As if feeling my eyes on him, he looks over at me, facealarmingly open—emotions unusually on display. His brows are drawn together, a short vertical line forming in the middle of them.
“You’re staring,”he murmurs into my thoughts.“Thought that was my job?”
An exasperated laugh slips from my mouth, and I shake my head. There’s still a dullness in his gaze, even now, but I play along. Being here has brought a lightness to him, too.
“We may need to find you a new job, seeing as that fire has held most of your attention tonight,”I tease.
He smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes.“Perhaps my hands are in need of something to do.”
My chest tightens at the playful words, an achingly familiar territory for us to be in—one I didn’t realize I missed so much until now.
“I can think of a thing or two,” I whisper, my cheeks heating as an unfamiliar wave of shyness envelops me.
His brows smooth out, the tension in them releasing as we stare at each other. Slowly, he reaches for my hand, sliding his palm against mine and intertwining our fingers so carefully that my heart nearly breaks at his gentleness.
I can see how hard he’s fighting to stay present—to stay here in this moment with me. But as quickly as he began to relax, his face changes and he slips further away from me again. Something flashes across his eyes—something akin to pain—and his expression shifts back into a calm mask of unreadable composure.
Graylen clears his throat. He gives my fingers a quick squeeze before releasing my hand, then looks back to the flames, busying the hand that was just within mine with a stick to prod at the firewood.
“We should discuss a plan for the castle,”he says into my mind, sounding every bit of the trained Aegis that he is.
My gaze lingers on him, unable to get the look of pain in his eyes out of my head. We’ve hardly talked about whathappened, and each time I feel him slipping away, my instinct is to let him.
I try to fight the unwelcoming thoughts stabbing at my mind, reminding me that if I were someone else—someone softer and gentler—maybe he wouldn’t push me away. Or maybe he can’t count on me with my magic slowly draining. Graylen needs steadiness right now, and I’m one wrong move from being powerless again.
Graylen has always been the one to push me, to sift through my layers of defenses until he had so thoroughly pushed past them that I had no choice but to be real. To beme. He never let me hide from him, even when I wanted to.
But he can’t save me from this. Only finding Nightfall can.
I take a deep breath and push gently back into his mind.“Graylen?—”
“Please.”His words quickly invade my thoughts before I can say any more.“Not yet.”
I swallow and look away from him.“Okay.”I draw my knees to my chest, resting my chin on the tops of them.“Not yet.”
He nods absentmindedly, still prodding the fire.
If he isn’t ready to talk, I won’t push him. Notyet. Not until he’s ready.
“We need to prepare for what state the castle may be in,”I start, shifting the subject.
Graylen visibly exhales, his chest deflating at the change in topic.“The last reports were of the rebels taking over and the shadows running rampant,”he muses.“If Moros is raising another army of Furies, then we need an exit plan. We can’t fight them all.”
I nod.“We’ll need an exit plan anyways.AfterI get Nightfall.”
Graylen cuts his eyes at me briefly before returning them to the fire. His jaw flexes as he says,“Do not forget you’re still the most important thing here.”
“To you?”I teaselightly.
“To the entirerealm, Lunaria,”he says evenly.“Not just to me, but to our people. To the Creans. Having the dagger without the person to wield it will mean nothing. We can’t lose you.”His jaw flexes.“I can’t lose you.”
Tears prick my eyes. I blink them back.“Right, well, we have to convince Moros you’re human, and that I chose to come back.”My eyes flicker to Adrian, who’s lost in watching the musician to our right, his head bobbing to the light beat.“And we’re going to have to get Adrian on board to do it.”
Graylen stiffens beside me.“You think we can trust him that much?”he asks warily.
I shake my head. Of course I don’t trust Adrian. Not witheverything, at least.
“No, but do we have any other choice?”I sigh.“He’ll either agree to it or he won’t. Only one way to find out.”
