“A quick wash.” I head for the small bathing chamber, tugging several clean squares of linen from the shelf and rinsing it in a fresh bowl of water. “You don’t need to move.”
She watches me drowsily from under lowered lids as I balance her on the sideboard with one arm around her lower back. Squeezing out the cloth, I begin gently wiping over her skin, taking extra care as I glide the linen over her wrists. “No bath here, I’m afraid. But I can take you back, if you’d prefer that.”
An oversight I intend to rectify as soon as possible.
“No.” Selene leans forward with a sigh, mumbling her words into my throat. “Stay here.”
Carrying her back in with several cloths in my hands, I settle her back on the bed. She blinks at me tiredly. “You took me with you.”
I pause, my hands on her legs. “Into the bathing room?”
She nods. Nudging her legs open, I carefully clean her up. Selene’s cheeks redden as she lets me.
I almost smile, tossing the cloth aside and climbing onto the bed beside her, pulling her against me and reaching for a soft blanket to tug over us. “I didn’t want to be away from you.”
The flush deepens as she shifts, facing me. Selene’s eyes trace my face. “I did not expect you.”
My throat tightens. “But I was waiting for you.”
Chapter forty-three
Selene
“Ican’t do this.”
I scrub my hands over my face in frustration, my temper getting the better of me as we walk back from the dock the following afternoon beneath another gray sky. My boots stamp into the lichen that covers the ground, every crunch a reminder. The lightness I felt upon waking this morning with Callan’s arms around me has vanished, buried beneath the wave of failure caused by spending hours staring at the starry void of the Never once again, waiting for something to happen.
Anything.
I am failing them. Not Petyr. But Callan. Esme. Sol, and Merrick. Leo. Matthias. Ryn, and Leesa. All of the people who linger on the doorsteps of their homes with weary faces as we pass by, watching me trudge back through their town with nothing to show for another day spent staring uselessly into the void they need me to fix.
It has been days, and any hope felt by my arrival is waning. If I can’t fix this, Callan will be forced back ontoVolatus, forced into another frantic trip to bring back the supplies Asteria needs before they starve, racing against his own maegis to make it back in time.
I know without asking that Petyr will not permit me to leave with him.
But I felt nothing at the dock. Not a single thing. The shadows refused to respond, my maegis vanishing when I tried to coax it out. “And this damned place—it feelsheavy, Callan.”
Even as we cross the bridge, the noise of the rushing water below filling my ears, even before we reach the outer gates, twisting up into the murky sky, I sense it. Something hovers in the air, pulling medown. I look up instead, forcing my feet to slow, and Callan pauses beside me.
My wings ache even at the thought. But I have to dosomething.
Callan’s face changes, his hands reaching for me. “Selene—,”
I launch myself upright, my wings pushing together in that still unfamiliar rhythm as I flap awkwardly, trying to force them to beat harder, to lift me up.
To help me reach Lucia. To bring her body down.
This is what I should have been doing. Practicing my flying.Thisis something I can do.
Except whatever strength I managed to find that day in the Sea of Stars does not find me now. My face crumples as I barely clear the top of Callan’s head before my strength fails, and I tumble. My knees smash into the ground, and Callan’s voice rings in my ears. “Selene!”
“I’m alright,” I croak. I push his hands away, regretting it even as they leave me. “Sorry. I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with me today.”
I bury my face in my hands. I can barely think for that heaviness. It’s a tug, like hands digging into my skin, dragging me down into the ground.
And it scares me.
When he kneels in front of me, I eye him through my fingers. He unpeels them gently, rubbing warmth back into my icy hands. His words are careful. “Is it because of last night? Did I hurt you? Or push you too hard?”
