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“If anyone spots you around town,” Arryn says, “it’s going to raise eyebrows. And if anyone sees you with a strange woman from the Worlds Above—”
Arryn makes a sound like an explosion in her mouth, then leans over the table, lowering her voice.
“I’ll go to the Crystal City,” she says, almost in a whisper. “I’ve been making it look like maybe I’m going to move there, so no one will bat an eyelash when I ride the hubs in. I’ll tell Lythienne we’ve got help,” she adds, nodding her head toward Alindra, “and then we’ll talk to Aloserin about how and when to break into his family’s estate.”
Arryn leans back in her chair and raises her mug to her lips.
“What do you need us to do?” Alindra asks.
“Stay here,” Arryn answers, with a shrug. “It’s too dangerous to travel when it’s dark, and we can’t risk you being seen now that everyone’s awake. Wait until the glowsoft orbs come back on tomorrow morning, then ride the hubs into the Crystal City. As early as you can, so no one notices. And Phae, try to blend in, okay? Don’t wear your sentry uniform.”
Her eyes narrow as if maybe she’s expecting some pushback to this totally reasonable request. When I say nothing, she continues.
“If I don’t meet you in the Crystal City’s barrier gardens when you arrive,” Arryn says, “you know where the royal ballroom is, right?”
I nod. Something inside of me still winces at the word ballroom. How many times have I pictured myself in that vast, marble-lined room, wearing a Royal Guard’s garb instead of my ragged sentry uniform, dancing with the high-born ladies in their silk and velvet? With both of my arms.
I swallow hard, as though I could force that thought to stay buried.
“We’ll rendezvous outside the ballroom, by the far eastern windows,” Arryn continues. “We need to make sure Aloserin’s occupying his family before we leave.”
Thinking of Aloserin, the smug, high-born prick who’d taken over as Acting Captain of the Royal Guard once Prince Orryen lost his heart to the woman he’s about to marry, does nothing to soothe the dull ache of those ruined ballroom fantasies. Voids, I’m an idiot.
“Okay,” I say. “Makes sense.”
Arryn takes another sip of her tea and then pushes back from the table.
“Perfect,” Arryn declares. “I’m going to the pub to complain a little more about the cold, and then I’ll ride the hubs into the city and let Ithronel know her sister made it down here.”
Arryn pulls Rowan’s old cloak over her shoulders, then turns back to me with shimmering eyes.
“Phae,” she says, “I’m so glad you’re here.”
I walk around the table and give Arryn another clumsy, one-armed hug.
“Me too,” I whisper, although that nagging fantasy of the royal ballroom comes back to nip at the edges of my heart.
Arryn pulls the door open. A gust of cold air swirls through the room. I close it behind her, leaving a few glittering ice fragments on the floor, and then turn to Alindra. She gives me a shy smile, then turns away, her cheeks almost as dark as her hair.
Well. Here we are.
Voids below, I’ve been here before. Once we settled in this cabin, Rowan discovered the seductive beauty of the void. He’d vanish in the void for days at a time, or even weeks, coming back frostbitten and emaciated and filled with a strange sort of energy, a glow that made me want to tie him to the chair and forbid him from ever leaving again.
But there was never any stopping Rowan, so I had to find my own ways of coping with the constant worry of his absence. And the World’s End just happened to be filling up with trekkers, all those beautiful citizens of the Inner Ring who came out here looking for adventure and who found my stories just fascinating. And, stars above, what a distraction they were, those sparkling ladies and gentlemen who’d wanted to come back with me, to see my cabin. And my bed.
But I was a different person then. The ghost of my right arm throbs against my side, as if it’s reminding me of what I’ve lost. Not just the ballroom fantasies; the chance of seduction, of meeting some handsome, witty stranger in the World’s End pub and taking him home. Of ever taking my shirt off again without casting an illusion first to hide my scars.
I swallow hard, again, and force myself to look around the place. Arryn’s taken good care of our little home, of course, but the cabin still isn’t quite as orderly as I like to keep it. I don’t leave dishes in the sink, ever, or little bits of firewood spread across the hearth. I spent far too long without a place to live to take this one for granted.
My eyes trace the floor, the kitchen counter, and the drying rack, until they finally rest on the door to my room. I’ve always kept my room immaculate, partly out of the sheer delight of having a space to call my own, and partly because there was always the chance I’d be opening that door with a new partner on my arm. Or, occasionally, more than one new partner.
Something bitter pools deep in my gut as I remember the state of my room just before I went to Fringe with Arryn, wild with grief and worry about Rowan, ready to throw myself into a gaping hole in the fabric of reality.
I wasn’t the man I’d once been, the stalwart sentry of the World’s End sending his constant stream of applications off to join the Royal Guard. Ever since the monster from the Kingdom of the Summer attacked me and took my arm, I hadn’t even bothered to make my bed. It didn’t seem worth the effort. No one but me was ever going to see the inside of that room again.
“This is—” Alindra offers, her voice catching in her throat. “It’s a nice place.”
She’s standing by the table, her fingertips drifting across the smooth wood surface that I re-wax once a year, not quite meeting my eyes. There’s something cautious about the way she’s holding her body, a sweet sort of hesitancy, and it makes me want to pull her to my chest and undress her very, very slowly.
