Page 12

The break is not as bad as I’d feared.

For this, I am grateful. It’s been some time since I last set a bone, especially without Eli’s watchful guidance. I kneel beside the pallet where Farley lies, conscious of Mabon, Uther, and Penn watching my every move like hawks circling a field of carrion.

Just as I had two summers ago, when our neighbor’s youngest child fell from an ashwood and splintered his arm at the wrist, I run my fingers along the exposed limb, keeping my touch light as I explore the extent of the fractures. Beneath the mottled bloom of bruises, I feel two distinct sections of bone. No fragments, no punctures in the skin. A single crack along his shin.

“No shards,” I tell Farley.

“That’s good news, right?”

I smile into his pallid face. “Very. It’s a clean break. We’ll have you on your way to healing in no time at all.”

His returning smile is thin but relieved. In his eyes, I see the drugging tincture I’d found in the healer’s storeroom doing its fine work. His lids are drooping as the pain is banished to the farthest reaches of his mind, no match for the effects of valerian root and verbena extract.

“Rest now,” I tell him. “When you wake, you’ll feel much better.”

He doesn’t respond. He is already unconscious.

The door swings inward. Jac stands there, the shoulders of his cloak dusted with fresh snow, his hands holding the ice I’d requested he fetch from outside.

“Cold as an ice giant’s cock out there,” he declares, plunking down beside me by the pallet. “Where do you want this?”

I take the block of hard-packed snow from him, my palms tingling at the frigidness, and gently apply it around the break.

“What are you doing?”

“Numbing the wound,” I murmur, focused on my task. “The ice will make it less inflamed when I realign the bones. And less painful when the herbs wear off in a few hours.”

“Can’t you just give him more?”

“Too much medicine can kill a man quicker than any battle wound. More than one dose a day, and he may never rouse from the stupor.”

Jac blows out a sharp breath but asks no more questions as he rejoins the other men by the door. I continue to ice the break, sopping up the runoff with a spare sheet as the snow melts in watery trickles. Only when I feel the leg is thoroughly numb do I glance up. My gaze snags immediately on Penn’s. I swallow hard and look into Uther’s steady gray eyes instead.

“I’ll need someone to hold his shoulders. The tonic I gave him should keep him sedated, but there’s a chance he’ll wake and, if that happens, the last thing I need is him thrashing about, causing himself more damage.”

There is a beat of silence as the men look at one another.

“I’m half-drunk,” Jac announces happily. “So I’m out of contention.”

“Mabon is the strongest,” Uther offers, looking at the stocky man beside him.

Mabon shifts uneasily, scratching at his neck like there are bugs crawling beneath his midnight skin. “Suppose I could…”

“I’ll do it.”

I don’t look at Penn when he speaks. I’d somehow known it would be him who helped me even before I asked for assistance. I merely nod and turn my attention back to the task at hand.

Beside me, a pile of materials pilfered from the healer’s orderly shelves sits at the ready—firm slats of wood and a roll of cloth for splinting. Thin leather straps to secure it. A dowel to twist the knots tight once the cast is in place.

I can do this.

I will do this.

Just as soon as my hands stop shaking.

I look up into Penn’s eyes. He is crouched by Farley’s head, his grip planted firmly on the sleeping man’s shoulders, ready to hold him down if necessary.

“I’ll start now,” I tell him needlessly.

He nods.

I chew my bottom lip. “Have you ever done something like this before?”

He shakes his head.

Of course he hasn’t. He’s a prince , for gods’ sake. There is probably a team of royal healers at the ready whenever he catches a case of the sniffles.

“It’s rather straightforward,” I say, as much for his benefit as my own. “The bones are out of alignment. I’ll need to pull down until they separate, then slide them back into their proper place. Once that’s done, I’ll set the leg with a splint so it doesn’t shift as it heals.”

He arches a dark brow. “Are you asking me or telling me?”

“I’m telling you,” I snap, abruptly annoyed.

“Good.”

