A Touch of Moonlight (A Court of Moonlight Book 1)

by Zora Marie

  Everytime he looked again, she was merely pushing the remains of her food around, a regretful look in her eyes as she stared down at her plate. She’d eaten a good bit, but not enough with how hollow and gaunt her face was.

  Beside her, Dorn shifted in his seat. “I think it’s time I call it a night. Would you like to join me, Rina? I’ll find you something to wear to bed.”

  Absently, Rina nodded and stood. “Thank you for dinner.” The words were barely more than a whisper as she pushed in her chair. She glanced at the plates, almost as if debating doing something with them, before turning to follow Dorn.

  Everyone was silent as they left, the only sound was the light scuff of Rina’s steps as she disappeared down the hall. Even once that sound faded, they were quiet for a long moment.

  “Why is that girl so sad?” Ash asked, beating Amber to whatever she wanted to ask.

  “Her brother died a few days ago.”

  “Brother? A human boy I take it?”

  “No. A halfling. Tomilin, he was Lyra’s son.” Arlen’s gaze fell.

  “Oh. Arlen, I’m so sorry.”

  Arlen’s eyes dipped to his plate, his shoulders rising with a long slow breath.

  “I’ll answer the rest of your questions later,” Farin said, breaking the silence.

  Amber nodded. Hesitating, she asked, “Still… may I take her shopping? That tunic of hers should have been tossed ages ago—like probably before she was born.”

  Shrugging, Arlen said, “I’ll leave that up to her, but I don’t think she would object to getting some new clothes. Just keep in mind that I don’t think she’s ever been shopping.”

  “What? Well, then she’s in for a treat.” Amber’s accompanying grin made Fen wary.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll make sure she behaves,” Ash said.

  “That’s what I’m worried about.” Arlen smiled faintly as he got up from the table. “I’ll let you know in the morning if she’d like to go.”

  Ash nodded. “I’ll bring you a set of clothes for her in a bit. I think I still have a few things here. They’ll be a bit big on her, but it’ll be better than what she has.”

  “Thank you, Ash,” Arlen said before politely excusing himself from the room.

  In silence, they finished dinner. Amber barely spared him a glance before she nodded to Farin and left. Despite the tug in his gut to leave, he stayed until everyone finished. When it was just him, he busied himself with clearing the table. It wasn’t his turn, but he didn’t mind. Most lords had servants, but his father was against such practices. In the main palace, they paid a mix of humans and fae to keep up the place, but here they liked to pretend they were normal. Or as normal as they could get.

  He washed, dried, and put the dishes away in silence. The entire time he turned over every look and movement Rina had made. It felt like he was trying to put a puzzle together without a clue of what he was looking at. He also had the distinct feeling that he was missing half the pieces and worried he may never get a clear image.

  7

  Rina

  Rina felt horrible for leaving food on her plate, but she’d been unable to eat any more without making herself sick. She couldn’t recall ever seeing so much food in one place. It had seemed like too much even with so many people at the table.

  And then there was Fen. There was something about him that she couldn’t put her finger on.

  As they entered their quarters, Dorn asked, “Would you like to take a bath before bed?”

  The thought of lugging water in to bathe made her cringe. She was too tired to bother and she didn’t want them to do it for her. They were already doing too much. “It can wait.”

  “We have running water and it heats itself.”

  “Running water?” She squinted at him. And what’s self-warming water? How does that work?

  Smiling, Dorn waved for her to follow him. “It’s a luxury that even Farin won’t give up,” he said as he walked to the door next to where she’d be sleeping, he said, “Even when we were living in tents, he still managed to find his way to a hot bath on most days.” Opening the door, he revealed a huge room with a large stone tub set in the floor, already rippling with water.

  She stared at the bath big enough for four people. The food, the house, this bath—all such a casual show of wealth. She’d known Farin was a lord, yet now she felt like she had no clue what she’d gotten herself into.

