“I like it.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
Yet he saw how uncomfortable it made her to admit this, the way she struggled to hold his gaze. Understanding poured into him. It had always been difficult for them to speak plainly, and especially about this.But: “Look at me,” he said. She did. “You’re beautiful. You always have been, to me.”
Somehow, this seemed to make things worse. It baffled him, the way her eyes filled with sudden tears, or how she sucked in a ragged breath, then held it.
“I’m sorry,” he said automatically. “I didn’t know—I didn’t mean to upset you. I take it back. You’re not beautiful. You’re wretched.”
She sniffed an almost-laugh.
“Tell me what’s wrong,” he said softly. When she struggled for words, he added, “Or don’t. You don’t have to say anything.”
“I know.” She made frustrated fists.
“You know?”
“I have my voice back. I can say anything. Icould.” She pulled her lips in. “I thought it would be simpler than this. To speak about…things. What I am thinking.”
“It’s not easy.” This, at least, he knew for certain. “Not for me, either. And you’ve been voiceless for…well, for too long, Ellina. It’s not goingto be easy. But you have time.”
“Time,” she repeated. Her breathing evened again. The tears were gone. She lifted her gaze to his. “Yes.”
TWENTY-SIX
When she woke again the following morning, the bed was empty.
Ellina’s pulse tripped as she scrambled upright, stumbling over the sheets in her haste. She flung back the curtain, which was not truly a curtain, but a bedsheet knotted to a rod. Her gaze landed on Erol changing pillowcases a few beds over. He looked up.
“Venick—?”
“Is fine,” Erol said smoothly. “He’s just been discharged.”
“But, his head…”
“The damage isn’t as serious as originally thought. He’ll have a headache, but there is no further reason to limit his activity. I examined him myself just this morning.” The ghost of a smile. “You, on the other hand, need to be careful with that thigh.”
The awful feeling in Ellina’s stomach began to settle. “My thigh is fine. It did not even need stitches.”
“Only because you refused them. You’re as bad as Lin Lill.”
“It is a minor wound.” Ellina was eager to finish this conversation. “A scrape. I would gladly suffer a thousand like it.”
Erol seemed to understand the unspoken,Given what I have gained.He opened his mouth to respond. Stopped himself. Wrung out another smile. “Venick is in the reception corridor, I think.” As Ellina turned gratefully away and began striding in that direction, Erol called out to her once more. “We are all glad for you, Ellina,” he said in elvish.“And I am so proud.”
Ellina’s boots squeaked to a halt.
There was a pause, which lasted just long enough for Ellina to find the courage she needed to turn back around and meet Erol’s gaze. She could count the number of times anyone had told her they were proud of her, so she was not expecting the sudden lurch of shyness…or pleasure.
Erol was smiling. He appeared comfortable, despite the sudden heaviness of the moment. Comfortable, despite having made the moment heavy.
Ellina did not like to think about her father. She saw no point in contemplating the would haves or could have beens,particularly when her own mother hardly cared to speak of him. Ellina’s father was dead. He had drowned in a river when Ellina was little. Even if he had not died, there was a good chance that Ellina would never have known him; after she was born, he chose to move back to his home city, Vivvre, rather than remain among the court. His story was long over.
Yet Ellina wondered, suddenly, if this was how it would have felt to have a father. She wondered if he would have been proud of her, and open enough to say so.
Ellina thought back to her last conversation with Venick. She was not like Erol. She had never been good at expressing difficult feelings. And yet, things were different now. Ellina understood better the preciousness of certain moments, how they must be grasped immediately, or else lost forever. And she saw, too, how she might be brave enough to grasp them.
