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“It was one throat punch,” she objected. “Why am I the one digging?”
Because he wanted to grow something with her. Something beautiful that didn’t have to be made ugly to endure.
“Because it’s going to be yours. You should have a hand in making it.”
She shoved the trowel into the ground, following his instructions on depth with all the good nature of a snarling wolf. He sprinkled the seeds in, gently covered them with the loose dirt. He indicated her hand. “Can I?”
When she nodded, he placed her hand on the ground, covering it with his own. His magic swept through him, through her, reaching to the seeds below. He woke them from their dormancy, coaxing them to sprout, roots burrowing down, growth shooting upwards, breaking the soil, forming stems and leaves and buds.
The bush grew, two feet, then four, the leaves halting just below the sill of her window, the buds bursting open into the lush, red flowers that had been painted on the city mural. Trumpet-like in shape, with five petals, the blooms as wide as his hand.
Carefully, as if afraid she would break it, she stretched her free hand to brush one of the velvet petals. “What are they?”
“Hibiscus. It’s from one of the old continents.” One that no longer existed, because of Alaric.
She dropped her fingers from the flower. “Why did you grow it?”
That was the question, wasn’t it? “Because not everything beautiful has to be marred.”
The response seemed to irritate her, and her next words were harsh. “Then it’s just going to die.”
“I won’t let it.” Not with his magic feeding it every week. Not when it felt so good to create something again. He looked down, where his hand still covered hers, and some of the high of the feeling left him.
This was dangerous. She was dangerous. Not for the reasons she’d warned him of, but still. He shouldn’t have come tonight. But he had, and while he was making poor life choices, he plucked one of the flowers and offered it to her, along with two words he shouldn’t. “I promise.”
Chapter Forty-One
The Library Is on the Ground Floor
Clare woke to the hibiscus flower staring her in the face from the bedside table, a spot of vivid redness floating in the sea of dark browns and blacks that formed the rest of the room’s interior. She’d expected to find it wilting, its decay evidence of her point on the ephemeral nature of beauty.
But it was as plump and unblemished as when Numair had plucked it from the bush, a thread of his magic lingering in its petals, as if he was as determined to prove his own point as she. Curiosity got the better of her and she leaned in to sniff it, disappointed to find it hardly smelled like anything at all. A hint of sweetness, nothing more.
She sat up and cupped it in her palm, transferring it to the drawer of the bedside table, where it nestled beside the still-unopened red envelope Numair had sent with Battle Armor. “Give it time,” she told the flower as she slid the drawer closed. “You’ll wither and die just like the rest of us.”
She dressed and went into the common room. Two things waited for her on the center table. The first was a large wrapped package that proved to contain the first delivery of her clothes from Chalen. The second was a breakfast tray. A tented card rested on it beside the plates and cups. She flicked it open, stared at the scribbles in the bold handwriting she guessed was Marquin’s, and growled at the incomprehensible lines. The Song was of no help—she only felt its presence now whenever she stepped outside the palace grounds, so intent was it on hiding in Alaric’s presence—and she wondered if it would be such a terrible thing if she admitted to Verol and Marquin that she couldn’t read.
A knock on theirs and Fitz’s door proved no one was home. The emptiness bothered her in a way emptiness never had before. All her life, emptiness had been an indicator of safety. People couldn’t hurt you if they weren’t around. The problem, she decided, was that she wasn’t afraid of Marquin or Verol or Fitz. And because she wasn’t, and because this space was meant to contain them, it felt…lonely, for them not to be here. As if they’d abandoned it.
She carried the tray and the letter into her room and closed the door. Two hours of pouring over Numair’s rudimentary reading books and sounding things out later, she managed to decipher the letter.
Verol is in meetings with the king all morning. I have errands to run but I will meet you at the manor at noon, as agreed, for your first lesson. -M
She glanced at the clock—time, at least, was something she could read just fine—and realized with a start that she’d slept in far later than she’d realized. She’d returned late last night, and woken frequently throughout it in little fits and starts. So much of her life had been spent sleeping in stolen snatches of time that the concept of sleeping through the night entirely was foreign to her. She felt safest sleeping in the day, and she’d only settled into true rest sometime around dawn.
All of which meant she needed to leave. Now. She put on the riding breeches and shirt she’d worn two days ago and then, after careful consideration of the items Chalen had delivered, packed a more elaborate outfit for her ride with the proconsul of Taella later that day.
She’d hardly stepped into the hall when she ran into Lady Meraland. Or rather, Lady Meraland ran into her. Upon exiting the room, Clare had stopped with the perfect grace and reaction time of someone well-accustomed to being held responsible for any physical mishap. Lady Meraland had kept walking, straight into Clare, and then stumbled back when Clare planted her feet and held her ground.
Clare prepared herself for a tirade of noble outrage but Lady Meraland—she really had to learn her first name—only stood there with a dazed, confused look on her face, as if finding it impossible to puzzle out what had halted her forward motion. She looked…vacant. As if something had reached inside and hollowed out a part of her, and she was temporarily stunned by the loss.
Grudgingly, Clare asked, “Are you all right?”
Lady Meraland blinked, startled, as if just noticing Clare. But it was as if she’d noticed only the question, and not the person who’d asked it. No hint of antipathy, or even of true recognition, showed on the woman’s face.
“I went somewhere I wasn’t supposed to.” Her voice was smooth and honey-sweet, almost childlike in its cadence.
“Where?”
