I tell him.
The way his eyes glimmer is all the evidence I need that he would. Not that I actually need any evidence. As I continue to look up at him, a look of concern flashes across his face.
‘I don’t remember much. I remember being awake, but … did I do anything … say anything … inappropriate?’
‘You told me some stories from your childhood,’ I admit.
He winces, and that makes my heart hurt all the more. Not for a second does he think the memories he told me might be good ones.
‘Well, at least I know what I have to do next time I want to wake up with you pressed all over me,’ he says instead.
It’s an obvious shift, moving the conversation to somewhere flirty, pushing away the awkwardness of his Robbard’s-induced confession, but I find I’m grateful for it.
‘Though I have to say, this isn’t quite how I imagined the next time we’d end up in a bed together. ’
‘You’ve thought about us being in bed together, have you?’ I say lightly, sliding my leg off his and letting him change the subject.
‘Endlessly,’ he confesses with a roguish grin. ‘While we’re here, would you like to hear some of the things I’ve thought about doing to you?’
Normally that voice, those words, would be more than enough to slide my thoughts into somewhere I try to pretend I don’t still go, but not right now.
Right now, all I can think of is how easily he hides behind his playboy facade. And maybe it worked before, but I’ve seen behind it now, and I don’t think such truths can be forgotten.
All the things we won’t or shouldn’t say hold fast within us, and we’re saved from the silence when a bang on the door rattles around the small room.
‘Some of your mates are here,’ a young voice calls out.
Some of our mates?
‘One minute,’ I yell back.
‘Ahh and just when we were about to start having fun.’ Kyor grins at me and I offer him a withering look as I help him up.
‘We were not going to have any fun,’ I reply. ‘Unless you find sleeping fun?’
He winces, exaggerating the action, as if the wound comes from my words and not his injured shoulder.
‘You slay me, madam,’ he says dramatically, making me smile despite myself.
When I’m sure he’s steady on his feet, I open the door.
‘Take us to them,’ I instruct the young boy waiting on the other side. He can’t be much more than twelve, perhaps younger. He’s painfully thin and the stale roll sits guiltily in my stomach.
But the kid’s not even looking at me, let alone listening. Instead, his owlish eyes are fixed on Elska. ‘Etta’s tits! A real dire wolf!’
To prove a point, Elska gnashes her teeth at him, clacking at empty air. The kid stumbles back, eyes still wide, grin in place. ‘Jovey’ll never believe this,’ he mutters.
‘What’s your name?’
‘Ryan.’
‘Nice to meet you, Ryan. Take us to where our friends are and I’ll give you a coin.’
‘Take us into a trap,’ Kyor growls, ‘and I’ll let the wolf eat you. She’s hungry.’
‘N-no …’ the kid stammers. ‘I won’t trick you, mister. Promise. This way.’
Elska moves close to the kid’s side, as if she’s ready to make good on Kyor’s threat, and it’s a testament to how tough slum kids are that he doesn’t shrink away from her, although his pace is notably brisk.
He leads us through the streets that I was too exhausted to note the twists and turns of as we stumbled through the slums yesterday.
My assumption is that he’s going to take me to a home, perhaps Lofty’s again, but instead, we reach a small back alley, where I spot Ruben, Benny, and Caz propped up against a less-than-stable wall.
I look for Loch and the Sannings with a quick scan around me, but there’s no sign of them.
Ruben’s eyes light up as they catch mine, and he flashes me a warm grin, though Benny and Caz are wearing notable poker faces, as if they don’t even recognise who I am.
Next to them, perched on the top of a barrel, is Lofty.
‘He looks better this morning,’ Lofty remarks with a nod at Kyor. ‘Good to see.’
I glare at the kid. ‘Our business here is done.’
‘It was,’ he agrees, keeping his voice real low.
‘It absolutely was.’ He flicks his gaze pointedly to my white-blonde hair.
‘But then I made some connections. Even here, we’ve heard of the gifted.
The Lady Rose.’ He then looks at Kyor. ‘And of course,’ tone mocking, he continues, ‘our dear Prince of the Morathkian Realm and his mighty dire wolf. It seems to me that I saved a royal life, and as such, something a little … more is required.’
‘We had a deal,’ I snap flatly.
‘Oh we did, but things change, don’t they, Bryony? Once upon a time, you were a slum rat, and now you’re a lady. The kids in the slums, they tell your story at bedtime now: the tale of the Lady Rose. It’s a better tale than that of the Myrkrs and Mortidem, I can tell you that.’
The Lady Rose.
The words land wrong in my chest, heavy and unreal. I think of frozen floors, empty cupboards, and learning to sleep with one eye open, and wonder when exactly all of that became a bedtime story.
He smirks at my reddening cheeks. ‘You give us hope, Lady Rose, that any of us can rise above our station. One of us. One of us is in the fucking High Hold. What a thing that is. What a dangerous thing, giving us hope.’ He leans forward.
‘Now, I promised discretion … but I might unpromise it real fast unless we can come to some new terms. All business, you understand. Nothing personal. So … those new terms …’
‘Listen you little guttersnipe—’ Kyor starts forward, drawing his sword, but he can’t hide the wince that even holding the weapon causes.
‘Is that any way for a prince to speak to one of his loyal subjects?’ Lofty says. He drops the smile. ‘I want a favour. Just one. At a time of my choosing. Take it or leave it.’ He pauses. ‘If you leave it, I’ll make sure everyone in the Galreckian court knows Prince Kyor is in town.’
