“I don’t like duty.”
“Neither do I at the moment.”
That made her laugh again. He bent down and gave her an all-too-short kiss before taking up his responsibilities once more.
An hour later, the sleigh runners left clean lines in the fresh snow as they climbed towards the ridge where the resort sprawled against the mountainside. The messenger pounding on the door had come to report that another three guests had ventured out alone into the wilderness and gotten lost. They’d been found by the time he was ready to start the journey, but he needed to discuss the problem with the resort manager before it occurred again.
Polly sat beside him, wrapped in borrowed furs, with Tess on her other side. The morning air had painted color into her cheeks, and loose strands of dark hair whipped around her face. He hadn’t expected her to agree when he asked if she wanted to accompany him, but to his surprise, she’d not only accepted but invited Tess to join them as well.
He remembered the first time he’d brought her this way. She’d barely spoken. She’d sat pressed against him, rigid beneath the furs, her small fingers clutching his belt. Every unfamiliar sound had made her flinch.
Today she was pointing something out to Tess in the distance, cheerfully arguing that the jagged formation on the eastern ridge looked like a sleeping animal.
“It does not,” Tess said.
“It does. There’s the head.”
“That’s a rock.”
Polly sighed. “Obviously it’s a rock. I didn’t think there was actually an animal the size of a mountain.”
“You said it looked like one.”
He tried to hide his amusement, but Polly caught him.
“You see it, don’t you?”
“I see a rock,” he said solemnly, and she rolled her eyes at him.
“Traitor.”
The resort emerged from the snow ahead of them, a sprawling complex of stone, timber, and glass built into the natural curves of the mountain. Tess leaned forward, her eyes wide.
“That’s the resort?”
“Yes.”
“It’s enormous.”
“The main building houses the guest quarters and common areas,” he said. “There are smaller lodges for visitors who prefer privacy and separate buildings for the staff.”
“So there are lots of strangers here?”
The amusement disappeared from Polly’s face. She was familiar with the resort—she’d lived there with him during much of the construction—but they’d left before the guests started to arrive.
“We don’t have to go through the public areas,” she told Tess. “There’s a back entrance through the staff corridors. It’s quieter.”
Tess glanced at her. “Because of me?”
“Because crowds are difficult,” she said. “For both of us.”
He said nothing. He had learned something since their argument—not every problem needed him to solve it.
They approached by the service road and entered through the rear of the resort. Caralt, a young Hothian female, greeted himand offered to have refreshments sent to one of the private observation rooms. He accepted, and led Polly and Tess to the room.
He watched Polly as they moved through the corridors. She slowed beside a covered walkway, her expression unreadable. He remembered that place too. She had collapsed there once during those first terrible days, unable to breathe, unable even to explain what frightened her. He’d sat on the cold stone beside her for hours while workers and clan members stepped carefully around them.
Now she looked at the walkway for a moment, and then she kept walking. Something swelled beneath his ribs. He didn’t tell her he was proud of her, but he suspected she already knew.
