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He sat up straighter in the same moment, untangling his legs with a sigh all too audible in the uncanny silence of the Underground. ‘Evening, Em.’
It was too flat, his voice. Too resigned.In the shadows, his face was as good as unreadable, save for the grim lines around his lips hinting at an emotion I couldn’t pinpoint, no matter how hard I tried. Was it anger? Annoyance?
Regret?
‘What in hell are you doing here?’ I snapped, rage trumping my confusion for a blissfully simple moment.
‘Contemplating my sins.’ He hauled himself to his feet, his sword loosely in his hand, and nodded at something behind me with that same unnatural restraint over his movements. ‘You may want to close the door before you start shouting. People are still awake.’
And gossipwouldspread like wildfire in these nervous, news-hungry hours. Oh, hell take me, was that why he’d faded so shamefully from Ylfreda’s living room? To avoid any appearance of a scene in the eyes of the people who’d be all too happy to take note of every possible weakness?
I took five steps back, not taking my gaze off him while I reached behind me and found the doorhandle with my fingers. The slam of wood against stone reverberated through the hall, the noise not nearly enough to soothe the boiling need for justice.
Go to hell, Emelin.
The words seemed to echo in the silence between us, growing larger by the heartbeat.
‘So.’ He broke the quiet, flicking his blade around once in his fingers – threat or invitation, I wasn’t sure. ‘Want to grab a sword?’
I blinked at him.
This was madness. All of it was madness. He was supposed to call me a little fae whore and inform me I wouldn’t be setting foot in his family home ever again; I was supposed to tell him I didn’t bloody care if he insisted on being a hateful arsehole for the rest of his life; and he was supposed to believe it even ifIknew damn well that it would be a lie. So what was he standing there for, looking like a warrior bracing himself for a losing fight?
‘What are you planning?’ I said, narrowing my eyes at him.
His grin was mirthless as the grave. ‘You know very well …’
‘… that you don’t make plans.’ I scoffed. ‘Yes, I know. Convenient excuse. So what in hell just happened, then? Am I supposed to believe that you just decided to defend Creon because you happened to feel like doing him a favour?’
Tared shrugged. ‘Something like that.’
I let out a sharp laugh. ‘You’re being ridiculous.’
‘Am I?’ Another flick of his sword. ‘I thought this was roughly the change of mind for which you’ve been arguing for a while.’
‘Yes, and it’s rather absurd of you to suddenly make that change after centuries of clinging to the same opinions.’ My hands were itching, clenching to fists by my side – inches away from the brilliant red of my dress. ‘What changed?’
He hesitated a fraction of a moment. ‘Lyn shouted at me for a couple of hours.’
I snorted. ‘She’s been shouting at you for decades.’
‘Admittedly.’ He briefly closed his eyes, fingers straining around his sword hilt. ‘I’ve never seen him smile like that in all those decades, though.’
I stared at him.
‘So’ – another shrug, this one more tense – ‘I figured—’
‘Hissmile?’ Thank the gods that I had closed the door behind me, because my soaring voice might have reached all the way into the fields around the Underground. ‘You saw him fuckingsmileand all of a sudden decided to stop hating him with a passion? Do you have any idea how utterly laughable—’
‘It was never about hating him, Em,’ Tared interrupted flatly.
I snapped my mouth shut, breathing heavily. ‘What?’
‘The hate was not the point. Just—'
‘You’ve been going out of your way to provoke and insult him every minute of the day forweeks,’ I sputtered, forcing myself to be rational even when all I wanted was to throw my words into his face until it hurt. ‘What else was it about, for hell’s sake? Was he supposed to take all of it as a slightly misguided attempt to befriend him?’
It seemed for a moment Tared would say something else, but in the end, all that left his lips was a heavy, ‘No.’
