Page 20 of Winter's Fate

“They brought the dinner quickly,” she commented, grabbing for a piece of bread. She was tired and shaky after the drama of the day, and the long journey. No call for tears, especially where Callum Farrow could see. “They must be frightened of you.”

Or they wanted to get a better look at him. Who could blame them?

He splayed one hand across his chest, eyebrows lifting as if in surprise. “Of me? But why?”

Now sheknewhe was making a joke. “No one told me you were funny.”

“I’m not. I’m frightening.” He knelt beside her chair, brow creased as he inspected her bruises once again. It was all too easy to remember how he’d looked without his shirt, and she found her gaze drifting toward his chest. Chastising herself, she took the opportunity to study his face instead: the rugged cut of his jaw, the crooked tilt of his nose that suggested he’d endured at least one break. Perhaps more. A scar traced up from the corner of his eyebrow to his hairline, light enough that she would not have noticed it at a greater distance.

And those eyes, the ice-chip blue contrasted against the black of his hair. She’d never before seen such a combination.

“I take it you don’t trust my sister’s physician?” Laena had meant for the words to sound light and airy; instead, they sounded shaky, at least to her own ears. While she knew the palace physician was trustworthy, it was telling that CaptainFarrow, a stranger to Etra, had already seen enough to make him suspicious of both the food and the quality of the medical care.

A foreign captain was taking more interest in protecting her than her own family. It shouldn’t sting, not anymore, but Kat was all she had left. She had reason to wish they would one day mend the rift between them and live as sisters again. Perhaps they’d never been particularly close, yet Laena couldn’t help wishing for it. If it was a fool’s hope, then it was better than not hoping at all.

Farrow lifted his hand, moving her hair aside, and carefully ran his fingers over the bump on the back of her head. His touch was gentle, and she found herself longing to lean into it. “After that display in her lacy little parlor?” he said. “I don’t trust her, or anyone she employs.”

His attention lingered on the cut, long enough that she thought he might ask about it. Instead, his gaze dropped briefly to her lips—so briefly that she might have imagined it—before he wrenched it away and stood, making his way to the other chair.

Laena swallowed, missing the feel of his fingers in her hair. She took a large bite of bread to cover her discomfort. “Mages, I missed palace bread. Nothing I bake is ever this good.” When he didn’t respond, she finished her bite and began heaping food onto a plate. “It’s all right. The physician. Kat wouldn’t hurt me.”

His eyes flashed, like a storm brewing on a distant horizon. “She wouldn’t help much, either.”

Laena shrugged. No use denying it. Though truly, he had no reason to defend her. Part of her felt as if she ought to dress him down, to make it clear that she was capable of fighting her own battles. She had defeated that assassin herself—not to mention a shadow monster, though she could hardly tell him about that part. In comparison, her sister was an easy opponent.

At least, she ought to be.

“You came here alone,” Farrow said.

As opposed to what? She couldn’t read him, wasn’t sure what he meant to imply. Laena slathered butter onto a second slice of bread. “As you see, Captain Farrow.”

He waved away the title with a flick of his hand. “Everyone calls me Callum.”

“Even your soldiers?”

“That would be inappropriate.”

“So not everyone.”

She could hear herself teasing him and couldn’t stop herself from doing it. This man was the captain of the Aglyean King’s Guard. He was famed for his ruthlessness, his cunning ability to hunt down any foe, and yet she found herself wishing she could lighten his burden, smooth out the crease between his eyes. Perhaps even make him smile.

The man before her somehow fulfilled that reputation and also defied it.

And why shouldn’t he? People were not the same as their reputations. She should know that better than anyone. Still, it was difficult to reconcile the man before her with the killer she’d heard of.

She couldn’t help but be all too aware of the intimacy of their situation. Them sitting together in his chamber, the bed not six feet away, the memory of his bare chest seared into her mind.

“Everyone who is not a soldier calls me Callum,” he amended. The corner of his mouth hooked upward, ever so slightly, and it was suddenly all too easy to imagine that mouth pressed to hers. And pressed… elsewhere. “Areyoua soldier, my lady?”

She raised an eyebrow, grasping for her equanimity. “No. And I’m not a lady, either.”

He did not acknowledge the reminder. She wondered if he even accepted it. While it was true that she had never beenformally stripped of her titles, and that she was still officially an Etran princess, she was now a commoner in every way that mattered.

Callum leaned an elbow on the arm of the chair, watching her intently. “And did you expect such a reception from your own sister when you decided to return here?”

How was she supposed to respond tothatquestion?Yes, actually I’m used to the disdain of my family and the people I was once responsible for? In fact, I came here to enjoy a helping of hostility, with a side of almost dying.

What had she expected, truly? That Kat would welcome her arrival with open arms, thrilled to see her accepting the role of emissary after all? That she’d throw a ball in Laena’s honor, receive her like some long-lost princess returned to the loving bosom of her family once more?

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