CHAPTER 34 #2
“The walls,” I gasped. A shudder ran through my body. I could not meet Eldreth’s eye. This was all happening because of me.
“They’ll hold. We need to get you safe.” He crossed the room, and the fact that he had no questions about what I’d packed or what I’d be doing with Sprakt or anything at all snapped me to attention. His need for information and control was gone. Right now, he was entirely orders and action.
Eldreth grabbed my bag. “Is this done?” He didn’t wait for a response as he tied the flaps closed.
“I packed all I could think of.”
“It’ll do.” He slung it over his shoulder where another sack was already secured. “I’m taking you below. I hope you don’t have issues with the dark.”
“No.”
He gripped my arm. “Good. This way.”
I followed him. I had never been in a battle unless you counted our mission with the dragori.
I’d never had my home attacked. When my father received reports of skirmishes on his lands, they were always in border regions far from the manor.
Until this moment, I had never fully appreciated how much I took my safety for granted.
We darted down stairways and through corridors that I’d never known existed. Sprakt kept pace with us, flying through doorways and darting ahead to the end, then waiting to see where we’d turn.
“These are the family safe rooms,” Eldreth explained as we walked. “We memorize the locations as children. There’s no time to teach you now. You need to stay here, no matter what happens.”
“What could happen?” I had to take two strides for every one of his, and I was already getting winded.
“It’ll be fine. If Callagh is in the keep, I’ll have her escorted here as soon as I can.”
“She’s at her mother’s home. Eldreth, please, what could happen?”
“The castle hasn’t been breached. You’ll be fine.
This is a precaution.” He marched us along a dim corridor and stopped at one of a dozen tapestries lining the walls.
He cast it aside, revealing a stone door without a handle or hinges.
His hand groped along the wall, searching for who knows what, but when he found it, the door swung inward.
“Do not leave here.” His eyes finally met mine. “Can I trust you with this?”
If I hadn’t spent months acclimating to his usual surliness, I might have missed the bitterness in his tone.
“I’ve said I’m sorry a hundred times. I can’t change the past.”
“We don’t have time for this,” he snapped, staring down the corridor. He was right. We’d already wasted time fighting and gotten nowhere.
“You said yourself, you don’t always like your father’s commands, but you follow them. How is what I did any different?”
I instantly regretted the question when his head snapped to me. “You’re comparing Dane to your margrave?”
“No.”
“That’s what it sounds like.”
“I just meant that we both understand what it’s like to have expectations we don’t agree with.”
His eyes darkened. “No, we don’t. If I don’t agree with something, I fight it.”
I stepped toward the opening in the wall. “You fight with Dane?”
“Constantly. You’ve seen me.”
He was right. I had. “It’s true,” I admitted, “nothing about our situations is the same.” One of his eyebrows raised.
I ignored the way it made my whole body react and pressed on.
“When I push back against my father, it earns me the back of his hand. I’m not given the chance to state my piece like you are.
You know nothing of what it’s like to be a woman in Inra, where you’re not allowed to think on your own, much less have a voice.
Obedience is the mark of a daughter, and punishment for defiance is swift. ”
Eldreth’s jaw clenched, and his fists tightened, but he did not interrupt me.
“So, no, I didn’t defy him at first. I did as told, making myself complicit in his deception. I was terrified to do it, but I was more terrified to fail. What do you think he’d do to me if I ever went back?”
“You won’t.” His voice was a growl.
“You say that now, but what happens when you can’t forgive me? If we can’t get past this?”
The corners of his mouth ticked downward. It was a tiny thing, barely perceptible, but it cut right through me. “When did it change?” he asked.
“What?”
“The letters. When did you stop feeding him our secrets?”
I took a deep breath. “The day I met Vaya’la.
” I wished I could turn it into something romantic.
Some foolish part of me thought that if he were my driving force, this might all change.
How quaint a picture that love might have helped me overcome my fear of defying my father.
But that wasn’t my truth. The moment I met her, my view of the world changed.
There were suddenly things in life so much bigger and more important than me.
Such a small change, stopping the flow of information, but it was what I could control.
I did it for Gerta, who had such hopes to make a life in this land.
I did it for Dane, who showed me what it meant to care for an entire people, not just rule over them.
But mostly, I did it for Vaya’la because even before I knew what she would become to me, I knew she should be protected at all costs.
“After your First Sun?” he asked.
“When she called me back to the cave. That’s when I stopped sending anything important.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know, I started writing about dresses and food and stupidity like that. Probably infuriated my father to no end. That’s why he’s here, isn’t it? If I’d come clean sooner, we could have stopped this, or prepared.”
“Why didn’t you?” The question was open and curious.
“Because of this.” I gestured between us. “I knew the moment the truth came out, I’d lose you for good.”
Eldreth surged forward, his lips seeking mine.
His kiss was soft despite the intensity vibrating from his every bone.
His tongue swept across my lips, and I parted them, letting him deepen the kiss.
Lightning shot through my body as he cupped the back of my head and worshipped me with his mouth.
When he pulled away, I was more breathless than after running down all those stairs.
“You haven’t lost me. Don’t worry about this today.
I’ll be back when all is clear, and we can fight then.
” The corner of his mouth quirked. He slung both bags off his shoulders and handed them to me.
