Page 74 of Silverbow (The Godsung Saga #1)

Liam sometimes occupied the stool beside the bed when he didn’t.

Oryn begrudgingly lingered on the deck when the stable boy took his watch, but he had no claim on Enya Silverbow.

Still, Liam never lingered long. He seemed to turn a bit green whenever he was in the cabin and Oryn wasn’t certain if it was the rocking of the ship or the gruesome shade of gray she’d gone.

On the third day, he settled back on the stool after Liam reappeared on the deck.

Seeing the blankets disturbed, he pulled them back up to her chin.

He never had liked sailing much. There was little to do on a ship but wait.

They would make Tuminzar in record time with the wind he kept in the sail, but still, as he watched her chest rise and fall, it felt like all of immortality.

She stirred, batting the blankets down as she shifted.

“Enya?”

She settled without answering, but when she stirred again, Oryn called out onto the deck for Aiden. The fire wielder appeared wearing a lopsided grin. He rolled his eyes at Oryn’s request to heat a pot of tea, but he did it with a wry grin.

“What?”

Aiden quirked a brow. “You’re fussing.”

“I am not.” He was, but Oryn shoved him through the cabin door and shut it with a click.

He unrolled his leather script and picked out a sachet of herbs. He tipped the contents into a cup and waited, returning to his stool.

“Enya, can you hear me?”

She stirred again, her face pinched in pain.

“En-”

She gasped, eyes flying wide. She tried to sit up, but Oryn stopped her with a hand carefully splayed across the other shoulder. She brought trembling fingers up to the place the bolt had pierced, probing with a wince.

“Careful,” he warned.

She blinked at him, brow furrowed, her gaze sweeping around the cabin. Her voice came out in a hoarse whisper. “Where are we?”

“A ship. We’re on our way to Tuminzar.”

“What happened?” She rasped.

Oryn added a spoonful of honey into the chipped ceramic teacup. He doubted it would improve the brew, but she took her tea with honey. She groaned in agony as she tried to push herself up onto the pillows. “Careful,” he warned again, helping her shift to sitting .

Faint spots of pink appeared in her pallid skin when she realized she was bare beneath the blankets save for his signet hanging around her neck. He helped her pull one up to her chin as he pressed the tea into her hand.

“Drink.”

She crinkled her nose at the cup. “What is it?”

“Herbs to help with the pain.”

She shuddered as she took a sip. “Crossbow, wasn’t it?”

“You remember?”

Her face scrunched. “No, but I’m glad that’s over with.”

Oryn blinked at her in disbelief. “Did you know that was going to happen?”

“Hylee showed me,” she answered.

Horror set his pulse skipping. “And you didn’t say anything?”

Her eyes flashed toward him with a familiar edge. An edge he strangely found comfort in now.

“I didn’t know where or when. I just heard it. Felt it.” She shifted uncomfortably, and Oryn reached behind her to plump a pillow.

“How’s the pain?”

“Bloody awful. Why haven’t you healed me?”

“I have,” he answered resignedly. “I’m sorry. It’s as much as I can do. I suppose you can add it to my debt.”

“Your debt?”

Oryn scrubbed a hand down his face. “They had Lara Fischer’s name at the gate. There’s no way they could have known it was you unless I was seen buying your papers.”

She huffed, wincing as she took another sip of the tea. “And the eggs?”

Oryn nodded to the satchel that sat at the end of the bed. A faint smile turned up the corners of her mouth, but she grimaced as she tried to reach for them.

“Don’t try to use the arm,” he growled. “You’ll make it worse. There’s a healer in Tuminzar that can fix it but I…I…”

“Fine,” she sighed, her eyes sweeping around the cabin. “How long until we’re there?”

“A week to the coast. Then a few days through the mountains.”

She huffed again. “I don’t suppose this ship has a serving woman.”

“You’re stuck with me, Silverbow. ”

Enya

Oryn insisted she not get out of bed that first day.

When she tried, she teetered so dangerously on her feet, she ended up braced against the table, glad to find it bolted to the floor.

Liam brought her a tray heaped with salt beef, cheese, and some strange tasteless cracker she thought she might break her teeth on.

She wasn’t sure she would have an appetite for any of it only to find she’d eaten every crumb.

Liam watched her warily.

“Stop looking at me like that,” she finally snapped.

“Sorry,” he muttered, but his face didn’t change.

“I’m fine, Liam.” It was a lie. Her left arm was useless, bound against her chest in a sling Oryn had fashioned but still with every movement, pain erupted through her.

Still, she supposed she ought to count herself lucky.

She’d seen the bolt sitting on the captain’s table. It could have been worse.

“I thought you were going to die.”

