Page 20 of Ties of Frost

All these years, I’d thought we were friends. I’d believed she was warming up to the idea of working together. Most rengiri traveled in pairs. Some even traveled in groups of three or four, but that seemed crowded. I greatly preferred working with one person, and I’d never fit with anyone as well as I did with her.

Zidra, it seemed, didn’t feel the same.

In fact, she was incensed by the heartbond. Neither of us wanted it. I just wanted to be her partner, not her husband. Even though Zidra was gorgeous, and talented, and made me better in every way, and sometimes rengiri did marry each other…

I shook my head. What kind of nonsense thoughtswere these? Partners. I wanted to fight and travel together, that was all.

Not that it mattered. She wanted me to leave her alone and would have gone in search of Physician Rouven by herself if she could have.

I looked up at the star-studded sky. “Iskyr.” My prayer left my lips in a whisper. “If we aren’t meant to be together—as partners or as anything more—why did you allow this bond to form between us?”

Only the chirping of insects answered me.

Nine

Zidra

A benefit to staying at West Quarter Haven was that the rengiri who stayed here didn’t tend to be late-night revelers. I paused outside the front door and listened. Only quiet met my ears. I eased the door open and crept into the common room. Dying coals in the fireplace provided a dim illumination to empty couches and chairs.

Good. The last thing I wanted to do was tell anyone, least of all Sajen, where I’d been and what had happened.

I didn’t even want to think about what had happened.

Weariness dragged down my steps. I passed through the common room and turned down the hallway that ran perpendicular to the front entrance. A half dozen doors lined the back wall, leading to the sleeping quarters. Each small room had a washbasin and changing area hidden behind a dressing screen, and two cots stacked on top of eachother on the other side of the room. Even during the Dawning Festival, West Quarter Haven wasn’t full. Only four of the rooms had two occupants. All of them were rengiri who traveled together as partners and were used to sharing a room, which thankfully left one of the remaining two rooms for me to have to myself.

None of the candles in the hallway were lit, so I ran my hand along the wall to count doors. When I reached the door on the far end, I went still. The scent of shifter and ale drifted from within, but it wasn’t my scent—nor had I drunk any ale. I pressed my ear to the door and heard quiet breathing.

Had an exhausted rengir forgotten which room he was staying in? Or perhaps a rengir had been visiting friends and decided it was too late or she was a little too tipsy to return to whichever Haven she had been staying at?

Or was another assassin lurking in my room?

The slow, even cadence of the intruder’s breathing sounded like someone sleeping. Perhaps a good assassin could fake that, though, to fool shifter hearing.

I leaned back and drew my sword, then eased open the door. The hinges creaked.

A grunt and shuffling accompanied someone moving on the bottom cot. My upper lip curled. That wasmybed.

But then, past the scent of ale, I caught a familiar scent. “Sajen?”

“Zidra?” my friend asked in a groggy rasp. “Why don’t you have a light?”

“Didn’t think I needed one.” I slammed my sword backinto its sheath. “Didn’t think there would be someone in my bed.”

His hearty laugh reminded me of some of my best days at Harcos. Most of the other students had loved Sajen for his sense of humor and vibrant personality. I’d loved him because he hadn’t treated me with suspicion and had taught me more ways to fight from the air, even though wyvern and gryphon anatomy and flight differed. He’d believed in me in a way no one else had—except for maybe Kyrundar, but I didn’t want to think about him right now.

“Istraiah came by and brought his cousin. His cousin drank too much and passed out, and Istraiah didn’t want to carry him to his home on the other side of the city, so I put them both in my room.”

I leaned against the doorframe. “And you’re in my bed because?”

“Because I weigh twice what you do. I have a fear of collapsing the top cot and crushing the poor rengir beneath me in the most ignoble death imaginable.”

I snorted. It was always difficult to stay upset with Sajen. “How considerate.” I pushed off the doorframe and felt my way to the small end table, where I fumbled to find the lamp and light it. “Sorry for waking you.”

The lamp flared to life, casting Sajen’s deep-brown skin in an orange glow and reflecting in his dark eyes. He sat hunched on the edge of the cot with his elbows on his knees and his fingers laced. His gaze studied my face for a moment before dropping to my bandaged arm.

“I’m glad you did. I’ve been worried since Kyrundarcame here looking for you and Aigider told him you were meeting someone at the Grivolen ruins.”

A rumble of a growl caught in my chest. “So that’s how he found me.”

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