Quill and Cobweb (The Chronicles of Whynne Book 2)

by B. A. Lovejoy

  I could have laughed.

  “I’m here,” he said softly. “I’m right here, and I’m all yours.”

  “Mine?” I scoffed, yet the sparks began to dull all the same. I hated how that stupid statement calmed me.

  “Yours,” he reassured, leveling with me, a glint of surprise in his eyes at my interest in the statement. “I’m yours, Wren,” he said, seeing the effect it had. “I’m always yours,” he reassured, his hold loosening. “Is that what you want to hear? Is that what you need to hear? I can say it to you a million times if that will get you to calm down.”

  “But will you mean it?” I asked hesitantly.

  He looked at me as if insulted I would think otherwise. “You need to sleep,” he concluded finally, pulling back his arm. “It’s rare that you ask me such foolish questions these days.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  “There she is,” Adam said the following morning with a half chuckle. “I’ll have you know that you look far too comfortable in Luka’s bed.”

  It was some ungodly hour, one which people shouldn’t have been awake for, just before the sun rose. There Adam was, at the foot of the bed, the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes and looked blearily around the room.

  “She doesn’t appreciate early mornings,” Luka warned him from the doorway. “You won’t get much out of her.” Ah, so that’s what he was here for.

  Adam snorted, obviously disagreeing. “I brought you a treat yesterday, you know. Of course, I didn’t know that you would be gone, but…” He came back into focus, his soft smile being one of the first things I could really see as the world ebbed in and out, my head still throbbing with the sounds of the forest. Adam reached down into his pocket, withdrawing a small, woven sack and placing it by my shoulder. “That puts you in a good mood, doesn’t it?”

  “We have nothing to grind the beans,” Luka said tightly behind him as I groggily sat up, enticed by the heady aroma emanating from the bag.

  Coffee. My fingers tightened. I inhaled a little more. I could have cried, Mylene had conveniently forgotten it while shopping at the market the day before.

  Adam ignored Luka’s statement, “Kristin said you nearly drank him out of house and home, I thought it might be a nice treat. Maybe you and I could have a conversation now?”

  I swayed, holding the bag of coffee beans firmly in both of my hands. Adam took that as a yes.

  “Luka, if you will,” Adam said, and I felt my hands tighten at the prospect of him leaving and going somewhere else in the cabin. “It’ll be just a moment, Wren,” Adam said, noting my expression. “Then he can come back.”

  “He stays outside,” I said.

  “She’s grown more commanding as of late,” Luka explained. “I try not to argue.”

  “Right,” Adam’s eyebrows narrowed. “Well then…” He gestured to the door and Luka obeyed his request, his footsteps not straying once he had passed it. I let out a sigh of relief, which only garnered further concern from Adam.

  “I thought he would go just to spite me,” I said, still watching the door.

  “Mhm,” Adam agreed, sitting down on the edge of the bed. “You know, you can put down the coffee.”

  “I’m afraid you’ll take it back.”

  He laughed, his face immediately morphing back into something more familiar, a less strained version of the man I knew. “If I had known that it was so precious to you, perhaps I would have sent some your way to convince you to actually try while you were at Alda.”

  “Would I have still ended up here?” I asked.

  The humor left his face. He leaned over, doing a quick scan of my features as he quickly moved on. We both knew the answer to that question, I suppose, it was an inevitability. “I just have to take a look at you and make sure that you’re okay.” As if I couldn’t figure that out. I was well aware of what he was worried about, the same thing she’d said the night before.

  I closed my eyes, leaning in as his hands were on my face. His hold was different than Luka’s, less burning, it felt almost like when Winry touched me.

  “Nausea? Dizziness? Headaches?” He asked.

  Yes, to all of them. “No,” I lied, eager to get out and return to normal.

  “Can I see your eyes?” He asked, squinting as I opened them. “Dilated,” he said, “but that doesn’t mean anything, I am quite handsome.” He knew it, apparently. Big surprise. “You don’t feel odd or anything?”

