Page 142

Baryn does not appear to believe them.

“You're standing,” he says from the doorway of my bathroom at the inn.

I look down at myself. “That does appear to be what's happening.”

“You're supposed to be resting,” he crosses the room before I can take the approximately three steps separating the bed from the small table near the window.

“I have been resting,” I remind him. Again.

“You got out of bed,” he points out.

“Temporarily.”

“That is generally how getting out of bed works,” he says, reaching the table ahead of me and picking up the water I was attempting to retrieve. He holds it out instead, watching until I take it from him. “What did you need?”

“Just water,” I answer.

“You could've asked me.”

“You were in the bathroom.”

“I would've come out.”

“I was unaware we had reached the point where obtaining twelve ounces of water required a support team,” I tell him.

Baryn's mouth flattens. “You were unconscious in the trunk of a car yesterday.”

“Yes,” I tell him. “Which would be considerably more relevant if I were currently attempting to climb back into one.”

Neither of us mentions that I could very easily tell him to leave. I could also tell him I don't need him following me every time I cross the room, checking the dosage instructions on medication I am perfectly capable of reading myself, or waking up every time I move beneath the blankets.

He spent the night in the chair beside the bed despite repeated assurances that the inn possesses several other pieces of furniture specifically designed for sleeping—including my bed, which he refused to sleep in out of fear of rolling over and hurting me.

Tamsin was only marginally easier to get rid of. She finally left this morning after I reminded her that she had been wearing the same clothes for nearly two days and promised to answer every text she sent me. Simon went with her, although I suspect Baryn assigned him the task of making sure she actually slept instead of finding another reason to come back. Neither of them has been gone long enough for me to miss them yet, and judging by the frequency with which my phone keeps vibrating on the nightstand, they have no intention of allowing me the opportunity.

A small weight shifts against my ankle, and I glance down at Faun, who has been attached to some part of my body since Nora deposited him here this morning with a bag of food, two blankets, and the declaration that he had been utterly inconsolable. I remain skeptical of the emotional range she has assigned to him, but Faun has followed me to the bathroom and even attempted to climb into the shower once, so the evidence is becoming difficult to dismiss.

“You too,” I tell him. Faun looks up at me. “You're also hovering. It’s atrocious.”

“He's concerned.” Baryn bends over to pick him up. “Look at him. He's experiencing emotions well outside his weight class.”

Despite myself, I laugh, and immediately regret it when the movement pulls at the stitches beneath my hair. My hand rises automatically, but Baryn is already moving before I can touch the spot.

“Don't,” he says, catching my wrist gently.

I scowl at him. “It’s not like I was going to pull them out.”

He regards me with exaggerated caution. “I don't know what you're capable of anymore.”

“I escaped a kidnapping. I didn't become feral.”

Baryn considers that for a moment. “You bit him. He needed stitches too.”

“He was holding me,” I remind him. “And his stitches were from being smacked in the face with a tire iron, not from me biting him.

“I didn't say it wasn't justified,” Baryn says.

“You're making it sound like evidence of a broader behavioral pattern,” I point out.