He stared at her a moment, and then he began to fidget nervously, his heel tapping on the ground. “You realize what I risk by calling it?” he asked.
She swallowed hard. “I do.”
His eyes flickered back to the fire again, and then he stood. “We’ll need to travel several more hours northeast from my home and into its territory. I will not risk it following us back.”
His boots squashed the fire in an instant.
She wasn’t sure what to expect from him in the hours that they traveled. But they traveled deliberately, and in silence for most of the hours it took them to reach a place where he was comfortable calling it.
Each time she would look over to him, he was staring into the trees, a blank expression of nothingness on his face.
“I did not know you knew how to stay so quiet,” she muttered once she could not stand it any longer.
His hand tightened and then relaxed on the reigns, and he continued to stare straight ahead of them. “There is a lot you do not know about me,” he replied. “For instance, my favorite food is--”
“Women?” she interjected.
His brows raised, and she swore she saw a quirk of a smile rise on his face. “I was going to say potatoes.”
She almost laughed. “I wasn’t aware we were on the favorite foods level of our friendship.”
“Is that what this is?” he asked, looking towards her with a grin. “And here I thought I was leading you to your certain death.”
“Allowing the Noctuans to do your dirty work… All this time you’ve promised my death would be privileged enough to have it done by your own sword.”
“The Berdijay will only rob you of your mind,” he assured her. “My sword will certainly be what ends your life.”
She almost laughed. “I am glad to know the fantasy of my death is what you dream of at night.”
“I’m surprised you were able to sleep without the aid of the tonic or Samar last night,” he bantered. “All that moaning—”
“You know, you keep talking about my moaning as though you cannot get it out of your head,” she mocked, raising her brow at him. “Something you’d like to share?”
Draven chuckled under his breath. “If I decide I should like to hear your moans again, you’ll know it.”
She didn’t recognize the flutter in her stomach as she met his gaze then, the sharp intake of breath she felt herself take as his eyes danced over her figure… She quickly pushed it to the back of her mind and looked out ahead of them.
Circumstance,Aydra, she told herself.Pure circumstance.
A chill grew through the forest before she could utter another word. Draven pulled on the reigns of his horse, and she followed suit.
“What—”
He held his hand up, and she stopped talking. Leaves crunched to their right. Draven squinted into the treeline and then moved slowly off his horse, pulling his sword from its scabbard when he did. Aydra quickly pulled her bow and an arrow.
Draven crouched as he walked around the horses, his feet making no noise on the dirt.
Infi, the raven called down to her.He crawls into the canopy. Left tree.
Aydra squinted into the shadows, searching for any movement. The white of its hands grasping onto the trunk caught her eye. She pulled the arrow through and sent it soaring through the air.
The arrowhead landed with a thud in the creature’s neck, and it fell backwards to the ground.
Draven straightened and stared at the dead Infi now lying in front of him.
“If you can land that shot in the shadows of this forest, do tell what happened that day on the beach,” he said as he turned back towards her.
Her jaw tightened. “You were shouting at me,” she argued.
