Page 89 of Rogue Elves of Ardani

There were a few angry knocks on the door and then some quiet arguing between Aruna and a long-suffering Nero before it was quiet again.

Crow turned to Vaara. He stared into the darkness of the room, at nothing. Crow was beginning to grow concerned.

“Vaara,” she said softly as she approached him.

He looked down at her, and to her surprise, he pulled her glove from her hand and touched her.

The swell of fear and pain she felt in him was not unexpected, but it took some effort to press down his feelings and keep them from overwhelming her. The feeling that she hadn’t expected—but perhaps she should have—was the shame.

He didn’t speak, but she felt a tentative, wordless inquiry, and she knew what he desired from her.

She focused on calming first herself, then him. She wove a tapestry of tranquility in her mind and covered him in it, muffling the tumult beneath—not enough to sedate him, but enough to make existence feel tolerable in that moment.

She felt him relax slightly. He squeezed her hand a little.Vaara, she thought to him.

There was a prickle of acknowledgement in his mind at her voice. She expected to feel the same discomfort she’d felt in him the last time she’d spoken directly into his mind. But this time, he didn’t care enough to feel much of anything. He was fully aware that she was in his head, but suddenly that invasion felt inconsequential.

Are you all right?she thought.

There was a stirring of irritation at the question—of course he wasn’tall right, but of course he was all rightenoughbecause he wasn’t some invalid, and he didn’t need to be looked after by her, and why wassheeven asking, why did it matter...

She let his thoughts flow into her. She let herself feel.

He was terrified of Alexei. He was in disbelief about what had happened, and at the fact that he’d escaped. He mourned the destruction of his body. He felt helpless and weak. To have her see him like this was humiliating.

She stopped when she felt that last one. The rest of his thoughts were reasonable, and she’d let them play out as they would, but not that one. She could not tolerate him feeling shame because of this.

Filled with a sudden, desperate urge to be even closer to him, she pressed her free hand to his chest without thinking. He stiffened.

Immediately she regretted touching him without asking. She was going to move away, but stopped when she felt an inkling of warmth in the back of his mind. She flexed her fingers a little, daring to trace over muscles and ribs—over fresh scars.

She couldn’t put into words all the things she was thinking, so she didn’t. Instead, she showed him himself through her eyes. She showed him his resilience, his strength, his pride, his stubbornness, his beauty, his irritatingly inflexible sense of morality. And after a moment of indecision, she revealed the grudging respect she’d come to feel for him over the past week.

He gave her a careful look. He was surprised. Crow pressed on, trying to ignore the way her heart was steadily speeding up the longer he looked at her.

Finally, she showed him himself on that stone slab when they’d first met, and bleeding and in chains the day after, even though the images made him angry at first. She let him feel the way she’d felt about him. She had felt anger and pain on his behalf. She’d felt disgust toward Alexei and everyone else who had allowed it to happen. But never had she thought him weak. Not once.

The things that are done to us,she thought to him,are not what we are. The actions of others don’t define us.

He slowly reached down to take her other hand. His mind was quiet.

Tell me what you want,Crow thought.

He glanced toward the bed. He wordlessly communicated to her a desire to lie in it—to fall asleep and be unconscious. Then he remembered the blood still covering his skin. He sighed, giving a vague thought of wanting it cleaned off.

“I’ll be back shortly,” Crow said, and when he didn’t react with panic at the thought of her leaving, she let go of him and went to find Nero.

She returned a while later with a bucket of water and a rag. Vaara watched her set the bucket down and nod toward the middle of the floor. “Get undressed and sit, if it pleases you.”

He blinked slowly. “I don’t need help,” he grunted.

“I’d like to, all the same.”

It might have been Crow’s imagination, but she thought his expression softened a little. He sat on the floor in front of her.

She approached his tangle of wavy black hair. He didn’t move when she grazed a hand over the dark mass.

“Why do you not braid your hair?” she asked.

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