“And I wasn’t keeping anything from you,” I went on.
“I know,” he said, this time slower, almost like a question. But a weird heaviness lingered in his air. He seemed more distant than usual. Not cold, just…removed.
In the distance, Dax began to descend toward the icy lake. My fists slowly unclenched.
“Then what’s going on?” I wanted to look back at Ryker so badly, but I couldn’t lose track of Dax. Each time one of his wings flapped, my chest trembled. “You were strange at the table and you’re being strange now.”
“Strange how?”
“It sounded like you thought I’d colluded with Dax to surprise you.”
“Then I apologize,” he said simply. “I don’t suspect you. I do suspect him.”
I huffed a sigh. “He’s harmless.”
At least in this particular context. He’d come here to help me, not weed out secrets.
“Orion was harmless, too.” His arm around my waist tightened. “And I almost lost you.”
“We can’t keep doing this.” I shook my head, ignoring the ghostly and ghastly memory of Orion’s hands on my neck.“Suspecting everyone. And you’ve gotten me beaten on that front.”
“You’re right,” he said gravely. “I’m a son of Solkar’s Reach, raised with the greedy shadows of the Northern Clans nipping at my heels. I’ve been taught to protect my own against the outside world–especially family that doesn’t deserve to be called that.”
So vastly different than my own Clan, where even the slightest marriage, thrice removed, was considered family and looked out for. “I’m from the outside world.”
“Not to me,” he said gently.
I tuned out the flutters in my stomach. “Perhaps not now. But a few weeks ago you were questioning why I was asking about you and your relatives.”
Who were, to put it mildly, bastards. The Northern Clans’ leaders had nothing to recommend them, apart from misplaced pride.
“A grave error on my part,” he said, his chest vibrating against my back and warming me.
I sniffed. “The worst.”
“Stubbornness runs in your blood, suspicion in mine. The events of the past months haven’t helped quench those predispositions, I’m afraid.”
“That doesn’t make them right.”
“It definitely does not,” he said. “That doesn’t change the fact that both of our uncles have been plotting against us. Yours just managed to do it quicker.”
Yet I still had the Protectorate crown and Ryker had his throne.
“I don’t trust my family and I don’t trust yours.” He shrugged, as if it was the normal thing in the world. “I’m very keen to change my opinion on the matter, but people keep betraying us. We don’t know who let the attackers through the passage and–”
“Yet,” I pressed. “And it had to be someone from inside. So not our relatives.”
“No, unfortunately. It would have been easier to point the finger at mine, I already despise them. I can’t think of a single soul in Solkar’s Reach who would want to hurt it. Though someone did and will probably do it again. Until we find out…”
“Trust nobody.” I sighed, regaining feeling in my feet as Dax slowly descended toward the frozen lake. “Is that all?”
“Suspecting everyone around us seems already like enough.”
“No. I mean yes. I mean you–” I licked my lips. There I went, exposing myself even more. Admitting it might make it real. I would have rather crawled out of my skin than be vulnerable, but I forced myself to go on. “–you feel…far away.”
In reply, Ryker’s hand began sliding up my spine.
I welcomed the touch, but it didn’t dissipate the tension rolling off him in waves.
