The little boy’s red-rimmed eyes flicked downward.
“It’s okay, most of the time that’s much worse. Charlie’s going to be happy to see you though, trust me.” Reeve hauled Eliot up into his arms. He took a look around the cottage as he listened to the storm outside, thunder no longer rumbling and the rain pattering lighter, then his gaze landed on the banister. The key still sat there, untouched, and even though Sid’s glow was doused in his scabbard, the metal still glinted in the darkness.
Reeve had never taken anything without permission before, but as if it were not his doing at all, his hand reached out and swiped the key, stuffing it into his pocket as they left.
Eliot was a practically drowned bundle, but the ride back on Earlylyte seemed to make him forget he was wet and cold at all. When they reached the temple, Charlie’s swarming melted any other residual fear. The girl was all apologies and hugs and tears, and as glad as Reeve was to see it, he sought out Celeste instead.
Her eyes had lost their seductive gaze as they stared back at him, replaced with something else, something more tender. Reeve swept wet hair away from his forehead and felt the heat in his face, his chest full, and in his pocket, the key he’d taken thumped against his hip.
The children were loaded back up onto Earlylyte, and the dripping and exhausted band walked into town. The storm had let up, but the clouds didn’t relent, and the sun was already sinking away, leaving Briarwyke prematurely dark. They came upon the circle just as the tavern door burst open, Halfrida and Gaspard’s bickering voices trading blame until they saw the soaked party. There were many more tight, squishy embraces, some unavoidable chastising, and finally Halfrida dragged them all up onto the inn’s porch beneath the eaves and demanded to know the truth.
There was a moment of silence, expectations turned to Eliot, who predictably didn’t speak. Celeste began offering up an excuse, that the two were only playing outside the temple, but Charlie broke in and admitted to everything, yelling at Eliot and making him run, searching all on her own, and keeping the danger a secret until she turned to the temple for help.
Halfrida put on a grim frown, and Reeve’s stomach knotted, but then the woman pulled the girl into another tight embrace. “Don’t youeverbe afraid to tell me anything again, Charlotte,” she said, and then, without hesitation, “I love you.”
The innkeeper insisted everyone warm up in front of the tavern’s fire. He tried to decline when Halfrida demanded everyone take a warm bath, but there was really no telling the woman no, and each took turns cleaning up as their clothes were dried out before the hearth—she needed the time to cook for them all anyway. It wasn’t how Reeve expected to spend his evening, but lounging by the hearth of the Dew Drop Inn, ladling buttered peas and potatoes covered in a cheesy sauce down his throat, wasn’t bad.
Evening turned to night, and a lute-less Gaspard took to telling stories that were appropriate for the three youngest in attendance as the bowls were cleared. He spoke in a quieter tone than was normal, the group smaller and huddled together. Willow had climbed into Celeste’s lap, and Halfrida had something like a death-grip on Eliot and Charlie.
Gaspard told another of his traveling mercenary tales, but in this one, there was a terrible battle, and the eldest member was gravely injured. They took respite in a dingy little town’s only inn, the wounded man unsure if he would survive. He held out hope, though, that he would rejoin his troupe of wanderers and see the rest of the realm. Further tragedy struck, however, when he awoke one day and the others were gone.
“It was like a dagger to the chest for the corsair, to find himself abandoned, to know he had only been holding them back all this time. He always had a crew, even when they were replaced one by one, and he did not recognize the youngsters from the originals he set out with some twenty years prior. For the first time in his life, he was frightened.” Gaspard was good at holding a crowd, his gaze always lingering on one listener just long enough before passing to the next, but at this, his eyes fell on Halfrida sitting across the hearth, and there they remained.
The woman was smoothing Eliot’s hair with one hand and had the other arm linked with Charlie, but her light eyes were glassy as she stared back at the storyteller.
“Fear never lasts though, not in the face of love. It is not the most exciting end to a tale, but eventually all heroes find their ending, and it’s far better to go the boring way than the alternative.”
The rain had died off and night had truly fallen before Celeste and Reeve were allowed to leave the tavern. Halfrida tried convincing them to spend the night—there were plenty of rooms and each would have their pick of the abundance of beds—but with coy glances at one another, they eventually freed themselves of the inn’s warm embrace.
Obviously, an inn with more than one bed would have been an unacceptable choice for the night’s end.
Earlylyte had shaken off the damp from his coat in the stable, and Reeve brought him around to the porch while Celeste waited on the steps, staring upward at the sky. She blinked sleepily at the clouds hiding the moons and barely noticed when Reeve approached.
“Earlylyte insists on carrying you home.”
She started as if just realizing the creature was there. “Oh, that’s all right, horses don’t usually like me very—ah!”
Reeve grabbed her about the waist and lifted her onto the horse’s back. She flailed because that was what Celeste often did, but then quickly grabbed a hold of his shoulders, leaning down as if he were pulling her off the mount instead. “You’re meant to stay up there,” he said and held her in place.
“I don’t want to upset him. It’s okay, I can walk, and you can ride.”
Earlylyte stood perfectly calm beneath her.
“You’re not upsetting him, but if it would help, we can both ride.”
Celeste took a breath, glanced once more at the horse’s untwitching ears, and then sat up, carefully pulling her leg over and awkwardly setting her hands on Earlylyte’s mane.
Reeve climbed up behind her, the horse still unbothered. Holy knights utilized breeds that could easily handle two riders—it wasn’t infrequent that a knight would have to daringly rescue someone while at a galloping pace or carry off a fallen warrior at speed—but even the broadness of Earlylyte’s back didn’t allow much room and inevitably the two slid together.
As they began up North Road, Celeste’s unease resulted in her leaning away from the horse. She was slender, and as Reeve reached around her to hold the reins, she was almost completely enveloped by him. Her back gently brushed his chest as Earlylyte plodded down the muddy road, crickets singing into the night.
Crickets, something else was beginning to sing as well.
Celeste seemed unbothered by the hardness that dug into her back, though. Her shoulders lost their tenseness, and she sighed out a noise that didn’t help things calm down at all. He thought to say something, her ear so close to his lips when he tipped his head to the side, but instead he was mesmerized by the way her hair fell, its color deeper than the blackness in the depths of the trees, and as the clouds parted to reveal both Lo and Ero, its strands shone blue under the moons’ light.
Her hair framed the edge of her face, the point to her nose and to her brow, every bit of her pointed and fine, too easily chipped away to leave exposed and jagged. But her lips had been soft—lips he finally knew the taste and feel of, though it hadn’t been enough. He wanted to learn more of her, to study each bladelike edge of her with his mouth, but instead settled for the crease of her cheek.
She started slightly beneath his kiss, then hummed and leaned back fully. The beat of his heart thumped against her chest, and in silence, they returned to the temple.
