What would it be like to be loved by someone like Keelynn? A woman willing to bargain with a witch and cross an entire country for a chance to bring back someone she cared for. Desperately naïve. But also desperately brave. Desperately loyal.
I stared out the window, watching the hedges get shorter, replaced by low stone walls and fields dotted with grazing cattle. Eventually, the random cottages grew more prevalent and closer together. When we reached a cobbled path, I knew we must be getting close to town.
“Maiden Death?” I gave Keelynn’s shoulder a poke. She swatted my hand and continued snoozing away. I poked her again. “Keelynn?”
Her lips lifted into a sleepy smile.
“Wake up, wasp. You’re drooling on my shirt.”
The way she blushed when she shot upright and saw that she had, in fact, marked my shirt, left me fighting a smile.
* * *
Someone had thought it would be a good idea to paint the three-story inn the color of pea soup. Moss grew in clumps on the slate roof tiles surrounding uneven chimneys. Padraig opened the carriage door for Keelynn, offering her a weathered hand down onto the damp cobblestones. I climbed out after her, settling my bag across my chest.
“We’ll see you in the morning?” Keelynn said with a small smile. I tried not to be offended that she hadn’t asked me to stay as well. Now that she knew I could evanesce, there was no point.
“I’ll see you in the morning.” With a nod, I turned to leave. Only, I didn’t want to say goodbye. Not really. So I twisted back around. “Will you join me for a drink tonight?”
She would say no. Still, I’d be a fool not to ask.
“What do you say, Padraig?” Keelynn offered her coachman a warm smile. No wonder the man loved her. Basking in her light must be like waking up to sunshine every morning.
His gaze landed on me, narrowed and assessing. I couldn’t help shifting my weight.
“I’ll leave the pints to the young, milady,” he said with a bob of his head. “Enjoy yerselves.”
I couldn’t believe it. That was good as giving his approval. No man approved of me within arm’s reach of a woman he cared for. I didn’t know what to make of it.
His approval made me feel . . . responsible.
I wasn’t sure I liked it. I could barely handle being responsible for myself half the time. How was I supposed to be responsible for her as well?
Keelynn gave my arm a nudge. “Where will we go?”
I shook away my rising panic, glancing up and down the narrow street. I’d been through this town plenty of times but never had a reason to stop. There wasn’t much. A butcher’s next to the baker’s. And an apothecary. The only place to get a drink seemed to be the inn where she was staying. “I’ll meet you here. Say, eight o’clock?”
She agreed with a smile.
With nothing better to do for the next couple of hours, I evanesced to the castle. The moment I reached my room, my brother burst through the door.
“Where have you been?” he demanded.
Where’d he get the energy to be so feckin’ dramatic all the time? “Busy.” I went to my wardrobe in the corner.
“You were ‘busy,’ were you? Did you forget that you were meant to meet me at the feckin’ portal? I waited in Tara’s house all feckin’ day.” He stalked over, gripping my arm, turning me, and pulling one of my hands toward him, then the other. “Dammit, Tadhg. I thought at least you’d have the feckin’ ring.”
“Not yet.”
His jaw ticked. “Why do you look so chuffed with yourself then?”
“That’s none of your business, now is it?” I tore out of his grip to slide the hangers in my wardrobe from one side to the other. Wasn’t there anything in here without holes?
“You bedded the assassin, didn’t you?”
“Not yet.”
“Then what the hell have you been doing for the last three days?” he snarled, throwing his hands in the air.