Even if she hadn’t been watching Cedric intently, her hand on his chest, her gaze roaming across the angles of his face, taking in the serious set of his brow, the tick in his jaw, she would have known.
It was chaos and arrogance wrapped up in orange flame.
Nothing like the wild, blistering, beautiful golden ones Cedric conjured.
Elyria’s stomach turned before she even looked up.
She released a low groan as she took in Raefe, standing a dozen feet from Cedric and her, fire still dancing in his open palm.
His expression was neutral, but she suspected he’d only just schooled it to be as such. Suspected he knewvery well what he’d just inserted himself into. She could see something working behind his gray eyes, could see him puzzling over her closeness to Cedric, the hand he’d surely just seen drop from the human’s chest.
He extinguished the lingering flame in his hand as his other one darted up to his face, his fingers brushing over his nose as though checking to make sure it was still there, was still repaired.
She smirked inwardly at the memory of Cedric charging at Raefe as though he wasn’t a knight of the realm, wasn’t the Victor of Havensreach, wasn’t a representative of the crown.
No, in that moment he was just Cedric, in all his typically misguided, honorable glory.
Well, honorable for her. She supposed it wasn’t quite the definition of honor for him to punch a visiting member of a diplomatic party in the face. She was just glad that his precious lord paramount had already left the courtyard before Cedric came to her defense.
Not that she needed the knight’s assistance, of course. But she surprised even herself at how much she didn’t mind that he’d provided it anyway.
She wasn’t blind, after all.
And the sight of Sir Cedric Thorne, eyes blazing, fists clenched, standing over the crumpled fool who’d once tried to make prey of the Revenant?
Well.
“What do you want?” she asked, sitting back on her heels, shadows curling faintly around her shoulders.
“Didn’t mean to”—his gray eyes darted between Elyria and Cedric—“interrupt. The dwarf was grumbling about the fire. Thought I’d come help.” Shoving his hands into his pockets, he took a few steps closer.
At her side, Cedric tensed. “I think you’ve helped enough.”
“Exactly.” Elyria dusted her hands off as she got to her feet. “And it’s Thraigg,” she added.
Raefe blinked, his carefully arranged mask still in place. “What?”
“You called him, ‘the dwarf.’ His name is Thraigg.”
From the corner of her eye, Elyria saw something flicker over Cedric’s face as he stood. Humor, maybe, though he wisely said nothing.She knew she herself regularly referred to Thraigg in the same manner—they all did. It was just a simple matter of what they were—Thraigg was a dwarf, the same way she and Ollie and Jocelyn were fae, Tenebris Nox was nocterrian, and Shep was sylvan.
The same way Cedric was . . .
At any rate, it felt different when Raefe did it.
“Right,” he muttered. “Of course. My apologies.”
Elyria threw her hands in the air. “Stars a-fucking-bove, haven’t you run out of those by now? Every other word out of your mouth has been some sort of halfhearted apology. You’re wasting your breath. I don’t buy a single one.”
He took another step toward them, and Elyria felt Cedric move closer to her side. “Consider this my last, then, and I won’t bother you again.”
“Finally,” she said, drawing out each syllable. “Get on with it then.”
“Iamsorry, you know.”
She scoffed. “That’s the best you have? You aren’t sorry.” She grabbed her chin between her thumb and pointer finger in a show of mock contemplation. “Well, perhaps that’s unfair of me. I’m sure you are sorry. Sorry you didn’t listen to my warning in The Sweltering Pig not to mess with me.” Her gaze flicked to his half-torn ear. “Sorry you were punished for failing to do so.”
Raefe pressed his lips into a hard line, his forearms flexing, like his hands had formed fists in his pockets. Like he was trying to calm the burgeoning anger she knew must have been burning to escape.