Ruben smirks. ‘You’ve either got a death wish or giant balls, kid.’
Lofty winks back. ‘Balls as big as a jotunn’s,’ he replies.
Ruben snorts, amused by the comeback, but Kyor, Benny, and I don’t. We can still remember the size of the giants, and those moments between life and death as they stomped around trying to kill us.
Frankly, I don’t want to be thinking of a jotunn’s private parts in any capacity.
And thinking of the jotnar makes me think of Estel, her body broken on the sand.
And thinking of Estel makes me think of Thea, and the way she deceived and manipulated Kyor.
Stripped away his ability to trust and tried to turn me against him with her half-truths.
With effort, I focus on the here and now and the scrawny little blackmailer with freckles dotted across his face.
‘One favour,’ I interrupt before Kyor can speak. ‘From me, and no one can die as a result of it.’
Lofty hesitates. He wants a favour from the prince in his back pocket, but he’ll have to settle for me. He finally nods. ‘Deal.’ He slides down off the barrel. ‘I’ll be seeing you, Lady Rose.’
‘I can’t wait,’ I say flatly.
He flashes me a surprisingly bright smile and then disappears into the slums.
The five of us are left alone with Elska. Battered, yes, but together.
As Caz moves to hug me, Ruben looks at Kyor. ‘You’re looking annoyingly alive,’ he mock-groans. ‘I hoped Stide had done a better job.’
Kyor grins. ‘Disappointing, isn’t it?’
Caz rolls her eyes at the men. ‘Good to see you still breathing, Kyor.’ For a second, she looks as if she might be about to hug him too, but instead she steps back. Still, something tells me he wouldn’t have shoved her away if she’d tried.
‘Thanks,’ he replies. ‘I’m quite pleased about it myself.’
While the greetings aren’t quite finished, I’m aware that we have more pressing issues that need answering.
‘Where are the others?’ I ask, looking at Benny. ‘Where’s Loch? And the Sannings?’
‘The Quiet Ones didn’t fancy the noise of the city of drink and drums.’
‘The city of drink and drums?’ I repeat with a half laugh. I suppose it works as a moniker. I’ve yet to meet a Galreckian who doesn’t enjoy some homebrew.
‘That’s what they call it,’ Benny explains.
‘Loch didn’t fancy it either. They’ll stick to the woodland, and we’ll meet them on the opposite side when we’re restocked with more food and extra horses.
That’s what took us so long – we had to finish the last stretch on foot as we left them with the horses. ’
Unease stirs. We don’t know Thessa and Stide well; they could decide to take the horses and go.
Caz reads my expression. ‘Thessa promised to stay, to wait for us,’ she says, eyes soft, ‘and she was telling the truth.’
The tension lessens but doesn’t fade entirely from me. I don’t doubt Caz’s power, but though Thessa was telling the truth when she made the promise, people can change their minds, and their truths change with them.
For now, I’ll just have to hope that’s not the case and focus on getting horses and food.
But before I can start to form a plan, Caz speaks again. ‘I want to head into the library,’ she says.
Benny huffs. ‘Of course you do.’
‘The Galreckians will have maps of this area,’ she says, ignoring Benny with flawless, practised ease. ‘And I suspect they’re a darn sight better than the ones from Wrohelm.’
Ruben frowns. ‘There can’t be much variation in a map, can there? Surely places are just where they are.’
‘Cartography is tricky,’ Kyor disagrees. ‘Some are better than others.’
‘Especially as we get further north,’ Caz says.
‘There are areas around the Hirathean Path that were known for Torailian attacks back when we were at war. Ambush sites where they’d come out in their thousands.
I already made notes of those areas so they could be avoided, but I want to cross-reference them with the maps here.
Make sure. Galreck has the biggest library in all of Morathka. ’
It’s clear from her tone that she’s extremely excited about the idea of being among all those books and scrolls, although being reminded that Torailians like to attack in groups of thousands isn’t something that fills me with sunshine.
Still, like she said, we’re planning on staying well out of their territory.
Ruben looks solely at Kyor, more than a little challenge in his eyes. ‘Surely you know the places that are best to avoid. You’re the commander of the king’s army. You must have been up that way hundreds of times.’
‘I wouldn’t go so far as to say hundreds,’ Kyor grunts laconically.
‘But surely you know which areas to skirt around?’ Ruben pushes. ‘Where the boundaries of their lands are? That’s what the battles were about, right? Land disputes?’
‘Yes, but it’s not quite that straightforward,’ Kyor says pointedly. ‘It’s not like there’s a big red line drawn in the earth.’
Benny weighs in. ‘No, but the boundaries must have been there for centuries, so surely you can tell us where we should steer clear of? You must have information about their old camps. Places we should avoid.’
All Benny’s questions are genuine, but Kyor is starting to look irritated.
‘Look, let Caroline look at her maps, and between the two of us, we won’t lead you wrong.
’ He ignores them then and turns to Elska.
‘Go and get some food. You’re making me hungry.
Then find the others and keep them safe.
Wait for me.’ It is clear that he says the orders aloud for our benefit.
In a rare display of affection, Elska trots close and licks his hand repeatedly. ‘Yeah,’ he says softly. ‘Love you too.’
For all his sharp orders and rough edges, I recall his whispered words of weakness. And I wonder if he realises that Elska is both his greatest strength and greatest vulnerability. Elska and – as much as I hate to admit it – me.
Because as his past shows, anyone he cares about has the ability to be used against him.