His dark-flame eyes are unwavering on mine. I cannot read the emotion in them. I do not know him well enough to decode the way he’s watching me in this moment. But I do know, for whatever reason, snapping at him calms me. Brings me back to myself. Slows my racing heart and stills my shaking hands.

I’m ready.

I look down at Farley’s bruised leg, exposed from the knee down. I take firm hold of his ankle. And, with a deep breath, I begin the meticulous process of bonesetting.

The door cracks open.

So do my eyes.

I stare up at the log ceiling, instantly alert. I’ve been asleep only minutes, judging by the exhaustion still infusing my limbs with lead. After the ordeal with Farley, I made it up the stairs and into the sparsely decorated chamber on the top floor with Marta’s aid. She said little as she helped me into a loose-fitting white nightgown and tucked me into bed, dousing the candles and stoking the fire with a fresh log before she shut the door. I’d barely heard the latch catch when I tumbled into unconsciousness.

Heavy boots pound on the floorboards, crossing toward me. I sit up in a flurry of blankets. The dagger on my nightstand—which I’d retrieved from Edwynna before she confiscated my old dress for burning—is in my hand in a heartbeat.

The footfalls stop.

“Planning to stab me?”

Penn.

I blink into the dark. “Maybe.”

“Maybe?” His voice is amused as I’ve ever heard it. “What’s holding you back? That intractable sense of morality you tote around like a war medal?”

“I’m surprised you can even recognize morality in others, seeing as you possess none of your own.”

“Trust me, I can recognize a great many shortcomings I myself am not afflicted with—naivety, for instance.”

“Did you come here to hurl insults?”

There is a marked pause. “No.”

“Then what are you doing in my room?” I grumble grouchily. “I was sleeping.”

And I was. In a bed, no less. The first one I’ve been lucky enough to utilize since I fled my own in the cover of night. Sure, it’s lumpy and smells faintly of mildew. But it is a bed. One that, until his rude interruption, I’d been thoroughly enjoying.

“By all means, carry on,” he mutters, crossing to the dressing table by the window, where a shaft of moonlight slants through the pane.

As my sight adjusts to the darkness, I’m able to make out the finer details of his tall form. He is dressed in black, as usual, but not his Commander Scythe garb. These are a Northlander’s clothes—the fabric thicker, sturdier, built to cut the wind and blunt the chill. There is nothing fancy or frilly about his attire, but it is clearly well made, crafted with care by a skilled seamstress. The shirt has a row of black buttons down the front. His heavy leather boots are to the knee, and recently polished. As I watch, his hands reach down to undo the laces.

I jolt. “What are you doing?”

“I thought you were sleeping.”

“I can’t sleep with you in here!”

“Then you’re in for a long night.”

He pulls off his boots. They hit the floor one by one. Each thump makes me flinch.

“But— You— I—” My voice is hoarse with panic. “I cannot believe this!”

“Believe it.”

The weariness of those two words makes me overlook their inherent arrogance. He sounds tired. Exhausted, in fact. Maybe even more so than me. And, though it shouldn’t, it catches me by surprise. Because until this point, he’s seemed so tireless. So inexhaustible. The formidable Commander Scythe. Never sleeping, never at ease. Never succumbing to mortal failings like hunger or fatigue.

I’ve been with him nearly a week now and had never once seen him rest—not even when we made camp at night. If he wasn’t nursing me back to health from the throes of fever, he was hunting to keep us fed or chopping wood to keep our fires burning. Riding hard through each day, holding watch through each night. Battling men and monsters alike in his unflagging determination to get us north.

To get us safe.

My protests dry up as I stare at him, my hand a death grip on the dagger. He stands in the shaft of moonlight, facing away from me, the broad planes of his back stiff with tension. There is a prolonged beat of silence. Then, reaching up, he does something that makes my heart seize within my chest. Something, I realize, I’ve been waiting for. For days. For a week. Since the very first moment I saw him, in fact, standing in front of my hanging tree, staring at me like my existence was the worst thing to ever befall him.

He takes off his helm.