“There’s food in here for several days, plus more inside.
You’ll find crates of fresh water, cups, beds, blankets… everything you need.”
“Except you.”
He stiffened.
“Come back to me, Eldreth. I understand your role. I know leading the warriors comes down to you, and you’ve probably done it dozens of times before, but this time I need you to come back to me. There’s still so much to say and do together.”
He cocked an eyebrow, and that delectable corner of his mouth quirked up again. “There’s a lot I can’t wait to do with you.”
Sprakt swooped down from somewhere overhead and landed on Eldreth’s shoulder, who glanced sideways and frowned. He shrugged, but Sprakt stood firm.
“How safe will you be?” I asked. “Tell me the truth.”
He kissed me once, quick and firm, causing Sprakt to screech and fly through the doorway, landing on the floor several yards in.
“The walls of Drakh have never fallen. The castle has never been breached. No one has taken control of the keep in the entire time it’s been standing.
Don’t worry about me. Stay safe, and stay hidden. ”
I nodded, dropped the bags, and flung my arms around him, holding tight and drinking in his scent as I prayed to Vaya’la that this wouldn’t be the last time. “This is all my fault,” I whispered.
His arms wrapped around me, crushing me to him. “That can wait until this is over,” he muttered. He buried his face in my hair, inhaling slowly. I matched my breath to his, stealing his calm.
When I opened my eyes, so did my second sight. Eldreth glowed with a pure white light.
“Your time will come to lead the fight,” he whispered to me, dropping his forehead against mine. “Today is my turn.”
I released him and stepped back into the gloom of the hallway.
With one last look, he placed his hand on the wall, and the stone door slid back into place.
Darkness engulfed me. I waited, allowing both my sights to adjust. The first thing that returned was my own glow.
My lifelight swirled with every imaginable color all at once, bouncing between radiant white and refracting to an iridescent rainbow.
Then, I saw Sprakt, who glowed bright green instead of silver.
“I’ve never seen that on you before,” I told him. He responded by hopping up to my shoulder and clicking his beak.
I hefted the bags at my feet and followed the dark swirls of the corridor.
A faint moss was growing along the walls, which gave off a forest-green glow.
I smelled damp earth and stone, though the air was fresh.
I had expected the air in a place like this to be stale.
The floor angled downward, and I stepped gingerly to keep my footing.
After several twists and turns, the corridor let out into a large room.
Braziers flickered in the corners, and a hearth crackled in the center of the room.
Behind me, a pair of large doors were propped open using great beams also meant to bar them shut.
Several woodpiles were stacked along the wall, and Sprakt fluttered from my shoulder atop one.
At the center of each of the other three walls was an opening leading to more hallways.
Down the hallway to the right, more moss grew along the walls.
There were five doors in this wing, two on each side and one at the end.
I opened the first and found a modest room with a bed, a half-table against the wall, and one chair.
A large chest sat at the end of the bed.
I pried open the lid—pillows, blankets, and sheets.
I dropped my bag on the bed, then went to check the other rooms. One was a bathing chamber.
The others were identical to mine, except for the room at the end, which had a larger bed, two chests, and a small table with two chairs.
I shut the doors, except the one I’d claimed, and headed back to the main room, stopping to retrieve my cloth-wrapped spice box on the way.
Time to inspect my food and the other provisions.
The sack, judging by its weight, was overfull.
I found a whole loaf of bread, a variety of fruits, veggies that could be eaten raw or cooked, a few jars I’d have to investigate later, a pouch of oats, a pouch of rice, and a hard cheese.
At least a week of food for one person, if not more.
I left these in piles across the table and moved to the shelves along the wall behind the benches.
Pots and kettles, bowls, mugs, plates, cutlery, and really anything you could need to prepare food were stacked in neat rows.
One side of the hearth had a flat surface, undoubtedly meant for cooking.
But where was the water? It took a full loop of the room for me to realize that barrels of wine propped up every table instead of legs.
With Sprakt’s help—as he bounced atop it—I discovered a shoulder-high pile of triangular, interlocking casks, which I had mistaken for a neatly arranged stack of firewood.
Each one was as long as my arm and had a small spout on the top.
I hefted one down, and it was heavy. My grip slipped, and it thudded to the ground, just missing my toes.
“Good thing it’s sturdy, eh?” I said to Sprakt.
“Back so soon?”
I whirled, raising my hands and connecting with Vaya’la’s power.
A figure rimmed in sage green stood in the archway of the hallway opposite mine. Delight? If not for my second sight, I wouldn’t have seen him against the darkness at all.
“Stay back,” I warned.
“Who are you?” He was speaking in Mayoran.
“Announce yourself,” I demanded, switching languages for him to understand.
“Did Drake send you?” His lifelight danced toward dull aqua. Confused.
I inched forward, moving so the light from the hearth would obstruct less of my vision. “Who’s Drake?” I asked.
“Why are you here?”
I knew that voice. I dropped my hands, the familiarity disarming me. “I could ask the same of you. I am asking. No one is supposed to be down here.”
He gasped and stepped fully into the room. “Serae?”
The light flickered across his face, but I already knew. The way he said my name, his accent, his height, the way he stood. “Bale?” I whispered.
His face split into a wide grin.