by Amanda Fleet
“There’s a Council meeting tomorrow morning. I can outline your concerns, but after what Mathas said… I don’t think the Council will let you go. Especially not after today.”
A bigger issue worried me. “What if Aegyir convinces more Guides to join him like he did before? What if when you go Outside, there are fifty or a hundred to deal with?”
He pushed his food around his plate. “I’ve been thinking about that. I don’t have any answers though.”
“When The Realm dealt with the rogue Guides last time, what did you do?”
“No one knew there were any. It was assumed there was just Aegyir.” A muscle in his jaw twitched. “He brought others with him. The Realm wasn’t prepared.”
I moved on to the dessert, tired of the food here. To Faran, it was merely fuel, and meals in the Great Hall were as much a chance to talk politics as eat. Would I ever lose my love of good food and just see it as fuel?
“What do the papers say?” he asked, shovelling up a spoonful of pudding.
I’d skimmed through them while he’d been sorting out some dinner for us, and told him the same as I’d told his father earlier – they reported a few flu cases and two murders, but no looming Armageddon.
“But the range and variety of papers the Scouts are bringing isn’t wide, and by the time they get them back to me, they’re out of date. I could be missing a lot. Which no doubt your father will see as me deliberately misleading him.”
We finished our food and Faran stacked our empty dishes outside, ready for the kitchen staff to retrieve. I pulled my boots off, wishing I had a pair of sweat-pants to change into. The leathers were comfortable enough, but I wanted a change.
Faran sat on the sofa next to me and I turned sideways, resting my back against the arm of the sofa and tucking my toes under his thigh. “Are you scared about going Outside?”
He rested his hand on my ankle, his thumb caressing the top of my foot. “Yes. But the choice is between going Outside to tackle Aegyir, or waiting until he storms the portal. Neither option is risk-free.” He caught my gaze, his green eyes suddenly dark. “Aeron. If I die Outside, marry Cenan.”
My head shot up. “Are you serious?”
“Yes. If I’m gone, you’ll have few Guardians who’ll speak for you. Cenan has always liked you. He’s a good match, although below your status. Lord Sondan would match your status better, but I don’t think he’d agree to marrying you, and I don’t think you’d be happy with him, even if he did. Though if I don’t come back, Sondan probably won’t either.”
“I don’t want to marry either of them. I haven’t come to terms with the fact I’m married to you! If you don’t come back, I’ll be out of here.”
“You would never be allowed to return if you did that.”
My breath huffed out. “I don’t care. Who would there be for me here if you’d been killed? Just come back safely. Or talk your father around into letting me go Outside too.”
“Let’s talk about this tomorrow. We should rest. I want you to sleep with me tonight.”
I pushed away from him, eyes wide. “Are you about to exert your marital rights?”
“What?” His brow creased, then his face cleared. “No! I would never violate you.”
“But if you did, I could do nothing. I couldn’t defend myself even at full strength. And who could I complain to? Your father? He’d laugh.”
He pulled at his earlobe. “If I’d wanted to force myself on you, I could have done so several times before now. A chair balanced against the door wouldn’t have stopped me. You’ve been at my mercy since your arrival and I’ve never taken advantage. You can trust me. Share the bed with me.”
I was too tired and sore to sleep on the floor out here in the lounge. I nodded, still far from happy.
I grabbed the bathroom first, changing into night-clothes while I was in there. Faran returned from the bathroom fully dressed, peeling off his trousers and kicking off his boots next to the bed. As he took off his top, I stopped him. From the memories that had returned, I knew Faran preferred to sleep naked.
“Could you keep more clothes on? Please?”
He pulled the top back on, eyes dancing. “I am not putting my trousers back on.”
“At least keep your shorts and a top on.”
I shuffled back as he slid into bed next to me, keeping the distance between us as large as possible. Not a huge distance, as the bed was barely the width of a double bed Outside and Faran filled more than half of it.
