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“He can’t help it,” Marquin offered. Which were not the words of assistance Verol had hoped for, if his glare was any indication.
“And I suppose you can’t help knowing it either?” Clare reached out and flicked a finger against the heartstone clutched in his staff. His surprise must have shown, because she laughed. “I don’t know what it is,” she said in reference to the stone, “but I can sense the two of you in it. What he feels you feel.”
“Yes,” Marquin answered, because Verol’s lips were too tightly compressed to form any response. If they had overcome the issues the formation of that stone had first caused, it was less in the way of having fully resolved an old hurt, and more in the way of having grown around it instead. Marquin knew he would never be fully forgiven for its existence, and he could live with that. Because Verol lived because it existed.
“The Kinthing—turn it off,” Clare ordered.
Verol rubbed the back of his neck. “I am sorry, but it doesn’t work that way.”
“I don’t believe,” Marquin said softly, “she was speaking to you.”
“Then who—oh.”
Clare had a withdrawn look, as if every ounce of her attention was focused inward. The look shattered a moment later and she shook her head. When she saw the both of them staring intently at her, she scowled. “It’s hiding, at the moment, like the coward it is. So the next time your Kinthing decides it cares, just…don’t. I don’t want its concern.”
“And what about mine?” Verol asked softly.
“Can there be any difference between the two?”
Verol opened his mouth, clicked it shut.
“That’s what I thought.”
It might be what she thought, but it wasn’t what was true. Yes, it was the Kinthing that had drawn Verol to Clare—first in the swamp, then again at the Hawk and Scepter and the Rival Theater—but it wasn’t the Kinthing that cared. The magic was a compulsion, devoid of human empathy or concern. It was the man who cared. It was the man who had come to know her, as much as he could, on the road to Veralna. The man who would give his life to protect her, if it should prove necessary. It was the man who loved lost wayward souls, who already loved her.
Quin put a hand on Verol’s shoulder, squeezing gently. “There can be and there is, but there is no use explaining it to you until you are willing to hear it.” He didn’t realize how harshly he’d said it until her head snapped back, a crack in her armor appearing for a mere second before it healed over. He wondered if he would ever be easy with her. If he would ever be able to care for her, as Verol already did. If she would even care if he did or not.
It wasn’t that he disliked her. Were she removed from their immediate orbit—their immediate responsibility—he would find much to admire in her. Her resilience, her self-reliance, her refusal to bend. But all of those qualities were infinitely more difficult when she was their responsibility. When he couldn’t even frame it in those terms because she would never accept that she was anyone’s responsibility but her own.
The best way out of an awkward situation being the offensive one, he turned the subject. “If you were not bothered by Lady Meraland’s remarks, you would have done better to let them go. Making a spectacle of yourself before Alaric will only serve to keep his attention on you.”
She looked ready to spit fire at that remark, but there was something beneath the anger, something questing, when she asked, “And why is his attention so much in my direction to begin with? What did you tell him about me?”
The very fact she would think to ask what they might have told Alaric meant there had been something in her conversation with the king—some subtext—that he and Verol had missed. But any attempt Quin might have made to push her toward revealing it was promptly ruined when Verol answered, “Nothing.”
Clare narrowed her eyes. “Nothing? Not a single thing?”
Verol rubbed at his temples. “Clare, the only occasion we’ve had to speak to Alaric since you came to us was last evening. And you were there for the entirety of that conversation.”
Her shoulders relaxed fractionally, so Quin pushed, though there was little point now that Verol had reassured her. “What is it you do not wish us to tell him? If you let us know, we can be certain to avoid letting it slip.”
She flashed her teeth at him. “I’m certain I have nothing to hide.”
For the first time in twenty years or so, Quin felt the urge to roll his eyes. He resisted the impulse.
“Even so,” Verol said, worry in every word, “the more you can do to lessen his attention, the better. To that end, avoiding any exchanges like the one just now would be best.”
“He was the one who asked his court what they thought of me. All I did was respond.”
“Yes,” Marquin said dryly, “and perhaps if you had given a less interesting response, he wouldn’t have asked one of the court’s most favored darlings to apologize to you in public. As things stand, he’s hardly likely to forget you, nor is Lady Meraland. She may be young but she is indulged and can be spitefully vindictive.”
Clare folded her arms across her chest, her fingers digging into her biceps, as if he were the one who was hopelessly naive, and she sought patience in dealing with him. “Nothing I said or did not say in that room would make King Tolvannen less likely to remember me. The best I can do is attempt to temper that interest, which my responses were calculated to do.
“As for Lady Meraland and her vindictiveness, I ensured she will take a public route in her dislike of me, as opposed to a more subtle one, which is how I prefer to fight my battles. So if we are quite done here, I think?—”
An urgent knock at the door cut her off. Verol answered it, returning a moment later with a letter. Marquin skimmed the contents, unease tightening his chest. “I’m afraid Alaric has business for us in the south of the province.”
Her brow furrowed. “How long will we be gone?”