There is a dull metal clank as it strikes the table. He braces his hands on either side of it, fingers splayed out along the wooden surface, and takes a deep, shuddering breath. I watch the muscles in his back ripple beneath his shirt as he exhales in slow degrees, releasing what seems to be a torrent of pent-up energy. His head is turned away. His hair falls around it, a shaggy curtain.

I catch myself wondering what expression he wears in that fraught moment; what he might look like with those shafts of moonlight painting him in shades of silver. By the time he turns to me, he’s schooled his face into the mask of cool indifference I’ve come to know so well. Still, I feel my tongue parch, my mouth going completely dry at the sight of him without the severe lines of his helm, without the serpentine nose guard to bisect his undeniably handsome features.

I swallow hard.

It is not the boyish beauty of a stage player, nor the flashy appeal of the male courtesans I’d seen loitering outside the brothels in Bellmere, Seahaven’s main port, on the rare occasion Eli allowed me to accompany him to the city. Penn’s is a sharp, symmetrical face with clean lines, a strong brow, and a straight nose.

It is, I decide, even better than I allowed myself to envision, all those nights I’d lain awake beside our campfire, wondering if I’d ever get a chance to see him unobscured. His hair, like the brows I’ve seen furrowed at me so often in frustration, is a lush, darkish brown. Neither long nor short but somewhere in between. I wonder if he wears it cropped when he isn’t undercover in the Midlands. The ends curl just past his ears—

His ears!

My breaths cease. My eyes widen. Because those ears…

They’re pointed.

He’s fae.

The dagger in my hand is clutched so tight, I think my knuckles might shatter. My heart begins to pound, my pulse increasing its tempo from a thrum to a roar in an instant.

“You,” I whisper, unable to say anything else. Unable to think anything else. Unable to even breathe properly. “You’re…”

A halfling.

Like me.

He does not move. Does not speak. Does not do a thing but stand there in that shaft of moonlight, staring at me.

“You’re fae.” I shake my head, rejecting the words even as I say them. “That’s…That’s not…You can’t be.”

His dark brows arch. “Can’t I?”

“But…you’re a prince!” I blurt stupidly.

“And?”

“How can a halfling hold such a position?” I must still be dreaming. “How can anyone with a drop of fae blood be so… visible …without being hunted down for daring to exist?”

“Things are different in the Northlands.” His shoulders lift in a brief shrug. “We do not hold with the more primitive customs of our southern neighbors.”

At this, I blink. Stupefied. “Then, in Dyved…there are more like me? Like…us?”

“Nearly all who live beyond the mountains are at least partly fae. It’s rare to see a full-blooded human past the range.”

“Your men aren’t fae,” I point out.

“They are.”

I shake my head rapidly. “But their ears—”

“There are glyphs stitched into their uniforms. Enchantments. Nothing powerful, but enough to cast a faint glamour that allows the wearer to pass as human. If you honed your senses, you could pierce through the illusions easily.” He pauses. “Try it next time you look at one of them. You’ll see for yourself.”

“I can’t see through glamours.”

“You can.” His voice is growing irritated. “You simply have neglected that ability—along with all your others.”

My spine stiffens at the implication. “You seem to believe I possess some kind of power because of… what , exactly? An odd birthmark on my chest? Surely, you realize how absurd that sounds. There hasn’t been maegic in Anwyvn since the Cull. It was extinguished when they slaughtered all the high fae. Everyone knows it.”

He is quiet for a beat. His question, when it comes, is delivered with terrifying softness. “Then what happened on that cliff side? To that man who tried to rape you?”

I flinch. “I don’t know.”

“You do.”

“No, I don’t!” I gnaw my bottom lip, trying to quell the surge of rising panic. “All I know is, one minute he was tearing at my dress and the next he was on the ground writhing in pain. Whatever happened to him wasn’t something I did.”

Not consciously, anyway.

His voice is still soft. Soft in a way that makes me nervous. Soft like a snake, just before the kill strike. “And what’s your explanation for the bridge? Hmm? How have you rearranged reality to suit your safe little delusions when it comes to that?”

“The bridge?”

“When you fell through that splintered slat. What happened?”