  “The bath is self-cycling so don’t worry about cleaning it.”

  She blinked, reeling in her wandering thoughts to process his words. “Really? How does it work?”

  With a flick of his wrist, he lit the half melted candles scattered around the room. She flinched at the rudeness of it and his features softened. “There's a natural spring under the house. With a bit of help from the Water Court, we've managed to direct it up into our pipes. Ash’s mother and I came up with a spell to heat it. The baths run constantly so the pipes don’t burst. The sinks have knobs.” He walked over to a basin on the counter and turned a curved bronze knob. “This one is hot, the other cold. It’s the same in the kitchen.”

  “How did you…” She pointed at a candle.

  “Magic.” He raised a hand and a tiny flame flickered on his finger. “I’ll go get clean clothes for you to sleep in.”

  As the door clicked shut behind him, Rina leaned over the edge of the tub. She stared down at her faint reflection, surprised at just how thin she had gotten in these last few weeks. She had always been skinny, but now her cheeks were protruding from her face and she was filthy. She fingered her matted braid. Shame crept through her. She could have at least brushed her hair. It was one of the few things Jake never took from her.

  With shaking hands, she began to unbraid it. Jake’s mood had worsened the last few weeks and he’d often sent them to bed without food. The few rabbits and squirrels she’d managed to catch clearly hadn’t been enough.

  The creak of the door interrupted her thoughts.

  “Here you go,” Dorn said, his tone quiet and soothing as he entered. “There’s soap in the dish over there and I grabbed you a towel too. The tunic will be big on you, but it will work for this evening.”

  “Thank you.”

  “If you need anything, I’ll just be in the other room, all right?”

  She nodded and he left again, closing the door behind him. Alone, she stripped. A nasty blue bruise greeted her and she gingerly prodded the tender flesh. Satisfied that it seemed to be healing well, she practically melted into the warmth of the water. Grabbing the small bar of soap, she broke off a piece for Tomilin. He always got so dirty dragging himself around as he tended their little garden. Her heart stopped. The piece slipped from her hand and fell into the water. As tears burned at the back of her eyes, she forced herself to take a deep breath. She looked around the room, grounding herself in the present. Ahead of her was a black shelf full of fluffy towels. Further down that wall was a strange chamber pot. On the next wall was the long counter littered with little vials and containers, brushes and combs. The next wall had strange pegs sticking out of it near the door. Then there was the bath, the water warm and trickling as the water came and went in a steady stream.

  Bit by bit that tightness in her chest eased until she could lie back. For a long moment she stared up at the stars shining through a window over the bath as she floated. The touch of her feet on stone had her sitting up to grab the remains of the soap. The quiet was too much. She made herself think of the chatter and noise of dinner as she lathered her hair and rinsed it. There had been too much going on in that room, yet Fen had been quiet the entire time. He hadn’t asked or pressed, yet she’d felt the solemn curiosity in his emotions. There had been too many people and emotions in the room for her to sort out, but Fen’s had somehow been clearer than the others. It’d been easy to anchor herself to him and let the others wash over and past her.

  Then there was this house, this place. This was what a home was supposed to be like. She could almost see her mo
ther here. See her curled up on the couch reading one of the books she’d loved so much. Maybe even their book. Sighing, Rina stood up. It did no good to think about what could or should have been.

  After toweling off, she pulled the clean shirt Dorn had brought her over her head. When he’d described the top as long, he hadn’t been exaggerating. It came down to her knees. Scooping up her dirty clothes, she stepped out into the sitting room.

  “Done already?” Dorn asked.

  “What would you like me to do with these?” She held up her wad of dirty clothes. At home she would have taken them to the stream with her in the morning and washed them, but here she didn’t know where to put them.

  “Um. Do you want to keep them or...?” Arlen asked.

  “I…” She trailed off. She wanted to keep them even though they had more threadbare patches than shirt.

  “You can keep them if you want. Even if you don’t wear them,” Dorn said. “We would never ask you to get rid of something that’s yours.”