  I felt like my body wasn’t mine, like my head would split open at any moment. “Perfectly fine.”

  He nodded, satisfied with my responses. Maybe he was just so used to being around the fae that he didn’t think I would lie to him. Maybe he trusted me. “Winry will be here in a few hours, try to avoid any strenuous situations. I imagine the King will be arriving with his healer shortly after, and Camden, sorry for that.”

  “Why would the King come?” I asked, alarm rising in me. He’d not come to visit yet.

  “I imagine it’s because you are an asset, and he’d rather not see you dead,” Adam said. “I was supposed to see your progress yesterday, but seeing as how you went and got injured… You’re lucky, Wren, not many people come back from the forest.”

  “You’ve been in and out of it,” I observed.

  “Yes, well,” he said, his hand rising to the back of his neck, no doubt running over the scarred skin. “I have the King’s name on my side, I always have.”

  “Is that why you love him?” I asked as he began to pull away. “I saw you in the palace, it hurt you when you went to see him; so, are the benefits what make it worthwhile?” There were no apparent benefits to loving Luka, so maybe I wanted to hear of a rational love, maybe knowing that there was another way, one that made sense, would calm me.

  Adam paused, looking back at me, perhaps debating whether or not he could tell me. I saw it, every muscle in his body tensed. “No,” he said slowly, rising from beside me to stand once more. “It’s not like that, it never was…” He looked at me, a question in his eyes that made me wonder whether it was for him or me. “I’ve known him since I was a child. He would watch me play from the back patio while talking about the news with my father. He is all I’ve ever known. His smile is all I’ve ever craved. Benefits are nothing, neither is sense or reason—it’s never like that when you are truly in love. For me, it is a sick consuming thing. It is a matter of knowing nothing else and wondering if it is real. Count yourself lucky that you do not live like that.”

  But I live a much crueler life, I wanted to tell him. One in which you loved someone, but you did not know if they actually loved you back, or even if their understanding of love was the same as yours.

  “Luka is good to you, Wren,” Adam said, “and I am glad for that. You know real love; you are lucky like that.”

  Did I? I watched Adam as he approached the door, likely readying to confront the others. “I want Mylene gone,” I said suddenly. “I don’t want her here.”

  Adam blinked, looking over his shoulder at me.

  “Please.”

  “That’ll have to be up to the King,” he said.

  Luka entered the room about an hour later, his hand smoothing over the blankets at the foot of the bed and his eyes looking me over, keeping an eye out for any oddities or an excuse to stay back. I had not left the bed, not even caring to listen in as they had their meeting outside and the beginnings of sunlight were peeking through the window, signaling that they would leave soon. Something about me felt hollow that morning.

  “I’m just checking in on you,” Luka said, sitting on the edge of the bed where Adam had been moments prior.

  “I figured.”

  “Mhm,” he hummed, reaching to the side of my face again and taming the locks that framed it. “Your hair is unruly, especially after you have used your powers and even more so after waking up,” he said, likely looking for something, anything to say. I wondered what he was thinking at the moment, if he was debating whether it was really worth it or not.


  Was he replaying the kiss of the night before in the back of his head?

  “I wanted to say goodbye before I left,” he finally admitted, his voice hesitant.

  “Why? Do you think you won’t be returning?” I asked, suddenly jerking back to reality.

  “No…” He said, but I couldn’t help but notice how he flinched. “You’re going to stay out of trouble, aren’t you Wren?”

  “I’ll try,” I said, unamused. His lack of faith in me was astonishing, and also ironic in a way.

  “Sleep, if you can.”

  “Are you telling me what to do now?” I fired back.

  The side of his mouth curved up as he scooted closer, looking at me with what seemed to be an unbearable amount of adoration. I felt a lump in the back of my throat, a part of me wanted to ask him to tell me the truth or to tell him what I saw—Mylene was a coward for not telling him what she knew.

