Page 138 of Flame and Sparrow

“And in a very good mood, I suspect.”

“He seemed happy enough when I left him.”

Valas appraised me for a moment more, tossing the plum up and down as he did. “You smell terrible by the way,” he informed me. “The shirt looks nice on you, though.”

“Shut it,” I grumbled.

“You should eat something.” He caught the fruit and gave it a little shake. “I suspect you’re famished after all the trouble you kids got into last night.”

“I am,” I agreed, snatching the plum and continuing on my way. “Thank you.”

“I wasn’t actually offering my own breakfast to you,” he called to my retreating back.

As I bit into the soft flesh and wiped away the juice that dribbled down my chin, I smiled. I was in a better mood than I had been in a long time, despite all of the confusing thoughts swirling in my mind and all my uncertainties about what the day might hold.

A quick, hot bath improved my mood even more, as did the fine, comfortable riding clothes Rieta laid out for me to change into.

After I was dressed, I found her waiting for me at the bureau and its mirror, brushes and combs in hand. We tackled my hair together; she was talented at braiding, and she managed to tame my unruly strands into several sleek plaits that she pinned into a twisting crown around my head.

“I came to your room late last night to check in on you,” she said as she worked, “and found you gone. Worried me for a moment.”

I hadn’t thought about causing concern to anyone—I was still not used to being expected anywhere in this realm. “I’m sorry,” I said. “Last night was…strange.”

She nodded in agreement. “I found out where you were soon enough. And I suspect you were safer with him than you would have been anywhere else, what with all the unrest and other nonsense last night.”

Images flashed in my mind—the unsettled sky, the Storm Marr’s dark gaze, the almost-fear in Dravyn’s eyes when he sent me to his room.

My good mood deflated a bit.

“‘Course it’s none of my business, but it’s nice to see you two are finally getting along.”

I nodded absently.

We were getting along—I could hardly deny that after the things we’d done.

But the further removed I became from those things, the more they felt like a dream that hadn’t truly happened. It had been so easy to slip into the dream when we were alone. Now the reality of my surroundings was settling in again, all my questions pressing into the places previously occupied by him.

My gaze drifted toward the closet.

I still hadn’t taken the knife Cillian had given me from its hiding place. I couldn’t hear its humming anymore, but I wondered if that was because I didn’t really want to.

“Are you all right, dear?”

“Yes,” I lied quickly. My gaze jumped up to my reflection in the mirror. “You’ve done a beautiful job.”

Rieta waved the words off and smoothed her skirts in the slightly flustered way she always did when I paid her a compliment, and then she busied herself with cleaning up the mess I’d left in the washroom.

I normally would have told her to leave the mess and let me deal with it myself, but I was too distracted by my thoughts. My gaze circled the room.

A room that, at some point, I’d started to think of asmine.

The evidence of my settling in was appallingly apparent, now that I took a moment to see it. To admit to it. I saw all my drawings scattered about; the books I’d chosen and taken from the main library; a beautiful vase I’d fallen in love with, which Dravyn had insisted I could keep in here to look at whenever I wanted; the bed made up the way I always made it at home, with the same number of pillows arranged in exactly the same manner.

Then there was the shelf where I’d collected my most important artifacts of this realm—the crown, the sword, the glass sparrow.

My sister’s necklace now sat on that shelf, too—it was as valuable as any god-given artifact, I’d reasoned—though I couldn’t see it from where I currently sat.

Instead, my gaze caught on Hydrus, the sword I’d earned from the Ocean Marr’s trial.

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