Draven’s lips pursed, and he glared at his friend. “We leave at midnight for the shores. On foot. No horses. I don’t want to give any inclination of our coming.”
“How did you attack last time?” Lex asked.
“Last time, we didn’t know what we were up against. I lost a great deal more men than I’d have liked to,” said Nadir. He hugged his arms against his chest. “We have the element of surprise on our side. My company is preparing arrows. We’ll take them before dawn.”
Nadir only stayed in the tree a few minutes after the last of their exchange. He told them he needed to make sure his people were prepared for battle, and so he left them upstairs, but not before Lex insisted she would join him to learn more about his people.
Aydra felt herself fumbling with the hem of her dress as she sat in the chair across from Draven at the familiar table, sipping on the wine he’d given her.
“You should get some sleep,” he said shortly, tapping his cup on the table. “We’ll be leaving soon.”
Aydra hugged her chest. “You saw the letter you thought I wrote, and yet you made him wait on me anyway,” Aydra said. “Why?”
He paused tapping the cup, and stared at the table. “Because you know protecting your own means more than just the people of your kingdom,” he said softly. “And you’re the only one of your kind to have ever thought it.”
She stared at him, her eyes narrowing at his words.
“And—” he stood from the table and finally looked at her “—I didn’t want to think you’d abandoned your promise.”
“You knew I didn’t write the letter?” she asked.
“I said I didn’t want to think,” he corrected. He took his and her cup from the table and started out the room again. “Take my bed. Get some sleep. The sun has nearly set. I’ll tell Lex where you are and find her somewhere she can stay as well.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
NO MATTER HOW many times Draven told her she needed to rest before they set out, she couldn’t. She paced around his room by the candlelight, After a while, she decided she would get dressed. She pulled her leather pants, black long sleeve tunic, and leather vest from her bags. She was just strapping on her sword belt when she heard footsteps coming up the stairs again.
“Don’t worry, I’m up. I’m ready, I’m—” her words ceased at the sight of Draven’s face standing there.
Black paints were smeared around his eyes, making the sage color stand stark against the darkness. It was as if they’d painted the color in every shadow of his face—his cheekbones, beneath his jaw, making his features stand stark and fearsome in the light of the candles. His walnut streaked hair was down. Someone had woven two small braids in it over his left ear. It was displayed as his own battle armor was, the fervor mane of the Forest King. The black leather vest he wore pressed against his torso, two belts wrapped criss-cross across his chest and shoulders, and she could see the two blades sticking out from over his shoulders. She felt a brow raise slightly on her face.
“The true form of the Venari King… I wondered where you’d been hiding him,” she mused.
His jaw clenched, and he walked over to the dresser, the echo of his black boots on the wood sounding in the quiet room. He grabbed his leather wrist braces and avoided her gaze. “Do something with that mane of yours,” he said in a low voice. “You’ll have us found in the darkness by the sight of it.”
She looked down at her hair, but said nothing as she pulled it up messily and tied it up with a fabric she tore from his sheet. He stopped moving and stared at her.
“Did you just rip by bedsheets?” he asked.
“You told me to tame my mane,” she said. “It was the first stray fabric I saw.”
“I can still see it,” he said, looking at her loose stark ginger ringlets. “You look like fire against the moonslight.”
“What do you suggest I do?” she asked haughtily.
His jaw clenched, and he grabbed a black scarf from inside the top drawer. The fabric was tossed at her face. “Wrap that around you.”
She balked. “You wish me to fight, covered up like—”
“I wish you to do nothing,” he argued. “You’ll have no one there to save you tonight if you get yourself in trouble.”
“Promise?” she muttered beneath her breath.
“On my life,” he answered.
Her jaw tightened, and she pushed the anger swelling through her to the back of her mind. He turned and left from the room then, leaving her to deal with the long black fabric. She took her hair down and tied it in a braid on her neck instead, then reluctantly wrapped the scarf around her head and neck.
The breeze from Lovi’s waters blasted her face the closer they reached to his shores.