  “Thank you.”

  “No need. Though if you go shopping with Ash and Amber, you may find you’ll have more clothes than you ever thought necessary.”

  Rina smiled a little. “Well, that won’t take much, but I don’t have money to buy anything.” She’d actually never had money, hadn’t even been allowed to touch the few coins Jake had gotten from selling the furs she’d tanned.

  “You don’t need to worry about money. Farin pays us too much as it is, so let us spoil you,” Dorn said.

  “But—”

  “No buts. You’re our niece and we have some years of doting on you to make up for.”

  “So you want to go with them?” Arlen asked with skepticism.

  The way Arlen was looking at her made her wonder what was so bad about shopping with Ash and Amber. They’d seemed friendly enough at the table. They’d been armed to the teeth, with the hilts of blades sticking out from all sorts of pockets in their clothes, but their eyes and emotions had told her they cared—perhaps too much given they didn’t know her. Still, she did need new clothes. And a bow. It was tempting to ask about the weapon right then, but no, they were doing enough. Clothes were a need, too. “I don’t see a reason not to, as long as they don’t mind the fact that I’ve never really gone into a village, let alone a town.”

  “Really?” Dorn asked. “Then you’ve been taking all of this quite well. I could come along if that would make you more comfortable. I sometimes enjoy shopping with Ash.”

  “Don’t you have responsibilities?”

  “We do,” Arlen admitted, “but there’s nothing all that important at the moment.”

  “Well, you look exhausted,” Dorn said. “How about I get you settled into bed and we can worry about everything else in the morning.”

  “Actually, I was hoping to talk with Arlen alone for a minute,” Rina said, glancing between the two males. She knew Dorn was more the mother hen of the two, but she didn’t want to leave things unsaid with Arlen.

  “All right.” Dorn nodded to Arlen. “I’ll go get ready for bed then.”

  After Dorn entered the room across from the one with the bath, Arlen gestured for her to sit next to him on the couch. She sat on the edge of it, her ratty clothes clutched tightly in her hands.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I wanted to make sure you didn’t blame yourself after how I reacted the other day.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I know you’ve been feeling guilty the last couple of days. I wanted to make sure none of that guilt was for… well, scaring me.” Arlen let out a long breath, so she continued in his silence. “It wasn’t you, I’ve just been jumpy ever since Jake killed Tomilin.”

  “Rina, that’s understandable given what you’ve been through.”

  “Yet, you still feel guilty.”

  “Well now I feel guilty for making you worry. Truly, my guilt isn’t over that. My guilt is over not trying to find you and your mother sooner. I promised your father I would find and protect both of you and I failed.”

  “I understand.” She paused, keeping her eyes downcast. “After Jake broke Tomilin’s back, I promised him I would do everything in my power to protect him, but I failed in so many ways. I knew Jake had been getting worse. He was angrier than usual. That’s why I kept working even after my hands started bleeding. I should have found a way to leave with Tomilin a long time ago.” She stared down at her hands, at the hands that should have been a mangled reminder of her biggest failure. She had heard the furniture crashing and Tomilin’s pleas. She’d run to the house, but instead of helping, instead of saving Tomilin, she’d froze.

  She’d watched the light fade from Tomilin’s wide eyes and she hadn’t stopped it. Hadn’t moved until it was too late.

  “Jake had convinced us that we would never be able to make it on our own. I should have known better. I had been doing all the hunting for years. The only money we ever had was from Jake selling and trading the furs and extra meat we had. But he always spent most of that on himself.” She stared at the mound of pillows in the chair across from her. “He wouldn’t even let us touch the stuff he bought.”

  She could feel the tension in Arlen ease as he followed her gaze. “Is that why you won’t touch the pillows?”

  “It’s irrational, I know.” She was glad that out of everything she had just said that was the topic he had chosen to push.

  “Perhaps. But guess what?”

  “What?” Rina asked, turning to face him as he grinned.

