Page 116 of Kingdoms of Night

There were humans who called themselves those terms. But each group seemed to see it differently. Most humans found lots of ways to make themselves distinct. To stand out and be special. It was one of the fascinating things about them. All the magnificent ways they could differentiate themselves within the same category. She’d always envied them that.

“Someone who uses words and energy to make plants grow, probably.” He gave a rather dramatic shrug.

She returned it and flounced her shoulders. “Well, then. I suppose that is what you might call me, a witch or a mage.” It was certainly better than just a tea maker. Though she preferred—she pinched her lips together. What did it really matter what she was called? Words mattered, but did they really when someone was like her? “It doesn’t matter, though.”

“For not being from Emaurria, you speak Emaurrian fluently.”

She chuckled. That was a word she’d never heard before. Emaurrian. It was pretty, though. “I doubt I am. I’ve passed through the Tue-Rah. It translates all words that are easily translatable. For me, it sounds as if you are speaking Ulnai.”

His brow furrowed, but the corners of his mouth quirked up. “This whole traveling between worlds doesn’t bother you, then?”

“Not at all. We do it all the time where I’m from. Though—haven’t seen a world quite like this.” That haze on the horizon beyond the forest really troubled her. It was like a curtain. Had it moved closer or was it just that they had gone farther? Something in the shimmering blue was off. “What about you?”

He scoffed, passed her the reed, and then turned his gaze upward. The sigh that followed was almost plaintive. “This is the first time I’ve left my world.”

“Oh.” She fidgeted with her necklace, taking care that the clips did not pierce the reed. “Did you know there were places like this?”

“No.”

“That must make this hard.”

“Life is.”

She smiled. That hardness in his voice wasn’t quite enough to fool her. Maybe because she had said it herself and so many others had said the same. The people who said it the most firmly were generally the ones who most wished it wasn’t so. Should she comfort him? No. She curled her fingers back against her palm.

He wasn’t as bad as she thought, but that didn’t mean they were—no. Just no.

She cleared her throat. “So you can talk to wolves?”

He shrugged. The black linen shirt clung to him, making the power in his shoulders obvious. His hands were heavily callused as well. Both suggested a life of extensive manual labor. Yet still there was that softness in his eyes.

“I guess at least those two.” He nodded toward Hawthorn and Buttercup, bounding along beside them.

“But not any others?”

This time he laughed. It was a warm sound, tinged with awkward energy. “It isn’t really something I’ve done before this. Actually, I didn’t know I could.”

“So they found you?”

“Yeah.” His mouth screwed up in an expression that was somewhere between amused and bemused, his green eyes contemplative. Plagues, she could stare into those eyes all day. “Don’t really know how or why. They say they’re part of my pack.”

“You have a pack?”

“I guess.”

Was she part of that pack, then? “I guess that’ll be useful after you find your niece. Will they go with you when you go home?”

“I…” He cleared his throat. “They shouldn’t. Really ,no one should. After I get Annette, I’m going to take her home and then I need to go my own way. It’s best for me to be alone.”

She nodded slowly, rubbing her arm. “Yeah, I get that.”

Sometimes one had to be alone to figure things out. Right now, just being around him was making things far more confusing. But being alone was not an option here. At least not for them.

“I didn’t get a chance to finish telling you properly, but thank you for everything you did last night.” There was a softness in his eyes when he looked at her. Something—something more.

Her stomach somersaulted. “Thank you for everything you did. You could have left me in that lake to drown. And you didn’t have to fight the spriggan or drink all the tea. Really. Just everything. Thank you.”

His grunt suggested he wasn’t particularly comfortable with compliments. He raked his thick fingers through his hair. “Just what anyone would have done. You didn’t have to do any of what you did either. But you did. And I just—I’m—thank you. You grow good plants. For fighting and drinking.”

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