"I did not make it alone."
"You did not make it with me."
"You have not been here."
"I have been exactly where I need to be."
"And I have been here," I say. "With them."
His jaw tightens. "That does not mean you leave without?—"
"Without what? Asking your permission?"
He stops. "That is not what I said."
"It is what you meant."
Silence moves through the room.
"I was gone for less than an hour," I say. "They were cared for. They were fed. Nothing happened."
"That is not the point."
"Then what is?"
Something moves through his expression. "You should have told me about Cambra."
"I would have," I say, "if you had been here."
He exhales once, his attention breaking away before returning. "I am handling something that requires my focus."
"I am aware."
"Then act like it."
"I am."
The words sit between us. He looks at me as though he wants to say more, and this time he does.
"I do not want you going back to the pools."
I look at him. "They are healing pools."
"It does not matter what they are. They are worse than the ones at Rathmor Palace because men and women share them.” His voice is controlled but the thread beneath it is not. "I do not want another man seeing my wife without her clothes on."
I hold his eyes for a moment.
"I understand," I say.
Something in him eases slightly at that.
I turn toward the door. "I am going for a walk."
He does not stop me.
And as I step into the corridor I think that understanding something and choosing to obey it are not, in fact, the same thing at all.
CHAPTER 55
