“Here,” she whispered, stepping back toward Aldric to make herself useful. He had not yet slipped his feet into the stirrups of his saddle. Her hand fell to his boot.
“I have it,” her husband snarled, bristling like a porcupine as he leaned down to hold his stirrup steady while he shoved his own foot into it.
His venomous tone was like a slap to the face, stealing her breath away. “I was just trying to help, Aldric—”
“But I do notneedhelp,” he snapped before lifting his gaze back to hers. The moment he did, he went quite still. His eye searched hers. Whatever he saw there lured a sigh from his lips, sending his breath caressing against her face—warm and peppermint-scented.
“I’m sorry,” he rasped, surprising her with the sudden apology. “I didn’t mean…”
But whatever he didn’t mean, he didn’t bother explaining. He simply trailed off and took Mourn’s reins in his hands, beginning to pull away.
Her pulse flickered. What if this plan of hers failed? What if one of them didn’t make it back from this alive? What if this…was goodbye?
Her arm snaked out, seizing his horse’s reins. “Aldric!” His name burst forth far louder than she had intended. Heat crawled up her throat as the eyes of all his men swung her way again.
Rakon rumbled something in Kunishi. Whatever the large man said, her Crow ignored it. Instead, he spared all his attention for her as he leaned back in, closing the distance between them. “What is it, kirei?”
He lingered so close that she could count the scars carved into his tawny flesh. That she could see herself reflected in his eye—not a woman wreathed in flame, but merely a woman. A woman who didn’t know what she was doing.
Her mouth ran dry. She lowered her gaze from his as her mind raced. What did one say to their husband at a time like this? A husband who was more stranger than lover?
“Be careful out there,” she finally whispered, lifting her face back to his.
Some emotion passed across her Crow’s face with that—something she couldn’t begin to understand or name, there and gone in an instant. His own gaze dipped lower. His attention hitched on her mouth for a single, breath-stealing moment.
His eye snapped back to hers again. Gruffly, he said, “You, too. Look after Reyla for me. Please.”
And then he retreated from that nearness, righting himself in his saddle at last. Looking away from her, he tugged the collar of his undershirt higher along his throat, no doubt to protect Soot from the cold.
That was that, she supposed. Nothing more to be said between them.
Ridiculous as it was, a tendril of disappointment squeezed her heart as she watched the Twelve Sons stir around their leader,preparing to join the Elmorian soldiers and Sir Easome in their march.
She shook her head at herself and edged backward out of their midst, her arms tightening around her midsection to protect herself from the biting cold.
What had she expected?
“Kirei!” Aldric called, his deep voice winging above the shouts of men and the clatter of hoofbeats against stone.
Her gaze cut back his way to find him holding Mourn steady against the tide, rooted in place, his attention fixed on her once more.
“If this doesn’t go as planned,” her Crow continued, his tone laced with equal parts warning and rare levity, “I make no promises not to simply do things my way.”
Despite herself, a faint smile hitched at the corner of her mouth. Lifting her chin, she called back, “Very well. Though for the record…” Trailing off, Seraphina nipped at her bottom lip, her pulse hitching at the bold quip lingering in her thoughts, demanding to be voiced.
Did she dare?
Aldric arched his eyebrow again.
His Sons stirred around him, their horses clearly restless. Rakon shouted something at him in Kunishi—words she didn’t know. But her husband ignored it. Still, his one-eyed gaze was all for her.
Emboldened by his lingering attention, she finally finished, “When it comes to the matter of gift-giving, I am the sort of woman who is more partial to flowers than decapitated heads.”
A few of the Sons laughed at that. Leif whistled again.
But it was Aldric’s reaction that stole her breath—a smile. Small and fleeting though it was, she had still lured that rarest of expressions to the corner of her Crow’s mouth for the barest of moments.
“I will keep that in mind,” he rumbled, the words almost lost within the chaos, the noise. But she traced them upon his lips easily enough.