He looked across, offering me a cuddle. “Come here. It’s been a horrible day.”
I hesitated, and he raised his eyebrows. Gingerly, I moved across and he slid an arm around my shoulders.
Silence thickened between us. He stared at the stars above us, blinking hard, and I followed his gaze, trying to recognise any of the constellations. None of them was familiar.
“Everyone thinks I’m a fool for loving you. Am I? Are you going to break my heart? Not by betraying me, but by never loving me again, the way you did.” He breathed deeply. “What we had was amazing. I’ll never find that with anyone else…” His breath hitched, and he pulled me tighter to him. “You know exactly how to hurt me so deeply I will never get up again, and it isn’t anything learned in the training room. I love you, and I hate feeling this vulnerable.”
I swallowed. Would I ever love him the way he wanted me to? The way I’d loved Finn?
I didn’t think so.
I eased out of his arms, trying to ignore the look of pain crossing his face.
“Goodnight,” I said, retreating to the far edge of the bed.
He drew the covers up. “Goodnight. Try to sleep. You can trust me.”
He turned away and switched off the lights. I don’t think I even managed to stay awake for ten seconds.
16
I woke in a jumble of limbs with him, my hand resting lightly on his abdomen under his top, my legs wrapped around his thigh, his arms around me.
He smiled at me. “Good morning.”
From the wide-open eyes and lack of drowsiness, I guessed he’d been awake for ages.
“You never could stay on your side of the bed,” he said. “Even if I’d made you cross, and you were determined to sleep with your back to me, I would always wake with you wrapped around me.”
I pulled my hand out from under his top, but he pressed his palm over it.
“I’m yours. None of me is off-limits.”
“All of me is.”
I realised exactly where my thigh was and moved my leg, cringing. “Sorry.”
“I have no complaints. I’ve missed waking up with you like this.”
How had I ended up completely in his side of the bed with my hand under his top and my thigh on his crotch? I’d always slept in the exact part of the bed that Finn was in, but that was because it had Finn in it. I tried to assuage my guilt by thinking I must just have been cold in the night, but deep down, I knew that wasn’t the reason and felt ten times worse.
“How are you feeling this morning?” Faran said.
I eased away from him and rolled on to my back. “Better. Not completely healed, but better. I should shower and dress.”
I wriggled away and headed for the shower. I turned on the water and stepped under, my head hanging. The warm water plastered my hair to my scalp. I leaned forward and rested my forehead against the stone tiling.
“Oh, Finn. I’m sorry,” I murmured.
Back in the bedroom, I waited awkwardly, wrapped in a thick towel, staring pointedly at the floor while Faran swung out of bed. I still wasn’t comfortable seeing him half-dressed.
While he showered, I dressed. My bloodied jacket from the day before had been cleaned and returned. The hole in the front and the slice through the arm that Faran had made the day before had been neatly mended and were almost invisible. I pulled the jacket on, just as Faran emerged, wrapped in a towel.
“I’ll leave you to dress,” I said.
“Stay. I don’t mind.” He
started to unwind the towel from his waist.
I made a dash for the door. “I’ll wait out there.”
“Do I train this morning?” I asked, when Faran joined me.
“There’ll be more papers for you to read but we should train afterwards if you feel strong enough. Otherwise, I can leave you here and train with Sondan or Cenan. Or you can teach me more English.”
“Let’s see how I feel after breakfast. English might be a good option for more than one reason.”
***
The news in the papers scared me. The Scouts had brought as up-to-date copies as they could and it seemed Aegyir had finally reformed and was killing prolifically. There was a sudden spike in flu cases and a number of unexplained deaths of runners in some woods not far from the portal. Woods Finn and I used to run in. I relayed the intelligence to both Lord Eredan and the group going Outside.
“You’d better train,” said Lord Eredan. “If what you say is true, there’s a chance that Aegyir could attack before tomorrow.”
