Alora dug the heels of her palms into her eyes. “Youimbecile,” she groaned. “Do you think I want to be?”
She felt his hands wrap around her own, pulling them away. “You could tell me.”
Her eyes drifted over his face. He’d a pale scar above his left eyebrow. She could see the barest indent where his dimple would be. He’d not shaved in some days—like he couldn’t be bothered to take even a moment for himself. All of this, and still she barely knew what made him. “I couldn’t.”
“Why?”
“Because I hardly know you.”
“Yes, you do.”
She shifted at his words, at the way he seemed determined to stare into the depths of her.Because I’m frightened,she said only to herself, but she wondered if he could see it.She cast her gaze down.“Also, because those are the rules. I’m nothing but a doting follower of rules.”
His answering huff was pure disbelief. Still, he reached between them, and Alora shivered when his fingers met her temple, brushing a lock of hair away. His fingertip traced the tip of her ear. “Maybe I’m an obsessive type, after all.”
She frowned, the words needling somewhere between her eyes. “What do you mean by that?”
“Nothing.” He stepped into the dank dark of the shop, careful of bones. “The storm is moving on. You should go. I’m sorry the kiss wasn’t helpful.”
“Oh.” Alora stepped back, caught off guard. “Right, well, you did say you were nervous.”
“I did.”
His eyes were dark with purpose. Alora wondered what he planned to do once she’d gone. She couldn’t ask, though, not without giving him something secret in return. She turned away so he might not see that his dismissal wounded her, because it shouldn’t have. He’d given her all she’d come for, after all.
“No matter what anyone else might say to you, you could never be trapped. Not someone like you.”
Alora turned back to him, her eyebrows meeting over his parting remark. “What makes you say that to me?”
“You had a cornered look about you when you came upon me tonight. You have it still.”
“Anyone can be trapped, Bash. I’m hardly special.”
“Ithink you might be the most special person I’ve ever met. Goodnight, Alora.”
The door closed between them. The finality of it mimicked the last distant bout of thunder, and when a heavy quiet descended over Mugwort Alley, it was punctured only by dripping gutters and her own breaths. A neighbor’s second story curtain shifted. A cat meowed from an alleyway.
And Alora pressed her hand over her heart and sighed like she’d lost some great battle, sure she’d been hollowed out.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Alora folded herself into the cushioned chair at El’s Books and Nibbles. Her head collapsed into her palms. She rubbed circles at her temples as she listened to the quiet sounds of pages turning and tea being sipped. There were no bees today, but Lucille and Loretta shuffled along the beams, nosy and judging. When Loretta dropped to the back of the chair opposite her, Alora didn’t startle, but imagined a shadow-mouse scurrying off into the corner. The owl abandoned her at once.
She wanted to be alone.
“Tea, dear?”
Alora lifted heavy eyes to the soft countenance of Ellie Turkens and couldn’t even bring about a smile. “Strong as you can make it, please.”
A brief pat to the head, and the old woman returned her nose to its novel and was gone.
There was a tornado inside her brain, moths eating holes in her thoughts. Alora couldn’t pin down any singular idea.
Merridon and his bribery.
Merridon and his contracts.
The Urchins’ shuttling of dark artifacts and captive creatures.
