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What was she supposed to do with herself?
Dishes, the Song offered, providing a further explanation of what that entailed because the Song knew, as always, the extent of her ignorance. It wasn’t like she’d ever had dishes in Renault County, and since she’d come to Veralna, they had always been someone else’s problem.
For once, she took its suggestion without grumbling, because she was grateful to have something to do. And there was something soothing in the methodical clearing of plates from the table, the scraping of food remnants into the bucket for that purpose that the Song had been able to guess the location of on its second try.
Eventually Nissa and Lorna stopped arguing long enough to be horrified—but somewhat approving—that she was doing everything. It hardly took any time to finish once they joined her, and once it was finished, Nissa bestowed upon Lorna a stiff, formal, “Goodnight, Mother,” and a slightly less stiff, “Goodnight, Clare, I’m glad you survived the day.”
She went into the common room, collected all three of the children and took them down the short hall to their room.
Lorna sighed as Numair came back into the kitchen. “She never would listen to reason, at any age. You were much more well-behaved.” She let out another world-weary sigh, this one sounding slightly manufactured. “I’m too old for this. Don’t either of you cause me a heart attack before the morning.”
With that she departed, turning out all but a single magelight on her way. In the remaining dim light, Numair led her to a smaller room off the kitchen, turning on the magelight within. He stood in the doorway, rubbing at the back of his neck. “So, ah, it is a child’s room.”
Which meant, she realized, that in addition to being small in general it also had a very small bed, the mattress of which rested directly on the floor as opposed to on a frame of any sort. And while they weren’t unaccustomed to sleeping in the same room, the layout of this one meant that whichever one of them took the floor might as well be on the bed for all the space that separated them.
“I’ll take the floor,” they said at the same time.
They bickered about it back and forth before Numair insisted they settle the matter by playing some ridiculous game involving hand gestures and rocks and scissors, which she naturally lost.
“This is a bad idea,” she muttered, kicking off her boots.
“I don’t think anyone’s ever grumbled so much about not having to sleep on the floor.”
“You have. Less than a minute ago.” She flopped onto the mattress, handing him the extra pillow and blanket Lorna had laid out at some point. “If I accidentally roll off this bed onto you in the middle of the night, don’t blame me when the unconscious version of myself decides to punch you in the throat again.”
Chapter Sixty-Nine
We Are Who We Are
The sound of approaching feet registered in Clare’s subconscious a moment before a rap at the door startled her awake. Her body and her mind were disjointed, the latter having not quite caught up with the former.
Where was she?
Panic set in as she tried to see through the total darkness. She felt the smallness of the room—air always moved differently, the smaller the space—and when the knock at the door came again and she felt someone stir beside her, she reacted on instinct. She pulled her slim bone dagger and rolled on top of the threat, pinning arms and legs, the blade of the dagger pressing against a soft throat.
Her hand trembled, her brain scrambling to understand why she hadn’t pushed the blade home. Threats had to be dealt with quickly, efficiently. But this body beneath her did not feel like a threat. Even if it was male. A soft wash of magic came from the man, bringing the scent of earth and growing things.
On the other side of the door, a boy’s innocent, “Uncle Numair?” finally made her mind catch up with her body. She shook, horrified, but she couldn’t move.
The magelight in the room flared to life, bathing her and Numair in a soft glow.
“We’ll be out in a minute, Tomlin,” Numair said, pitching his voice to carry. He smiled sleepily up at her, like there wasn’t a knife pressed to his throat or a thin line of red coming from it. “Morning.”
Morning? She was probably cutting off the circulation to his arms and legs, and he went with Morning? “I’m sorry,” she whispered. She wanted to let the knife go, but she had this terrible fear that if she tried to pull back her body would do the opposite and push forward. And she realized in that moment that, of all the terrible things she’d done in her life, this would be the worst.
This would be the one that would matter, the one she couldn’t come back from, the one that meant nothing else would ever matter again. If she pressed that blade forward, if Numair was no longer here, then she might as well give the Song what it wanted.
Which was precisely why she couldn’t move her hand. Her fears were never born from absent things, though often they were born from things she couldn’t immediately identify the root of. This one—the fear that she would drive the blade in rather than pull it back—was born from the Song. It didn’t like Numair, and she finally understood why. It had nothing to do with him, and everything to do with what he was to her. With what his absence might finally allow the Song to convince her to do.
Numair shrugged off her apology. “It isn’t the worst way I’ve ever been woken up.”
Her fingers still wouldn’t let go. She squeezed her eyes tight before opening them again, and she wondered what they looked like, if the Song was burning out of them the way it felt like it was.
She didn’t know if she’d ever felt as vulnerable as she did when she admitted, “I think I need you to help me.”
“All right. I’m going to move my arm, okay?”
She exhaled. “Okay.”
