Page 64 of The False Vow

Without waiting for a response, I turned and strode toward the back of the room, aware that my actions were nonsensical, and yet—what else was I to do? The first sob came as I was climbing in between the unmade sheets, muffled and hiccupped and altogether mortifying. Covering my face with my hands, I turned toward the pillow, my skin red.

“Tamerlane.” Noé’s voice was soft. I heard him draw closer, and curled in tighter on myself in reaction. My pulse was beating as fast as a mouse’s. “Stop it. You’ll kill yourself if you don’t breathe.”

I gasped, but no air seemed to reach me. “I asked you,” I choked out, “to leave me be.”

“Leave you to your death, you mean. Here—let me.”

He knelt by the bedside. I froze as, gently, he took one of my hands between his, guiding it toward himself. His eyes on mine, he unbuttoned the collar of his shirt, laying my fingers flat against his bare chest. His skin was as cold and smooth as cream; beneath it, I could make out the faint one-two rhythm of his heart.

The burn in my cheeks deepened. I moved to rip my hand away, but he resisted, holding my palm in place.

“It means nothing,” he said hurriedly. “You loathe me. I loathe you. Come morning, we need never speak of this again. Just for now—let me help you.” He paused. “All right?”

Hesitantly, our gazes met: mine tear-washed and hazy, his intent and inscrutable. In his stare, I saw the words he’d just spoken reflected back again, as if I’d held them up to a mirror. You loathe me. I loathe you. A curious truce—and yet…

It was one I could accept.

He exhaled when I relaxed. Cautiously, he adjusted the position of my hand on his chest, moving it so that the center of my palm was directly above his heart. The feel of his pulse was stronger now, so near it was almost as though I could close my fingers around it, stow it in my pocket like a sun-warmed coal.

“Can you feel that?” He spoke tentatively; there was something in his manner that made me want to look away.

Swallowing, I nodded.

“Good,” he replied. “Now match your breaths to mine.”

With deliberate slowness, he drew an inhale—and reluctantly, I mimicked the action. Air filled my lungs, perfuming and sweet; in my mind, the fog of panic seemed to abate just a fraction.

“There you are,” Noé said. His tone was low and gritty, sending shivers over me. “That’s much better.”

We cycled through several more breaths that way, our chests rising and falling in tandem. When my pulse had calmed enough that I no longer felt as though my heart was about to hurtle out of my body, he dropped my arm, rose, and crossed to close the door.

I sat up against my pillows as he shifted back toward me. Now that we were no longer touching, the urge to turn away from him was powerful, the reality of what I’d allowed him to witness settling in. Not since Markham had tossed me out of our apartment had I lost my grip on myself like that. It was a vulnerability I had permitted not even Eliot to approach.

My parents had left me; my brother despised me; society opposed me, simply because of my silkwitch status. I was my only protector. If I fell, who would help me up?

“There is no need to be embarrassed by it, you know,” Noé said, watching me. “Emotion. It only means that you care.”

I snapped my gaze to him, suddenly defensive. “I do not care.”

“Oh?” he smirked. “Well then, I suppose you are like me.”

At first, I didn’t comprehend his meaning—until my memory flashed back to the pub, and the insult I’d lobbed at him there. Name one person you care for whose surname is not Lear. Such a pointlessly cruel thing to say. Reflecting on it, I blushed.

He seemed to register my discomfort. Leaving the door behind—in addition to locking it, he’d dragged an armchair beneath its knob to prevent it from opening—he moved in the direction of the bed. I wondered, for a moment, whether he was preparing to climb in with me, but instead, he only sat at its foot, balancing on the edge of the bed frame.

He ran a hand through his hair, tugging on his curls. “I know I have not spoken to you about her much,” Noé said flatly. “Ophelia.”

Our stares connected. I hadn’t expected him to bring up Ophelia. He’d referenced her in the automobile, of course, when he’d told me the only goal which mattered to him was revenge against his father, but I thought we’d laid the subject to rest once we’d reentered Fortblanche.

He must have seen me judging him, then. Was this his attempt to explain himself?

“When we were younger, the three of us were so close—Eliot and I in particular, but Ophelia, too,” Noé continued. “Their mother died when Eliot was twelve, and mine a year later, both of illnesses from which they never recovered. Witnessing my father’s and my relationship as you have, it will come as no surprise to you to hear that we’ve never gotten along, not even in my youth. Following my mother’s passing, the Lears became my family.

“Ophelia and I…We weren’t a natural match,” Noé admitted after a pause. “I think that’s part of why Eliot never guessed at what we’d become—the two of us were so obviously ill-suited for one another, in so many ways, that no one would have anticipated a connection would develop between us.” Glancing at me again, he smirked humorlessly. “She despised my vices,” he said. “Like you. Prior to me, the few men she had allowed to court her had been upstanding, virtuous. Usually reformer types, fixed on bending the world to their moral ruler. But…” He hesitated. “We had one thing in common. She wanted a way out of her family, and I wanted a way in.”

Sighing, he hunched forward, worrying at his lip with his thumb.

“Sometimes I wonder if our entire relationship was about Eliot,” Noé said. “Ophelia felt stifled by him—by the expectations he set on her—and I…more than anything, I just wanted his approval.”