She slid her hands across the table, palms up. Why he took them was a question for his conscience, forever unresolved when he was near her. He had crossed worlds for her, but it didn’t exonerate him of the wrongs he’d done. “Let’s go back to the room,” she said.
He’d heard many women speak those words, in that tone, and every time, they’d been a temptation he could outmaneuver. There’d never been another woman who could make him forget his oath to himself, and there’d never be another.
She must have sensed his hesitation. “I respect your conviction to yourself. And I have no more to offer than you, nor the courage to try. Certainly not the courage to try and fail. But you’re still the only one who has ever made me feel safe, and after everything that’s happened, the only thing I want is to fall asleep knowing you’re there.”
With his breath unsteady, his heart more so, Jesstin raised her hands to his mouth and held them there. “Let’s go.”
By the time they left the tavern, it was pouring rain, with hail mixed in. Elloven had come to fear all storms in the Infinitum because there was no predicting their duration or their intensity. The squall she was looking at, from huddled under the covered portico with Jesstin, was the kind that stung the skin. The inn suddenly seemed so far away.
Jesstin pulled her out of her stupor by grabbing her hand.
“On three?” he asked.
Elloven nodded, already shivering.
“One,” he said and tugged her forward as he bolted into the storm. Mud splashed them as they raced across the road. She was already imagining another awkward conversation with the cellar staff, but as she sprinted through the deluge with the man who had defied the very laws of death to save her, she couldn’t recall the last time she’d felt such pure, childlike bliss.
Everyone ran like chickens scattering in a barnyard. Some had jackets to protect themselves, others whatever they could find. Bin lids, planks...
Elloven was distracted watching a man strip away his shirt and missed another one running straight for her. The force of the clash carried her sideways. Her hand broke free of Jesstin’s. The slick mud sent her sprawling, and her leg instantly exploded in pain. She hadn’t even pulled herself up before Jesstin was doing it for her.
“Are you hurt?” he asked as he adjusted her in his arms.
“I might be.” Elloven nuzzled her head to his neck and breathed through the pain as she bounced.
“We’re almost there.”
The jostling as he sprinted up the stairs was even more painful. He clicked the handle to their room and shoved it open with his hips, then closed it the same way.
“Where does it hurt?” Jesstin set her upon a chair and started inspecting her before she could answer.
“It will... heal fast.” She had to bite down to keep from screaming.
“Where?” he demanded.
Her hand shook so hard, she could barely point at her thigh.
Jesstin ripped her gown up the center until he found it. Her heart jumped ahead of its rhythm when she realized her prominence birthmark—and her horrifying mutilation from Fabrien’s brand—was exposed. His sudden silence made her forget her pain.
She couldn’t look at him.
“Elloven,” he said seriously. “Do you know you have freckles on your knees?”
Elloven was so taken aback, she cackled in a most undignified manner. “What?”
“I said?—”
“I heard you.” She shook her head in disbelief. “I believe I’m aware, yes.”
“And how often do a woman’s knees see the sun?” Gingerly, he used his fingertips to push her leg to the left, then right. He clicked his tongue, shaking his head. “This is deeply concerning.”
“Is it now?” Elloven dithered between amusement and befuddlement.
Jesstin gave a tight-lipped nod. He continued his careful examination of her leg. “You’ve been frolicking outside in the nude.”
“I—what?”
“How often? Once, twice, thirty times a day?”