  “I expect you to be in one piece when I get back,” he said. “Or at the very least, keep the damage minimal. The King will blame me for your clumsiness, I’m sure, just as he’ll blame me for your current state.”

  “We wouldn’t want that,” I said.

  “Well, maybe you would,” he mused. I couldn’t hold back the snicker that escaped me.

  For a moment, the voices seemed so much quieter. They were far away again, almost out of reach. But I knew that the second the door opened again and he left, they would be back. It was almost maddening to me. I knew that they wouldn’t stop.

  “I want to tell you something before I leave,” he said, suddenly quieter, unable to look at me. I wondered if it was going to be about Mylene.

  “To try to sleep near the wall instead of by the side of the bed?” I asked, desperate not to talk about it, not to discuss her. She was out there, I knew, waiting for him. If she had any sense, she would have forced her way into the hunting party, staying as far away from me as possible.

  “No,” he said. “But you should try to do that too.”

  I smiled at the response, but then my grin faltered as I realized he was watching me, trying to gauge my reaction. He was likely debating with himself.

  Finally, he seemed to come to a conclusion, his eyes searching mine and his hand at my side, cradling my hip.

  “I love you, Wren,” he whispered, suddenly shy as if he was afraid that I would hear it and tell him otherwise. I felt my heart shudder.

  I looked at him, my eyes wide and my back straightening as I darted up, my mouth half open at the statement. A lie, it had to be a lie, after all that I’d seen the night before, it could not be anything else—

  His face was honest. I had never seen him lie, but I had seen him tell the truth, sometimes truths that he wished he could keep from others.

  “I’ve wanted to tell you that for a while now,” he said. “Actually, I think I have for half of my life. But you had told me that it would make you cry the first time I tried, and after that, no other moment felt right. I didn’t want it to be out of anger, or at a moment where it could be brushed away. I didn’t want it to seem unimportant or like a diversion.” He inhaled, seeming to gather strength with the motion. “But I love you. I love you now, I’ll love you tomorrow, and I’m very embarrassed to say that I loved you then. I have not known much of the world where I did not love you, so, there,” he said awkwardly. “I wanted you to know.”

  What could I say?

  “You don’t have to say anything, Wren,” he said, standing up from the bed. “I won’t make you repeat yourself. I know. You have no idea how many times I’ve played your words in my head.”

  And now he was going. Just like that, off into the woods. For me.

  “Let me say goodbye,” I said anxiously, standing up from the bed. “Properly.”

  His eyes flickered with concern at that, but then my arms were around him, holding him tightly.

  “You come back,” I demanded. “You promise me that you’ll come back.”

  “I can’t make any promises,” he said, “but I can tell you that I will do my best.” His head tucked down beside mine, his arms holding me so much tighter. “I love you, Wren,” he repeated, not soft or hesitant, but sure of himself. “You could not begin to have any idea of the extent.”

  And when he pulled away, the call became so much stronger.

  Chapter Seventeen

  They had left. It was a short, uneventful goodbye with everyone else, one met with the promise of a return and the stiff postures of all of the men. They left in a haste, eager to move during daylight. They entered the woods far too quickly, leaving us behind to watch the trees swallow them whole.

  After that, we remained in front of the cabin, Lindy not willing to go inside when they were gone. I think, though she did not say it, she was worried that a scream would ring out and no one would hear it. So she sat there, keeping me with her.

  Keeping me by the woods.

  Leaving me to stare after them, a numbness overcoming my body as I realized how deep the party must have been in the woods by then. I almost felt like I was slipping away and was too unwilling to prove Mylene right by saying anything about it. No, instead I stayed there, listening to the woods.

  It was loud. Far too loud. A scream in the back of my head as I stared at the trees, the voices demanding that I go in.

  “You see,” Lindy explained to Mylene the hundredth time beside me as we sat by the firewood. “You sit them out, and they start to feel healthy again. We do this with the babies in my country: rain, snow, sleet, or shine. Though it is largely snow. They get the air, and they feel better.”

