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Her eyes hardened, and then the moment became so uncomfortably long that it became apparent Ione was speaking to Kalen in her mind. At least it was apparent to me. Kalen’s mouth twisted, Ione chewed again on that nothingness sitting heavy upon her tongue and the silence began to tense and coil and suffocate, and—
“Oh! By the Mother! Oh! Oh!Oh!” Ione’s cook lady burst through dining hall doors from the kitchen, her wide hips knocking around the guest chairs as she hopped and skipped and jumped, one stocky leg lifted in the air. The woman’s cheeks were doughy and beet red, her hair had slipped from her bonnet and the extreme stretch of her eyes caused immediate alarm across our small party. Those of us who hadn’t been cast fromthe table by the sweep of the cook’s skirts, stood immediately from our chairs to see what had caused the fuss.
I had the urge to stay seated and catch my breath from our terse confrontation with the High Mer. But when Kalen rose from his chair, so did I.
The whole party crowded around the woman, making difficult work for any onlooker, but once I finally had a good look at the scrimmage in the corner of the dining room, I slapped my palm over my mouth to avoid bursting out with laughter. Hanging on by the strength of one buttery claw, was the tiny warrior, his spindly legs jerking and twisting in an attempt to crawl up the cook’s calves. She howled and screamed, as he pinched and snapped.
Before anyone could count to five, the woman fell stiff to the floor in agony, some of the Lords rushing to her side in chivalry.A hiccup passed from my lips through my clenched hand, and I turned my face quickly from the cook and the crab.
Noiselessly giggling, I brushed at the skirt ofmydress just to be sure. As the silk settled, I felt a prickling sensation fall over me. It fizzled in the tips of my ears and wisped down my spine. When I looked up, my eyes found Ione’s. The High Mer was completely ignorant of all the commotion.
She was staring at me.
I swallowed and wondered what it would be like to drown in the middle of a crowded dining hall. Unpleasant to be sure.
“Sucha sight!” Tyr jeered with a sugary tone, leaning into the Ione, his shoulder nudging her arm, putting a brief stop to our moment. The General gave her a sly expression, one that begged her to join in on the fun.The High Mer smiled at him, like one might smile at a child just to satisfy them, before she set her eyes on mine once more.
“Such a sight indeed,” she said.
“I CAN’T BELIEVE YOUspoke to her that way.”
My fist hit the palm of Kalen’s hand with an embarrassingly soft thud. I wasn’t nearly as strong as I should have been. Or at least as strong as I thought I would have been by now. I’d been practicing punching Kalen in various hard spots of his body for the last two weeks and still, my throws were no greater than that of a new Guardian, according to the Preserver.
I wanted to remind him of the time I’d had him on his knees in the middle of the Well, but I knew what he would say to that.You caught me by surprise. I pummeled his chest with all of my might. He barely winced.
As if things could not be worse, there had been no sign of my stone anywhere in this indecently large castle. Not that I had proper time to search yet. Tyr hovered over me every chance he got. Especially during training, when he spent hours complimenting my form or asking to correct it. Kalen stared holes into his back every time his slender fingers drifted down my waist to direct my center. I felt bad for the Preserver, but it didn’t hurt to make friends with the enemy.Regardless, this was the first training day that Kalen and I were truly on our own.
A new section of recruits had come from every corner of Aegedonia to learn from the general. Twenty red-faced boys who believed wholeheartedly that to become men, they must offer themselves up as fodder for the greater good of their faction. They didn’t know that only immortals had enough time on this earth to grow up and grow well, and sometimes even that wasn’t enough.
“I can’t believe you flirted with Tyr right in front of me,” my punching bag finally said. For only a second, his breathing labored as he switched up the combination we were working on. Kalen clicked his tongue twice, a signal that he was about to start hitting back. I nodded and began to add in the footwork he showed me.
“Accepting his invitation to train is hardly flirting,” I grunted. Kalen swung his right fist high, aiming for my cheek through to the space behind me. I ducked at the last second with wide eyes. “You really almost just hit me?”
“You ducked.”
“Kalen!”
“Accepting his invitation is flirting if you are planning to neglect your training partner.” Kalen deflected, taking his turn to defend himself, though he’d seen my uppercut the second I’d thought about it.Dirty cheat.His fists closed tight around his temples, his right shoulder jutting forward just so as I came in from my left. Kalen let out a hearty laugh when my fist hit the meat of his arm.
“I wasn’t going to go without you. But now that I know you’re a jealous oaf, I might take the general up on his offer for private lessons.”
A gruff snarl came from Kalen’s throat as he dodged another of my fruitless assaults. I tried again, swinging my fist to his nose. Kalen caught it easily with an open hand, wrapping the other around my wrist and pulling me against his chest.
“Does this sudden attraction to the General have anything to do with the fact that I won’t tell you what Ione said to me at dinner?”
Kalen’s magic drifted out to me. The sweet tang mixed with the sweaty smell of him and punched me right in the face. My heart began to thump wildly beneath my ribs and not because I’d been kicking and swinging at him moments before. I steeled my mind,drawing it to a blank so that he wouldn’t see all of the Truth.
“No,” I said calmly. “I’m not one to make friendships out of spite.”
Kalen’s cheek tugged up with a smile. He pulled me tighter against him. “Anything he can do, I most certainly do better. Or don’t you remember, Gwyn?” he asked quietly, his powers flickering in the air around us.
My eyes scoured his face which was too close to mine now. A drop of sweat fell from the space between his brows onto his mouth. Kalen pressed his lips together, ridding the droplet with his tongue, his teeth scraping lightly against the bottom lip as he watched me. I stopped breathing if only so my chest wouldn’t brush against his when he looked at me like that. If it did, if we touched just once more, I was sure I would drop to my knees in the middle of this sandpit and let him remind me of all the things he did exceptionally well.
It had been too long. We were so busy looking for my stone that other things had to be neglected. Not to mention Ione had stowed us away in separate rooms several halls apart. If we ever did steal a moment to ourselves, the only relief we found came in a violent smash of lips and teeth in hidden corridors. It was never enough.
With Kalen, anything less than more was never enough.
“I’m going to take your silence for a yes.”
