Page 23 of Heart’s Rescue

Rowan

I Trust You

Ipause in the doorway of my bedroom to watch her. The monster - the lady - Arryn is sitting on the edge of Phaedron’s bed with an empty teacup at her feet and running his comb through the curly tangles of her hair. Thankfully, Charay thought to leave dinner for us, so I was spared the indignity of trying to cook for Arryn. Or walking to the World’s End and trying to stammer out an explanation for why I’d want three meals to go.

Phaedron handled Arryn beautifully, as I’d known he would. He’d made polite conversation, kept her smiling, and somehow turned serving tea to a monster from the Worlds Above into something that felt almost normal.

Meanwhile, I’d snuck into my room to start frantically shoving my crap under my bed, because where else was she going to sleep tonight, but something about the scene just outside my door makes me stop, my hand on the doorframe, my breath caught in the back of my throat. Maybe it’s the way Arryn’s ears catch the firelight; I’d been worried about her getting frostbite, but no, the delicate points of her ears look perfectly hale.

Or maybe it’s just the fact of her, sitting on my brother’s bed, brushing her hair in the glow of the firelight. It fits, of course, to have a beautiful woman in my brother’s bed. The only thing out of place is that Phaedron’s bed is in the middle of the house, right by the fire, instead of tucked away in his tidy little room.

Phaedron’s brought hundreds of ladies to our house before; it’s one of the reasons why he likes to keep things so clean. Sometimes they even stick around long enough to start getting on my nerves, although that hasn’t happened much lately. There aren’t many starry-eyed young women around anymore. No, just us cynical old assholes in the World's End.

“Oh, you missed one,” Phaedron says.

He reaches for Arryn’s hair as though the two of them were best friends, and she winces as he pulls a stick out of her wavy curls.

“Voids, that’s a lot of twigs,” Phaedron says, tossing it into the fire. “Is that the fashion in the Worlds Above these days?”

Arryn smiles, and I suddenly realize I’ve been standing in the doorway staring at her like an absolute creep. I turn around, my ragged, frost-bitten ears burning, and try to tune out whatever she says in response. My little room is almost halfway acceptable. I’ve got my piles of maps and sketches and reams of calculations shoved into the corner, most of the clothes kicked under the bed, and all the empty bottles tossed out the window.

That just leaves the bed itself. I frown at the wrinkled mess of blankets and sheets. The voids alone know the last time any of this has been washed; I don’t exactly do much of the type of entertaining that requires clean sheets. Voids curse it, Phaedron really is onto something with his weekly wash days.

With a sigh, I shake out the sheets and blankets as well as I can and then smooth down the bed. When I come back out of my room, Arryn is staring at the ceiling.

“Are those stars?” she asks.

Phaedron laughs softly. “Sure are. You like them?”

Arryn stands and raises a hand. Her fingertips almost brush the stars Phaedron has painted on our roofbeams, little spinning dots of white and gold and red and blue.

“Rowan has always wanted to see the stars,” Phaedron says, “ever since he was a little kid. So, I figured this would be the next best thing.”

My cheeks feel hot. I’m glad Phaedron’s handling this thing with the lady but, for some reason, I’d prefer if he left me entirely out of the conversation. Arryn turns to me with her wide, dark eyes.

“You haven’t seen the stars?” she asks.

There’s something in her voice, some note of pity or disbelief, that makes my insides curl.

“Nope,” I reply. “I was born down here. The first, the last, the only.”

Arryn’s forehead wrinkles. The fire snaps loudly.

“The only?” she asks.

I shrug, more than ready to change the subject.

“No one has babies in the Lands Below,” Phaedron says. “They just don’t kindle this far down. Mother was pregnant when she crossed the barrier, but the birthing process was too much for her—”

Phaedron’s voice fades. Great. What a wonderful little topic of conversation this is. I love to tell all our guests about the time I killed my own mother coming into this world.

“Okay,” I announce. “Who wants a nightcap?”

Without waiting for an answer, I tilt open the pantry door, pull out a bottle of what was sold to me as brandy, and then shake it in Phaedron and Arryn’s general direction.

“And, if this doesn’t sound good, we’ve also got some of Phaedron’s painkillers,” I offer.

“Rowan.” Phaedron’s voice has that edge to it.