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Juliana’s thoughts muddled. She wasn’t quite sure what that meant, but before she could collect her words into some semblance of order, a fresh bowl of steaming stew was pressed into her lap.
“Eat,” the witch instructed. “You can be out of here in another day if you get your strength up.”
Juliana did what she was told, but she hated every minute of it. She hadn’t been bed-bound since she was a child. The blankets might well have been chains. Hawthorn had been a poor patient when he was sick with faerie fever, but she was fairly sure she would have been worse.
Hawthorn.
From time-to-time, she thought she felt someone’s eyes on her, but she couldn’t give weight to that feeling. At one point, one of Mabel’s wards went off outside, but nothing seemed to have been disturbed but a few branches that had snapped over in the wind.
He was practising, Juliana realised. He was growing stronger while she couldn’t.
Night came, and with it, Hawthorn. Juliana had spent most of the day dozing under the influence of the witch’s brew, recovering her strength and trying not to die of boredom. When she finally lay down to sleep, a strange giddiness plagued her insides. Shewantedto sleep. Longed for it.
But not for rest.
She wanted to see him.
Thank the stars he could not read minds, and for the shield her lies offered her.
“Miss me?” Hawthorn grinned at her from the floor, looking something a little like an energetic puppy.
She groaned, largely out of habit. “You wish. It’s been lovely and quiet.”
He rolled over, folding his arms underneath his chin on the mattress, inches away from her face. The endless smirking continued. “You’re lying.”
“Maybe.”
“I refuse to believe I’m not better company than the mean old witch.”
Mabel, who’d been snoring by the fire, startled in her sleep, as if she knew she’d just been insulted.
“She can’t hear us,” Hawthorn reminded her, sensing Juliana’s thoughts. “More… she can just sense us. I had to use branches to gain her attention before.”
He paused for a moment, reaching out to stroke a loose lock from her face, and then pulled his hand back suddenly, like the action was too intimate now she was so lucid.
I kissed him,she remembered.I let him kiss me.
I want to do it again.
She swallowed, biting back her impulses.
“So, how was your day?” Hawthorn asked brightly.
Juliana scowled.
“Right, yes, trapped in a bed with just a mean old witch for company, silly question.” He waited a moment. “How do you feel?”
“Like I’d like to get out and go murder something.”
“Ha!” Hawthorn laughed. “That certainly sounds like my dear guard.” His eyes fell over her form, drifting down to her middle. “Does it hurt?”
“A bit.”
“You can tell me.”
“It won’t change anything.”
“Right,” he said, “of course.” He rolled away again, staring into the embers of the fire. The wind howled outside, making the branches scrap against the windows.
