Page 82 of Of Sword & Silver

Lara’s eyes widen, and Caedia simply ignores everything, tending to her white horse like Kyrie crying isn’t anything to worry about.

“Get a fire started, Morrow,” I order. “Caedia, heal her horse.”

Caedia shoots me a disgruntled frown.

“Please,” I tack on.

As for Kyrie, I pick her up again because, Heska help me, I can’t seem to keep myself from touching her. Not for any comfort it gives her, but because of the comfort it gives me.

The reassurance that she’s real.

There’s a small door in the floor near the stone fireplace and I kick it open, carrying Kyrie down into the cold dark beneath.

The dark’s never bothered me, and I know Kyrie well enough to know she doesn’t want to be around the others right now.

The door slams behind us and the only noise is that of the horses and quiet conversation above, muffled by Kyrie’s full-on sobs.

“I am sorry, Sword, I am so sorry.” She’s shaking her head, her hands tight around my neck, like she’s afraid of what will happen should she let go.

I don’t want her to let go.

She blinks up at me, eyes swollen and red as her frost-bit nose, and it’s clear she can’t see as well as I can in the dark.

I shift her, settling us down on what’s undoubtedly a filthy cellar floor, not caring, the need to comfort her overriding everything, always.

“Why, Kyrie? Why are you sorry?”

“Be-be-because someone is going to die. Someone I care about now, even stupid Morrow, I like him too, I don’t want him to die.”

My shoulders tense. I don’t want her to like Morrow.

“I’m not stupid,” he yells from overhead.

“Shut it,” Lara says, and dirt slips through the cracks between floorboards as they walk around above us.

Blessedly, Caedia begins singing, a song I thought lost to time.

It makes me tighten my hold on Kyrie.

I don’t want to lose her.

I can’t.

“Why did I have to drink from it?” She drags a hand across her face, wiping the evidence of her tears away.

“Kyrie of Sola,” I say softly, wanting my words to be for her alone and not any that may listen above, gods and humans both.

She stares up at me, her eyes huge and luminous, the red rims only making them seem even more unearthly green.

My breath stalls and I force myself to breathe through the sudden desire rushing through me.

“Kyrie,” I finally manage to continue. “Think. Could you have kept yourself from it?”

“Shouldn’t I have been able to? If no one else has been stupid enough to do it but me?”

“Did you consider, Kyrie,” my Kyrie, “that you did it because you had to? That you were the one the draught was destined for?”

I’m getting dangerously close to revealing too much. The truth is right there, dangling before her, and all she need do is reach out and grab it.

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