The walk to the training rooms was through a busy thoroughfare and Faran dipped his head to speak softly in my ear.
“How many has Aegyir killed?”
“A lot. And the papers are now a few days old.”
He nodded, his jaw clenched.
“What can you manage?” he asked once we were in the training room
I did a mental assessment. “Well, these leathers aren’t blade-proof and it’ll be tomorrow before any new ones will be ready, so let’s not risk you stabbing me again. And I’m not a hundred per cent, so nothing too difficult.”
“Shall we work on hand-to-hand fighting?” He tossed a head-guard and protective vest to me and marked the mid-point of the floor. “I’ll try to reach that wall; you try to stop me.”
He began his attack before I was even half-prepared, beating me back until I was in a corner and boxing my ear before walking back to the middle of the room, chuckling.
“You should probably wear some protection,” I said, straightening. “Because the only way I stand a chance is to fight the way I know best. The only reason your balls aren’t in your chest right now is because I promised not to kick you there again unless you were wearing a box.”
Faran strode over to the cupboard and yanked out the leather protection he’d worn before, not bothering to turn his back as he tucked it into his trousers. I tried not to look.
“Okay. Fight by whatever method you think will work,” he said.
Within seconds I was curled in a heap on the floor while Faran stood over me, kicking me.
“Aeron, I am going to keep kicking until you find a way to get up. You know that even two of these, if I’d meant them, would have broken all of your ribs?” He kicked my head, hard enough to make me gasp, despite the head-protection. “Get up.”
I tried to, only to get a boot in my midriff.
“Get up!”
I wriggled and punched and clawed my way up, managing to wallop Faran across the temple in the process, leaving him blinking and reeling. Before he’d recovered, I drop-kicked him, my toe catching his chin perfectly, and he crumpled to his knees.
I stood in front of him, breathing hard, ready to punch his lights out. He smiled ruefully, rubbing his jaw. “Good. I need you to be able to last out about a minute of Aegyir. It could take me that time to reach you if he attacks.”
After another ten minutes of sparring, the grins decorating Faran’s face riled me and I wanted to kill him. He caught me by my wrists, stopping me mid-attack. “Slow down! You’re a mess of flailing fists and are signalling every move. Use your anger and frustration productively. Look. Plan. Don’t just react. And get a guard up or I will hit you. Come on. You’re blazing hot and it’s become a disadvantage.”
I didn’t want to think about how battered I’d be if he’d meant even a single one of his blows. He waited while I brushed myself down, a maddening quirk in his brows.
“Aeron, I can keep this up all day,” he said, pausing heavily between the last two words. “I can see how much you want to hurt me but unless you focus, you’ll spend the rest of the day spitting dust out of your mouth while I laugh at you. Come. Pin me down.” He beckoned to me with his fingers.
I faced him, my ribs still aching. He parried my first few attempts easily and walloped me again.
And then everything clicked into place and I found a whole heap of muscle memory I had no prior knowledge of. The rapidity with which this wiped the smile off Faran’s face amused me no end. Where the focus and co-ordination were coming from, I had no idea but I was kicking his sorry ass.
He might be six feet eight and built like a brick outhouse, but he didn’t have my agility or flexibility. Or my lack of compunction over fighting dirty in a training session. Twice I managed to pin him down; another three times I got close. If he hadn’t been wearing a box, his nuts would have been close to his ribs. He had a smear of blood on his lip and a black eye for his efforts, too. We called an end to hostilities and sat on the floor, breathing hard.
“How does it feel to have beaten me finally?” he said, dabbing salve on his face.
I laughed. “Fantastic. Something suddenly clicked.”
“Did I hurt you?” Faran peeled his top off so that I could apply the cream to the marks I’d left on his torso.
“No. Not really. You manage to pull most of your punches.” My breath whistled as I saw the bruises on his back. “Oh, shit, I’m sorry!”