Enya surveyed him over a chipped teacup. There was a faint green tinge to his haggard face as if the sea didn’t agree with him. “I’ve quite a bit to do before my time runs out, Liam.”

He swallowed, fidgeting on the stool. “Enya, I…I-”

“I know, Liam.” She was too tired, too drained to offer him much more, but she didn’t want him to say it.

She didn’t want him to utter those words that would change everything between them.

She loved Liam. As a brother. As a friend.

But she had known he would not go to Valbelle and that terrified her.

Enya recoiled from the hurt painted across his features and Liam wiped it away for her benefit. He straightened, his tone hardening. “What else did your seer show you?”

Enya studied him, eyes narrowing. “What is it they told you?”

Liam did not wilt under her stare. “That you aren’t a Ryerson.”

It was her turn to fidget, setting her teacup on the tray and turning the handle so it was just right, unwilling to meet Liam’s gaze. “Technically.” For a gargoyle, Oryn bloody Brydove has a big mouth.

“I watched you almost die. You could at least tell me the truth. ”

She squared her shoulders, a motion that made her wince. “I am a Ryerson. But Renley was not my father.”

Liam’s brow furrowed. “Who was?”

“I’m not sure, actually.” She hadn’t seen him in the visions.

“Then how are you-”

Enya held up a finger to silence him. “Marwar brought me to Ryerson House as an infant.”

Liam blinked, tilting his head from side to side, studying her. “You don’t look like the old man, either.”

Enya huffed. “He was only the messenger, I think.” She supposed she didn’t really know, but she was fairly certain the Captain of the Queen’s Guard was not her father.

“From who?”

Enya swallowed and picked at the edge of the blanket. “My mother…my mother was Maia Trakbatten.” Enya waited, letting the words settle between them. It was the first time she’d admitted that aloud.

Liam’s brow furrowed. He let out a rough laugh. “And my da is Pallas bloody Davolier. Don’t be ridiculous, En.”

She huffed again. “Renley Ryerson served in the Queen’s Guard. Did you know that?”

Liam shook his head slowly.

“Your da served in the city watch.”

Liam scrubbed his hand down his face. “Are you sure you’re alright, En? You’re not making any sense.”

“I am if you would listen, Liam,” she hissed more acridly than she intended.

Enya gritted her teeth. Liam looked as if she’d slapped him, and it felt like fingers digging into the hole in her chest. “It’s why I was fairly certain I could get in and out of Blackash Keep.

Drulougan the Dread was mated to my mother’s dragon. I…I figured he would know me.”

“Did he?”

Enya nodded. “I think I hoped he wouldn’t.

Not that I wanted to be torched or eaten,” she added hurriedly at the look of horror on Liam’s face.

“But I hoped the witch might have been wrong, might have lied.” She gave a mirthless laugh that died in a groan.

“It seems I am as much a Trakbatten as I am a Ryerson.”

“You didn’t tell me,” Liam accused, the hurt plain on his face.

“Liam, I- ”

“I crossed the world for you, En, and you didn’t see fit to tell me.”

“Liam-”

“I had to hear it from Oryn bloody Brydove!”

Enya winced, but her own temper flared. “He wasn’t supposed to tell you!”

“Well I’m glad he did.” Liam’s anger took her by surprise, his usual easy nature hardened. “I’m glad someone had the decency to stop me looking like a bloody fool.” Liam shot off the stool. “I am just a stable boy, after all.”

“Is that what this is about?” She asked in surprise.

“It’s what it’s always been about, En.”

“Liam, don’t go.”

“Is that an order, Your Highness?”

The venom in the words made Enya flinch, but her own stubbornness made her bite her tongue. Liam didn’t look back as he stalked through the cabin door and slammed it behind him.

She pushed the tray aside and gingerly lowered herself onto the pillows. She wanted so badly for nothing to change between them, but perhaps, it was too late. Perhaps it had been too late all along. She hated the tightness in her throat and pressure that built behind her eyes. Light, Liam.

She heard Oryn’s boots on the deck followed by a soft knock on the cabin door. She didn’t answer. She just pulled the blanket up to her chin and rolled to face the wall as the door swung in. She felt the weight of the tray leave the bed.

“Are you alright?” He asked.

She was too tired to deal with Oryn bloody Brydove now too. She was too wounded to work up the words and the anger she would deliver to the Prince of Ashes.

“Go away.”

Bound to follow her orders, he slipped back out.

Two more days passed before she teetered her way onto the deck of The Seabird.

Liam hadn’t returned to her cabin. Oryn’s stony presence was her only company and he lingered at her elbow in the warm breeze on the deck as if she might faint like a proper lady at any moment.

She batted him away as she walked toward where Liam tended the horses.