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“Wouldn’t want that. Someone paid good money to have that head intact.”

A wry smile full of secrets and something else I couldn’t quite name pulled plush lips dusted by dark stubble doing its damnedest to claim his face.

“They did indeed.”

He didn’t move his hand an inch, not even a fraction of an inch, until my own rested fully in one of his. Only then did he slowly close his fingers around mine, as if giving me all the opportunity I needed to snatch my hand back.

I couldn’t help but lean into the additional support while his other hand offered to take mine. His grip on my fingers was gentle, like he was holding back the delicate wings of a dove that could be easily crushed by carelessness.

His tenderness, his careful, measured approach grated on my nerves. Not because it wasn’t the right thing to do. Not because I didn’t need him to show me that, unlike his king, he would not harm me but because I needed exactly that. I knew deep in my bones that the moment he twitched wrong, the moment he jerked or made any sudden movement, like a spooked horse, I would bolt. What irritated me more than him knowing intuitively that I needed that was that I actually did need it.

I had always prided myself on adhering to Rule #10. No one sees your tears. That meant weaknesses, too. No one got to see me battered, bruised, and broken. He had seen me in all of these states. He had seen my weakness, and I feared what he would do with it now that he had. I feared that I had let him in, even by necessity of circumstance, even a little. And as I slid my hand into his other hand, I was letting him in even more. I was letting him support me, both physically, and if I was truly honest with myself, a little emotionally as well.

“Thank you for trusting me, Cricket,” he whispered and took a step back to give me room to step forward.

“I shouldn’t,” I murmured as I shifted my focus away from his beguiling face and back down to my feet that I was trying very hard to convince they were, in fact, feet.

“Shouldn’t you?”

I didn’t manage to pick the foot up but was able to lean on his steadfast hand and slide it forward. It felt like a monumental victory. It was not that I couldn’t move my legs and feet but that they had forgotten what it meant to be told to move. It was as if they had forgotten how to speak the same language as my brain and weren’t hearing the request. Even when they did hear the request, acting on it was difficult.

I had imagined it would feel like an especially harsh workout, that my muscles would ache and hurt from the strain of weakness, but it was the opposite. It was the complete lack of any muscle sensation at all.

“How long?”

I didn’t raise my head from my task, sliding one dead foot forward and him stepping back. His arms never lowered nor gave under the pressure I was exerting on them.

“Have you been in bed?”

“No. How long did you let him beat me for before you bothered to get off your fancy ass to help me?”

I felt his wince all the way down my arm and let it sink into my shoulders like a solid metal bar.

He let me take two more steps before he drew in a slow breath and exhaled it into his words. “Three minutes.”

No excuses. No justifications. No request to be forgiven. No hollow apology. Just a resigned accounting of the facts.

“And did you escort him down from the throne room the other times?”

That was the first time his fingers moved. They twitched, and I could tell he had caught them from gripping me in anger. I was already mid-rearing back before he let them relax.

“I will not ask you to believe me, Cricket. But know that I have never and would never lie to you, and I swear here in the Temple of the Ascended on Feidlimid’s own hand that I do not lie to you on this. I did not know he came to you afterwards.”

When I lifted my head to measure him for any potential lie, he was staring directly at me. Our eyes locked, and for a single moment, I fell into his gaze. A flash of dawn breaking over green mountains and chasing the night from the land settled into my mind, and his words dulled the edge of my ire.

“Swear on whoever you want. They’re just statues. It means nothing.”

My words should have been biting, sharp, cutting, but they had all the slice of an ancient butter knife.

“You’ve so much to learn about Magh Meall, Cricket.”

“What, they don’t have liars here?”

“Oh, no, on the contrary. Everyone here is a liar. If someone tells you the sky is blue, dip your head out the window to check.”

“Then, why would I believe you?”

“Because I swore it on my god’s name.”