“Wait. So what happened to your face?” I licked the tip of my thumb, using it to wipe clean the dried blood in his brow.
“Oh.” He held a hand to the injury and his cheeks blushed. “Not my proudest moment, but I directed my horse straight into a low lying branch. Smacked me right in the face.”
I refrained from laughing, although it was quite funny.
“How long do you think we need to prepare before we attack?” In my opinion, once Franlow’s soldiers settled in Lumosia, we shouldn’t waste any time.
“I’ll work with Azain to draw up a strategy. I don’t want to waste a single second. The sooner we can kill Bitchmont and his hybrid army, the better.”
“Agreed.” My fingertip traced the tattoo on his bicep, outlining every line of black ink.
“How was it while I was gone?” he asked me, his gaze following my finger.
“Oh it was absolutelydreadful. I had no idea what to do without you. I spent most of my time lying in bed, anticipating your return,” I teased, stifling my laugh.
“Ha-ha,” Sebastian monotoned.
Rolling in his arms, I lifted my nose to see him better. “In all seriousness, it was fine. I spent some time with Sawyer training and we had a good heart to heart.”
“Oh yeah? About what?”
“The future. Kids. He told me that he was adopted.”
Sebastian’s lips tipped to the side. “What?”
“You didn’t know that?” My surprise was evident in my tone. For as long as they’d been friends, the knowledge that Sebastian didn’t know something so important about Sawyer blew my mind. I wouldn’t have said anything, but I thought for sure Seb knew that information already.
“No. He never told me that,” he said flatly, his face drooping before he forced a subject change. “Anything else?”
My face froze.
Sebastian’s eyebrow arched in pure panic. “Oh gods. What?”
When I didn’t speak, he demanded with a low rumble, “Spill it.”
“Don’t be mad,” I deadpanned, rolling to my stomach and lifting myself up onto my elbows.
“I already don’t like this.” Sebastian’s face portrayed a look of betrayal, as if he was thinking about how I had just been alone with Sawyer for days.
“It’s not that bad. Really,” I began, pleading ignorance. “But when Sawyer and I were training this morning, someonemayhave overheard?—“
Sebastian cut me off, running a hand over his face, letting it linger on his jaw to massage the muscle. “Gods, Maeve…overheard what?”
“It’s not a huge deal. But Franlow overheard Sawyer and me talking about my ability to wield the stars and?—”
“For fuck’s sake!” Sebastian backed up against the headboard, sitting upright. “You have got to be kidding me,” he growled, his eyes fiery and wide.
I held my hands up in submission. “I handled it. I was honest and told him our theory about Blythe's soul and my body. He wanted to kick us out, but I reminded him how much he needs us.” What I didn’t say was that if Sebastian hadn’t returned when he did, Franlow probablywouldhave kicked us out.
For minutes, silence flooded our room, and for a moment I worried I had lost my hearing. I contemplated flashing him my breasts to snap him back into the conversation, but instead I waved a hand in front of Sebastian’s face, reeling him back into the reality he seemed to have lost. “Say something. You're scaring me.”
He cleared his throat, unclamping his jaw to scrape his teeth on his lower lip. “Do you understand what this means?” hegrilled me, his words so precise and slow that it made my fists clench.
“Um?” I did not want to answer wrong.
“I’ll tell you what this means.”
Thank the gods.