“I…” I shake my head again, a swift jerk of confusion. “I got lucky, I guess. The bridge pitched in the wind…I was tossed up onto it.”

“ Lucky ,” he mutters. “Skies above.”

“Yes, lucky !” I snap. “What else would it be?”

“You’re serious.”

I nearly bite through my lips trying to hold in my more furious retorts, instead uttering a bald “ Yes. ”

“Fine. Let’s talk for a moment about that lucky wind.” Penn sidles a step closer to the bed, putting me instantly on alert. He stops just short of the carved post at the foot—not close enough to touch me, but still too close for my liking. “Wind that came up out of nowhere, so quickly it defied the laws of nature. Wind that moved not from one direction, in a current, but whirled in a curious vortex that centered around you . Wind that pitched your dangling body in such a way that you were delivered, in one piece, from almost certain death. Wind that dissipated in a single blink as soon as you were safely back on solid footing.” He pauses, letting his words penetrate the thick fog of denial and confusion wrapped around me like a blanket. “I have seen some strange things in my time on this earth. Inexplicable things. Monstrous things, even. But I have never, in all my years, seen anything like that wind.”

If my pulse was a drumbeat before, it is now a roar. The blood rushing between my ears is so loud, I can barely hear my own thoughts.

“It was a squall,” I say weakly, not believing the words but somehow still needing to voice them. “A freak windstorm…”

“It was no squall and you know it. You know the truth. You just don’t want to believe it.”

“And what truth is that?”

He takes another step toward me. His eyes never leave mine as his left hand rises to grip the bedpost. “You called that wind. Conjured it from thin air.”

“That’s…That’s not possible.”

“It is.”

“What does…” I suck in a sharp breath. Inside my head, my thoughts are a jumble. Each question spawns two more, until my mind swarms in increasing disquiet. “What are you saying?”

Penn’s patience has all but evaporated. “I’m saying that mark on your chest is no birthmark. It is a Remnant mark. A sign of elemental power. I recognized it the moment I saw it.”

Memories slam into me, hurling me back a week’s time—to my hanging tree. Noose around my neck, iron at my wrists. And two burning eyes fixed upon me with such intensity, it seemed to singe my skin as he pulled loose the laces of my dress to examine the whorls and spirals etched between my breasts.

He’d known even then.

What that mark means.

What I am.

It seems wrong, somehow, that he knew so long before I did. That I still don’t know. Not really. Even now, I feel frustratingly in the dark about my own identity.

“What am I?” I whisper in horror, mostly to myself.

To my surprise, Penn answers. “When I found you, I suspected but wasn’t certain which of the four elements you controlled. After the bridge, I knew for sure.” He stares at me, eyes glittering. “You are a wind weaver. You are Air. Air, awoken.”

Something deep within me thrums, like the deep strike of a mallet on a drum, reverberating through every nerve ending in a silent current.

Air.

Air, awoken.

The mark on my chest prickles, a familiar ache of cold.

Awake, now.

Finally awake.

A breathy, borderline-hysterical edge creeps into my voice. My last gasp of denial. “Don’t you think if I could call the wind, I would’ve used it to my advantage these past few days? Against, let’s say… you ?”

“I think if you’d bothered to learn to control your maegic instead of allowing it to lash out unpredictably whenever your life is endangered,” Penn says on a murmur, “yes. You might well have wielded it against me. But as things stand, you seem entirely ignorant of the birthright you carry. Of the untapped power within you.”

“Power,” I echo, my lips struggling to form the word as my mind struggles to come to terms with all he is saying. Impossible as it seems, there is a part of me—a very small part, speaking from the darkest recesses of my mind—that feels acute relief in hearing someone confirm what I’ve long suspected.

There is something wrong with me.

Something that sets me ever so slightly apart from others. More than just the mark on my flesh or the points of my ears. An innate strangeness, a peculiarity in the very marrow of my bones that whispers in the dark of the night that I will never lead a normal life. That I am destined for something else. Something far from the sunny shores of Seahaven. Something beyond a pleasant, predictable marriage to a soft-spoken man like Tomas.