  I suppose to her I did look better, seeing as how I was sitting up straight and was wide awake. I did not, however, feel any better. If anything, I felt worse.

  “We should take her back to the cabin,” Mylene said, eyeing me warily as she sat in a chair from the dining room beside Lindy. “Put her back in her own room and lock the door until they arrive. She’s not predictable like this.”

  “Nonsense,” Lindy scoffed, patting my thigh. “She is fine. Look at her.”

  I was anything but fine, but I didn’t have the heart to tell her that.

  “Here,” Lindy said, trying to calm Mylene. She grabbed the side of my face and wrenched it to the side, shoving her pointer finger into my view and pointing to the horizon. “You see that? You see those little figures? There are your friends, the men who feel so strong and capable that they were stupid enough not to bring with any women. Soon they will be gone to be idiots in the woods. And then, if you keep watching there, you will see your sister and your king. Does that make you happy?” She asked, again patting my thigh. “They’ll be home soon, they’ll likely give up like men are prone to do, but they’ll be back. Safe and sound.”

  Mylene was unconvinced, perhaps it was the way that I continued to stare towards the forest. I couldn’t really focus on the figures Lindy showed me, not with the way that my head ached.

  “We should take her back in,” Mylene persisted.

  “I was the one put in charge of her, not you,” Lindy fired back, beginning the squabble. I still did what I was told, watching the horizon, taking in the colors of the sun rise.

  It was supposed to be the safest time of day. I wish someone would have told the drums in my head that. The voices were becoming clearer, somehow overwhelming the conversation beside me. I swore I could hear something moving towards me.

  Stay out of trouble, the voice in the back of my head warned. It was quickly becoming fainter.

  “The King will know what’s best to do with her,” Mylene continued to argue, and my eyes scanned the horizon, traveling across the trees.

  “You always think that your king is so smart,” Lindy dismissed. “He could send you to your death and you would say that.”

  I could feel my hands tighten in the dirty red tunic they’d not yet bothered to change me out of. I knew to look away, I should have looked away. But I couldn’t.

  My eyes kept moving, searching without my permission, looking
for something—no, someone. I knew there would be someone. Someone was waiting.

  I saw the trees move.

  “You agree, don’t you, Wren?” Lindy asked, dragging me back into the conversation. I was only half listening, so I could only think to nod. Since it was Lindy speaking, I had faith that agreeing was the right thing to do, at least while my mind was elsewhere.

  Something was out there. Yet again, it was there. I could feel it in my body. But I could resist.

  “Hopefully, Luka will be back soon,” Mylene said, and I felt that small ounce of control begin to leave me. Because, when she said Luka, it sounded so sincere, so wanting. Like she was allowed to wish he was there, like him being there would make it all better for her.

  Yours, the trees called. Always yours. He belongs to you.

  I was going to be sick.

  “Wren?” Lindy asked. Her hand was on my shoulder, trying and failing to gain my attention.

  I wanted to go.

  I had this all-consuming need to go, to take off into the trees and leave. It was undeniable, practically clawing its way to the surface. I had to go.

  I felt the cold sting of ice traveling across my skin and snapped my head to the side, surprised to find Lindy staring at me, her eyes far colder than the magic she’d used. “Wren,” she repeated, her voice tense and her fingers closing around my shoulder. I could see her breath come out in thin, white clouds, hanging in the air around her mouth.

  “I’m fine,” I said mechanically.

  “No,” she said decisively, slowly beginning to rise.

  “I’m not going inside.”

  I felt Mylene’s eyes snap to mine, a strangled exhale leaving her.

  “No,” said Lindy calmly, “you are…” Her hand tensed, her fingers slowly digging into my shoulder. She knew. She could see it in my face.

  Something in me snapped.

  Maybe it was the contact. Maybe it was the deadly silence the woods had taken in the background. Maybe it was the eyes that I felt on the back of my head.