“I agree.” Alanna nodded, wishing that Ballanor, Grendel and Dornar, and everyone associated with them, could be flung deep into the Abyss.
Suddenly it was too much. She couldn’t think about Ballanor and his favorites for one more minute without screaming. The entire day was a horrible blur of terror and panic, and her muscles ached with the aftermath of her frantic run through the woods and the desperate fear of seeing Val and the Hawks back in Ballanor’s power. She was covered in dust and dirt and the stink of acrid sweat, and she needed it gone.
She looked at Nim. “We need to get clean before we can even think about touching anything in this room. Shall we try those baths Haniel pointed out? I could do with some of the famous Eshcol salts.”
Nim looked down at herself and gave a Tristan-like grunt. She was equally stained and smelly.
They made their way out the door and down the hall to the women’s baths. A young acolyte brought them small bars of creamy soap and clean linen towels as well as sets of fresh clothes that had been set aside for them. Then she showed them to a large roofless room containing three deep turquoise circular pools, fed by the hot springs that the complex was founded upon.
The column-lined walls around them were covered in glorious ceramic tiles in greens, blues, and whites, depicting the gifts of the archangels of nature in a bounty of riotous foliage. Here and there, a profusion of brilliant-colored flowers burst across the calming scene.
The artwork was so vivid that it almost seemed real, while the weak sunlight filtered through the open roof in long shafts, reflecting off the steam rising lazily from the surface of the water, making it feel as if they had stepped into a real jungle.
Alanna sighed in relief as she pulled off her boots and then struggled out of her mud-caked, rain-shrunk leathers while Nim did the same beside her.
She turned away without thinking to drop her jerkin—and froze. She knew how bad the scars on her back looked. And she didn’t want Nim to treat her differently. To see her as less, somehow.
“I’ve seen them before you know,” Nim said softly. “I cared for you after Val rescued you. I helped Rafe.”
Alanna felt her eyes prickle with gratitude to the people who had given her so much. Nim didn’t see her as weak. As a failed princess. And nor did Val. Her neck felt hot as she remembered Val running his lips over her scars, kissing her, whispering that she was perfect.
It occurred to her that the marks on her back had convinced Haniel to listen to her. Without them, he might have turned her away. They were not a mark of her failure. They were the mark of her survival.
Her strength came with those scars.
She straightened her spine and looked over her shoulder at Nim. “Thank you. I know it’s not enough for everything you’ve done, but thank you.”
Nim smiled warmly. “Don’t thank me. You’re with Val, that makes us sisters, and family looks after each other.”
Alanna couldn’t help the fiery blush that crept up from the back of her neck as she shook her head.
There were several technicalities preventing them from being sisters—like the fact that she was still married to Ballanor—but she wasn’t going to argue. “I can’t think of anyone better to be my sister.”
Nim grinned back at her and then winked. “Last one in is a rotten egg!”
There was no way Alanna was about to let her get away with that. They ran, slipping and shoving each other into the hot water, completely ruining the refined beauty of the baths with their shrieks and giggles.
The baths were gloriously hot and soothing, and they floated for ages in the swirling steam.
By the time they were finished, the sunlight had disappeared, her skin was scrubbed pink, and her hair smelled subtly of roses from the soap. They dried themselves and then dressed in the soft cotton kirtles that they’d been given, the pale blue of a summer sky for Nim and the dark green of a shaded wood for Alanna.
Alanna tied the front laces and then pulled on her boots and covered herself in the heavy woolen cloak provided with the dress, feeling warm and clean, and vibrantly alive. As if the time in the baths had allowed her to shed an old, too small skin.
She had stood up for herself. She had brought help when it was needed. She was becoming the woman she wanted to be.
They made their way out to the small courtyard that flanked their rooms and found the rest of their group already there.
The Hawks were sitting at a wooden table covered in an array of breads, cold meats, cheeses, and fruits, drinking wine from large silver goblets. Lamps flickered warmly, bathing everyone in a soft yellow light.
Tristan and Val moved further apart as they approached the table, and Alanna and Nim settled in between them.
Val was wearing clean leather breeches and a loose linen shirt with its sleeves rolled up to reveal his strong, tanned arms as he leaned forward against the table, his wings relaxed behind him. His hair was pulled back and held by a strip of leather, while his beard had been neatly trimmed, and she had to fight the urge to run her fingers over his jaw right there at the table.
He looked tired, but more relaxed than she had seen for months, despite the lingering sadness from his visit with Reece.
As soon as she was settled, Val put his hand on her thigh. It felt intimate and possessive in a way that made her acutely aware of every inch of heat along the length of her body where she pressed up against him.
She had never sat with anyone like that before, let alone imagined she could have such open, easy affection with Val—her Val—and her head flooded with memories of everything that had happened between them the night before.
