Page 71 of Haunted

Niawen can be my tormentor, but I cannot be hers.

Too late. You’ve already scarred her.

49

“So what do you think? Do you think you can make Islwyn your home?” I ask.

We conclude the tour of the citadel and its grounds. I insinuated, with every turn, what a splendid place I have—that I have plenty of stores for the winter, that I have many men who serve me. Rolant is a welcome place for outcasts. My home is meager, but the realm thrives in trade. The river supplies many fresh foods, even in the bitter winter.

I worry what Niawen thinks, and that strikes me as odd that I should care, but the rooms are abrasive and cold, with the minimum amount of tapestries for insulation. The negative ambience also might be from the dreary, overcast skies lending their harshness. No sun shines into the rooms, and candelabra do little to dissipate the gloom.

She must think it all dreadful.

“You and Seren arrived just in time for a long winter,” I say, trying to minimize the obviousness of my bachelor existence.

More than once she glanced at me as she surveyed each room. More than once my gaze caught hers, and she looked away.

Her grip tightens on the parapet, where we are on the outer wall around my citadel, and she leans her head against the stone. Houses cover the ground below us, crammed together, spreading out in the distance.

I lean casually against the wall, studying her reaction with confidence. She has nowhere else to go. “I know my home needs a woman’s touch. I’ve turned down the head housekeeper’s efforts to make the place more cheery. I suppose, before, I didn’t see the need.”

If she was confused before, my statement utterly throws her. Her brows knit together. Let her conclude what she must from my words.

I snicker. “I’m a bit stodgy. I’ve lived here for more than a few years.”

“Exactly how long?”

“Oh, here we go. You’re really asking my age. If Siana left Gorlassar over three thousand years ago, then how old could I be?”

She glares at me.

“You know that’s what you’re thinking,” I say. “It’s not easy to judge an emrys’s age unless you’re staring them in the eye, is it? How many ages has my soul seen? How much wisdom is behind these eyes?”

She inhales sharply, and after a moment of stewing thoughts, she shrugs. “Once we mature in our lights’ ability and our physical self stops aging, I don’t see why the difference in years should matter.”

I arch my eyebrows. “Deep down this bothers you, or you wouldn’t want to know.”

By all the stars in the sky, I want to read her, but I don’t dare. She will sense if I do. Instead of diving with my light, I gauge her carefully, noticing every flinch of her body.

She’s boiling under the surface.

“I don’t want to discuss it.” She turns and backs against the wall.

I move a hand’s breadth away and prop my elbow on a higher part of the wall, supporting my head. I remain calm, but I mock her distress, and she knows it. “I don’t want you to think I’m an old man, but take a guess.”

“I told you it doesn’t matter!”

But you are curious!

I narrow my eyes. “Well, then. Now that that’s settled. I’ll leave you to ponder my peculiarities.” I stalk away.

I want to watch her expression, and though I don’t turn, I know she stands with her mouth gaping open.

Pleasure singes my scalp.

Age does not matter.

50

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