He grinned. “It’s okay. We have salve. And anyway, it reminds me of old times. Do you remember anything else? Other than how to fight.”
I paused. Did I tell him?
“Aeron?”
I cleared my throat. “Um. Yeah. I can remember losing my temper with you and taking it out on you in here. You won. Pissing me off even more.”
“I remember. You were furious! Anything else?”
I took a breath. “I can remember you kissing me.” I met his eye. “You’re very good.”
He chuckled. “Thank you.”
“And I can remember some things from the bedroom. And bathroom.”
“Oh.” Pink crept over his cheeks. “Well, we did enjoy sharing the shower. I’m glad you’ve remembered some of what we had.”
I kept my head down. “Mm.”
There was silence from him for a moment.
“You don’t sound very happy about it,” he said, eventually.
“It’s difficult.” I looked up. “My memories of you overlap with my memories of Finn, so now I feel like I’ve cheated on both of you. Can we take a break? I’m not sure my focus is great right now.”
***
I watched carefully as Faran led us to the centre of the labyrinth, counting turns. Knowing the coding in the panelling in the halls had allowed me to find my way around, but I had no such clues here – just tall green hedging. At the fountain, Faran leaned his back against the stone basin but I strolled around, letting my fingers trail in the cold water, my head bombarded with memories of coming here with him. I flicked the droplets at him when I reached him and he laughed, scooping up a cupped hand of water and throwing it at me. I dodged most of it and tried to retaliate.
“Don’t make me throw you in the water,” warned Faran.
“Don’t make me need to kick you in the nuts again!”
“Shall we sit? Talk?”
I sat on one of the benches. “Okay. Since I’m having a hard time with both you and Finn overlapping in my memories, tell me about you and Lady Morgan. Technically, she overlapped with me, since we were still married while I was away.”
“What do you need to know?”
“Ah. Faran the diplomat again. What I need to know is a whole different answer from what I want to know.”
“What do you want to know?”
His expression was open, and I decided to chance my luck. “Everything.”
He held his breath for a moment then let it free with a huff. “All right.”
He sat on the far end of the bench,
lay down and rested his head on my thigh, his knees bent, his hands folded on his abdomen. He flicked his brows at me, seeking permission after the fact and I shrugged. He was there now, and it felt normal, rather than over-familiar.
I let my gaze travel over his sharp cheekbones and the line of his nose to his lips. “Why did you choose Lady Morgan? She seems like a piece of work to me.”
He frowned at the phrase.
“Unpleasant. Manipulative,” I said.
His face cleared. “Mm. She would probably prefer ‘focused’ or ‘ambitious’.”
His hands rose and fell with his breath and a smile poked the corner of his mouth up. The sun came out, a shaft of brightness illuminating his face, and he squinted. I moved my hands to shade his eyes.
“Thank you,” he said. He breathed deeply, thoughtful. “Lilja told me that you would return and at first I was angry. I didn’t want you back. But I didn’t want to marry anyone else. I knew I would never love anyone the way I’d loved you. I didn’t want to. It hurt too much. But I didn’t want a loveless marriage either. It would have felt like a sham after everything we had.” He flexed his back. “I would have stayed single, but a couple of months ago, my father reminded me it was my duty to The Realm to marry and have children. To remarry would also secure my role as Elected Successor. Show that I had sound judgement. Lady Morgan made it clear that she would accept any offer from me.”
“That sounds a bit clinical.”
“It would have been a marriage of convenience. I needed a wife; Lady Morgan’s status is senior, but she wanted to climb the ranks.”
“So she doesn’t hate me because she loves you, but because I’ve thwarted her ambition? Stolen her ticket to the throne?”
He smiled. “Ah, Aeron. Never the diplomat!”
The sound of the fountain nearby soothed me and I began to see why Faran and I would escape here to the peace and seclusion. I wished more of the sun penetrated the middle of the labyrinth as the air had shifted from fresh, to chilly.