My lips part involuntarily from the contact. I look up into his good eye, and it’s warm and soft as he cleans my cheek, a shy smile tugging on his lips.
I wonder what it would be like to kiss him.
It took my mind a moment to get used to the disfigurement of his face, but now that it has, I’m growing fond of it. Here is a man with character. A man who has seen battle, if on the wrong side. A man who survived.
No, he’s not perfect like Ronan, but he’s nice. Approachable.
And I’m unable to stop thinking about how his body felt pressed against mine.
I think about asking him if there’s somewhere we can go. I’m not certain of it, but from the way he touches me—gentle, but with an edge of hunger, like he’s having to stop himself from going further—I think he would agree to it. I don’t have long before I need to get back to the palace, but these things never seem to take as long as I’d like anyway.
But we’ve only just met, and there’s still so much more of the market to see.
I let him guide me through it. He takes me to a fruit-seller and a butcher and a purveyor of fine fabrics, to a booth with rare books and parchments and to a stall with perfumes and oils, which I may or may not have sampled in an effort to find the one he’s wearing. At a small cart owned by a water-born, he buys mea flower, a desert rose. It has little fragrance, but it’s lovely to look at, a soft pink edged with brighter color. I tuck it gratefully into my hair.
We narrowly avoid a merchant selling Nithyrian wines that I recognize from occasional visits to our market and that would almost certainly recognize me. I explain that I’ve been home too recently to miss the flavor.
I notice that there are stands that we avoid, including most of the ones selling anything made of gold, of which there are fewer than I had imagined there would be, and a stand selling ornamental masks like you might wear to a ball that I certainly would have stopped at had Soren not warned me against it.
“His are the best masks on the market, but he’s not worth the trouble, believe me.”
By the time we’ve covered maybe a quarter of the square, the sun is slipping behind the city walls. It’s certainly dinner time, maybe past it even, but I feel no hurry to return to the palace.
I don’t want this day to end. I’m trying to remember a better day than this, and I can’t.
I know I should go back; I just don’t want to. Ronan isn’t even there, and I’m sure Adria can make up some excuse once she realizes I’m still occupied in my reconnaissance mission.
I haven’t forgotten my duty. I could never forget my duty. But has there been a day in all my life when I was able to do what I wanted?
“Is there anywhere good to eat around here?” I ask Soren.
He grins and takes me by the arm. I like the familiar way he handles me. It never feels pushy or uncomfortable. It’s natural, like we’ve known each other for years rather than hours.
I wonder if I’ve ever felt this at ease with someone I’ve just met.
Soren makes one last stop before bringing me to the tavern. It’s at a small shop off of the main square that looks to sellribbons and jewelry, though again, little that’s made of gold. I wonder if the Guild keeps it out of the hands of the common folks on purpose.
I twist my mother’s ring on my finger, hiding the crest of her house in case it’s recognizable to the owner. The air is warm and stale inside, as if we’re the only ones who’ve passed through the door in recent memory.
There’s no one behind the counter.
Soren calls into a darkened doorway. No one answers, but there are footsteps on the stairs.
“We’re closed,” says a woman’s voice. “Oh, it’s you,” she says when she spots Soren. She’s an older woman with leathery skin and graying hair, maybe around Larus’s age. “You haven’t heard? Vesper’s not been here in a week. You know how she is.”
“A week?” asks Soren. There’s concern in his voice.
She?Is this a friend of Soren’s?
Or a lover?
My heart flutters at the thought, which is ridiculous. Why should I be jealous? I’ve only just met the man. I have no claim on him.
“I’m sure you’ll find her soon enough, at the bottom of a bottle somewhere by the docks. Or rotting in one of Ronan’s cells.” The woman spits at the ground.
My interest is piqued. An enemy of Ronan’s, or at least someone Selaran who isn’t among his admirers.
And someone willing to say it out loud, bold as anything.
