Page 45

“Storm’s coming in.” His voice was a gruff whisper, and it burrowed inside me. It had been so long since anyone had cared if I was cold. He pulled up the fur-lined hood and tucked a strand of hair behind my ear with fingers that ignited a trail of longing over my skin.

I pulled the cloak tighter around me and pulled on a pair of thick socks and snow boots. My bag had already been packed and was waiting by the door. So was the codex, wrapped in oilskin and strapped tight to Aster’s bag. Seemed like he didn’t trust me that much.

He’d been busy while I slept. “You’re very sure,” I said. “Doing all this.”

Aster handed me a pair of gloves. “Would you rather a cage under a Smoke Phoenix?”

I pulled the gloves on and reached for the codex bundle, but Aster caught it first. “I’ll carry it.”

“No.”

“But if—”

“I said no.”

We stared at each other across the narrow space. He was always trying to anticipate the hit before it landed. I was always trying to prove I could take it. In the end, he gave one sharp nod and passed the bundle over. That wasn’t what I’d been expecting—he never used to back down—but I would take the win where I could. I strapped the bag across my body beneath the cloak, but it was the little book that sat against my ribs like a second heartbeat, warming me.

“Out of all those horses I saw earlier, there’s only one Warhorse?” I asked.

“Yes.” He smiled down at me.

“Still hate that.”

“I’m sure you can bear it.”

I wasn’t. Being trapped on a horse behind Aster for hours sounded like its own form of torture.

He unbarred the door a fraction and paused, listening. I did the same, stretching my senses toward the silence outside. No voices or boots crunching in the snow. Only the deep winter hush of a Yule night and, far off, the low groan of wind moving through the trees and the pattering of snow falling from their branches.

Aster turned back, his green-flecked eyes meeting mine. “We won’t stop unless the mountain or storm forces us to.”

“Comforting.”

“When did either of us know comfort?”

Three years ago, together, I wanted to say. But true comfort was an even more distant memory—one of an enormous four-poster bed with bright blue curtains, piled high with fluffy cushions and soft, silky furs. Nothing was soft about my life anymore, and I didn’t want it to be. There was an illusion of safety in softness that I couldn’t afford to lean into.

“Never,” I said quietly.

His shoulders sagged a little, and he stepped up to me. For a moment, we both just stood there. With a glance at the corner of the room where the listening rune twinkled, he whispered, “Fix the book and stay here with me.”

I turned away from him and fixed my gaze on the fire. It was too much; the image he was painting was one that I would never be able to have, so I shut him out. It was a nice dream, but I was bound to my cousins and getting Annatalia back.

“You’ll never go home?”

“This is home now.” He rubbed the back of his neck and turned away. Was he ashamed?

“You’re loyal to all this?” I pointed at his bracelets.

“I’m loyal to you and your cousins.”

“But how can you be with that!” I jabbed a finger at his oath.

Silence itched its way along my spine.

His jaw flexed as he glanced at the runes again. “I’m sorry…” The sigh from his chest was long and weary. “I missed you.”

Three little signs that should have changed everything, but they changed nothing at all. If I were someone who allowed tears to flow, then I might not have been able to blink them away; instead, I reached out and took his calloused hand and pulled it so that it rested over my heart. Warm and heavy. To try to stop the hopelessness that was written all over his face.