Something greater.

That voice has been silenced for so long—first, at Eli’s urging.

Best keep it covered, Rhya.

Best not allow anyone too close, Rhya.

Best try to blend in, Rhya.

And, later, at my own.

Be good.

Be normal.

Be ordinary.

I had tried. Oh, how I’d tried. Day after day, year after year. I had pushed down my disquiet, forced out the voice that taunted that I was different. Wrong. Cursed. I had buried it over and over, every time it resurfaced, until I forgot it existed in the first place.

But now that voice is screaming out, each word strengthening from a whisper to a shout I cannot ignore. Cannot bury.

Wind weaver , the mark seems to mock, its murmur ancient as time itself, its cold sting so acute I actually shiver. Sylph of the skies…No more hiding…

I press my free hand against it through the fabric of my borrowed nightgown, trying to quiet the unwelcome voice. My heart is a mad tattoo in my veins as my eyes rise to Penn where he stands a handful of paces away. His grip is tight on the bedpost, his knuckles stark white in the darkness.

“And what if I don’t want it?” I ask, the words barely audible. “This… Remnant. This…power.”

The smirk that twists his lips has a cruel edge. His eyes are flinty with tightly leashed rage. “Then I should’ve let you swing and saved myself a week of wasted effort.”

My lips part on a shocked gasp.

“Now,” he says, pushing off the bedpost, “I’m exhausted. First light is four hours away. I don’t plan to use that time talking in circles.”

He rounds the bed, approaching in unhurried strides. I scramble backward, trying to maintain some distance, but there is nowhere to go—my shoulder blades hit the headboard. I press my spine flat against it as Penn sits, his weight depressing the mattress, and slowly unfurls his long limbs into a reposed position atop the blankets. His head dents the pillow beside mine as his lids slide shut.

For a moment, it is silent. I sit there, pressed against the headboard, staring at the man lying inches away. His bare feet are crossed at the ankles. The back of his arm is thrown across his eyes to shield them from the moonlight.

“Either stab me with that dagger or put it on the nightstand,” he mutters. “At this point, I really don’t care which.”

I jolt in surprise, staring down at my hand. I’d completely forgotten about the dagger, but sure enough, its hilt is still clutched in my grip, my fingertips pale from lack of circulation.

Throat working to swallow the lump of nerves lodged there, I reach over and set the weapon down with a light metallic clink. My fingers tingle as blood begins flowing once more. When I look back at Penn, he is in the same position—ankles crossed, arm over his eyes—as if completely unconcerned that I could gut him in his sleep. His breathing is level, chest rising and falling in even beats. His mouth is slack, slightly parted. His lips seem fuller in the absence of the stern frown he wears most often when looking my way.

Can he be asleep already?

A faint crease mars his forehead, furrowing his brows together. I wonder whether he is in a great amount of pain from the wound in his shoulder but do not ask, loath to let such an opportunity slip away. To study him without his knowledge is perilously rare. He is always on his guard, his gaze seeing everything at once, no detail too minute to escape his notice. Even now, with his eyes closed, there is a part of me that feels he is watching somehow, his perception so sharp he does not need to look at me to see me.

I force my eyes away from his face.

Despite my deep exhaustion, I doubt I’ll be able to sleep. Not after everything he’s told me. Certainly not with him lying next to me.

It is not a large bed, and he is a very large man.

Heart in my throat, I slide as far to my side of the mattress as I can manage without tumbling to the floor, turn my back firmly in his direction, and curl into a ball—knees to my chest, arms looped around them. I hug myself tight as I stare into the dark, my thoughts chasing one another across my mind like a dog after its own tail.

I think about birthrights and strange winds, Remnant marks and metal helms. About fallen bridges and screaming soldiers, red-plumed arrows and bleeding wounds. About milky eyes and serrated mandibles, viridescent goo and snapped bones. About the Northlands and what awaits me there. Most of all, I think about the strange bedfellow beside me, his breaths a steady harmony to the melody of worries clanging around inside my head.

Somehow, lulled by that strange song, I drift off to sleep.