The world returned in fragments: the distant creak of wood, a muffled curse, the hushed sigh of old floorboards beneath a familiar tread. Cold air scratched at my cheeks. The sorry blanket had twisted about my legs in the night, leaving my knees exposed by the borrowed tunic’s inadequate hem.
Mav stood near the hearth, fastening the last buckle at his belt. His hair, mussed by sleep, fell in loose waves, flattened where a hand had raked through upon waking. His shirt bore the faintest crease where it had been pulled on in haste; the cuffs were rolled unevenly at his forearms. Along his jaw, a shadow of stubble had gathered overnight.
My breath misstepped.
There was something devastatingly handsome about him in the morning light.
Not in the polished way of portraits and princelings, but in the quiet way some men are unselfconscious, utterly unbothered by being looked upon.
Which, regrettably, I was doing.
Thoroughly.
I cursed my treacherous eyes, unwilling to admit how they lingered of their own accord.
This man—this disgraced knight with too much charm and too little sleep—was not someone I could afford to fall for. I had chided myself for noticing such things last night: the breadth of his shoulders as he bent for his stockings, the sure shape of his hands on the scarred tabletop.
I did not intend to begin anew.
I turned my face into the pillow and exhaled. Fool that I was, I still watched him from the corner of my vision as he crossed the room to retrieve his boots, moving with the unencumbered grace of one who did not yet know he was being observed.
“Morning,” he said at last, not looking up as he crouched to lace his boots. Sleep had roughened his voice.
I swallowed and pushed upright. “Good morning.”
He glanced then. His eyes brushed across me—bare knees, borrowed tunic, tangled hair—and then away again, as if his gaze had touched something fragile without having meant to. I tucked the blanket about me in a late attempt at modesty. If he thought anything of it, he kept it behind his teeth. Instead, he rose and offered a half-smile.
“I figured we would get breakfast before we head out.”
I smoothed the tunic with careful hands and inclined my head.
He must not have seen the way I looked at him. Best so. The line between us had begun to blur.
I slipped into the washroom, freshened up the best I could, and changed into my singular gown. I put on my newly inherited boots and joined him at the landing.
The narrow stair reeked of damp stone. An upward draft carried the tang of coal smoke from the street. The tether stretched, a silken cord between us, drawing me forward.
Halfway down, he stepped aside to let me pass. The brush ofhis shoulder against mine was nothing by any sensible measure. A fleeting touch. Harmless. Yet my breath caught. It was a terrible habit of mine, permitting my heart to entangle with those to whom I was bound.
In other centuries, when I had awoken to an unfamiliar world, I convinced myself a fleeting romance might soften the sharpness of impermanence. And so it did—until the end came. Heartbreak had a way of outlasting whatever sweetness preceded it.
I would not make the same mistake again.
Mav glanced down as I passed, a line set between his brows as though he might speak. He did not. His footfalls slowed behind mine, and the city’s noise rose to meet us. Morning lay gold on the cobbles, glinting from an earlier shower. A cart sloshed through the puddles. A merchant called from the corner. A distant bell tolled the hour.
Mav fell in step beside me, close enough that the warmth of him was at odds with the cool spring air. I focused on the street ahead: on pale buds swelling along the bare-limbed trees; on too-damp laundry clapping in the breeze; on anything that was not the steady presence at my side.
Inside the Withering Whistle, Mav’s boots found the same path as before, carrying him to the far table with the ease of habit. I mirrored the motions of our first evening and sat opposite.
“Ah,” Wren drawled from behind the counter, slinging a rag over his shoulder. “Domestic bliss. Round…four, is it now?”
“Don’t ruin breakfast, Wren,” Mav said without bothering to look up.
“I would never.” His gaze slid to me, all sly warmth. “You have the patience of a Saint. Planning to keep him long?”
I smiled with perfect grace. “Only until I teach him table manners.”
“So, two lifetimes then?” Wren goaded with a grin. Mav huffed a laugh as Wren deposited two bowls, full of the same tasteless porridge we had endured yesterday. The first few minutes passed in quiet, broken only by the muted clatter of other patrons. Mav seemed at ease here—rooted in the scuffed boards and the low murmur of the room—as if he had been carved from the same timber.