  “You are now the proud owner of all the pillows.” He tossed a pillow on her lap. “In here at least.” He proceeded to pile pillows up against her until she couldn’t help but laugh.

  “How many pillows do you have?” Rina asked, practically buried in pillows. One was even propped on top of her head.

  “In here? I now have none.”

  “Are you giving away my pillows?” Dorn asked playfully as he entered.

  “As if you don’t have thirty more in the closet.”

  “But these are my orange pillows,” Dorn said as he wrapped his arms around Arlen. “I suppose if they make Rina happy, she can have all the pillows.”

  “Thanks, but I have no need for this many pillows,” Rina said, still laughing a little.

  Dorn’s smile softened and she remembered that he could feel her emotions even if she did her best to hide them. “Well, how about we all get some rest? We have a lot to discuss tomorrow.”

  “Like what?” Rina asked.

  “Like if you would like to learn to shift and who would be best to teach you.”

  “As if there is a question of who,” Arlen said and gave Dorn a quick kiss that left Dorn blushing.

  “She may not want me to be the one to teach her.”

  “If Arlen trusts you to teach me, then I do, too.”

  “Thank you, Rina, but all of this can wait until morning. I can feel that you are both more tired than you’re letting on.”

  Rina nodded, her gut twisting. She didn’t want to sleep. Didn’t want to be alone in her own head. She could feel Arlen’s exhaustion, though, and refused to be the reason he didn’t sleep again.

  “Go on.” Dorn shooed Arlen toward their room. “I’ll join you after Rina’s settled in.”

  “You know I’m not a little kid, right?” Rina asked.

  “Oh, he knows,” Arlen said, “but he’s a bit of a mother hen. It’s best just to go with it.”

  “Oh, hush,” Dorn said before turning back to Rina. “And you wouldn’t touch a pillow a few minutes ago, so yes, I’m going to make sure you’re settled in and comfortable before I go to bed. For my own peace of mind if not yours, all right? And you can leave these pillows there. There are better ones on your bed.”

  “My bed?” A pile of old ratty blankets next to the earthen hearth was the best she and Tomilin had ever had. Arlen had offered her a room, but to think of it as her own bed, not just a borrowed place, was different.

  “Yes, it is your
s so long as you want it,” Dorn said, leading her to her room.

  Love and contentment emanated from him as he pulled down the blankets on the bed and tossed another log into the fireplace. Even just this room was nearly the size of her old home and the bed was even bigger than Jake’s. Her stomach turned at the thought of Jake and she pushed thoughts of him away, hoping she could keep the nightmares at bay.

  “Would you like to talk about it?” Dorn asked as he perched on the edge of the bed. “Sometimes it helps.”

  “Not tonight,” she said and climbed onto the bed. It was soft and squishy beneath her. She felt like she was wrapped in a hug as she snuggled under the covers.

  “All right. Just know that I’m here for you whenever you’re ready and if you need me, I’ll just be in the other room.”

  “Thank you, Dorn.”

  Dorn nodded before letting out a long sigh as he glanced around the room. His emotions dipped, and she thought she caught a hint of sadness in them.

  “What’s wrong?” She propped herself up on an elbow to avoid the enveloping embrace of the bed.

  “Oh… Nothing.”

  The way he said it didn’t have her convinced, so she reached out and squeezed his hand. “Hey, I don’t just want to take. If you ever need someone to talk to, I’d like to be here for you, too.”

  The tension in Dorn’s expression softened as he studied her. “I’d like that. Well, you get some sleep, all right?”

  She nodded, so Dorn left and the candles scattered around the room went out at a flick of his hand. She stared at the closed door for a long time. The room felt too big and too empty despite the furniture. She snuggled down in the pillows and pulled the blanket up around herself. Even without the candles there was a fair amount of light in the room between the fire and the moonlight coming through the windows. She grounded herself in that light and hoped sleep would be blissfully devoid of memories.