Page 64 of Destroyer

There was a thump, footsteps, and a moment later the door swung inward. Fen stood in the doorway, one arm braced on the door frame, his hair fluttering slightly in the wake of the door flying open. He wore tight black trousers and a loose black shirt, hanging open at the collar. His sleeves were rolled up to the elbow, revealing forearms corded with lean muscle. The angles of his jaw were shadowed with the beginnings of a true beard, as though he’d been too distracted to shave.

Ru stared up at him, momentarily lost for words. He was so tall and broad-shouldered, yet slender and elegant in the way he held himself. Ru herself wasn’t exactly petite, she would have described herself asaveragein every category, but Fen towered over her. When she stood near him she felt engulfed by him. It wasn’t a bad feeling.

“Hello,” he said, a momentary expression of surprise replaced quickly by a smile, soft and welcoming.

The artifact, waking from some slumber, lit up inside her, an affectionate flame at the edge of her thoughts.

“Hello,” she said, echoing his words due to loss of her own.

He stepped aside, giving her space to enter. An invitation. Wordlessly, she slipped past him and into the room, acutely aware of his proximity, the heat of his body, his gaze on her.

Fen’s room was even smaller than hers, not much larger than the bed itself, with just enough room for a small hearth, a washbasin, and an armchair. And almost every surface in the place was covered in books. Stacks of tomes sat on the floor, piled on the armchair, and lined the bed. Some open, some closed, all different subjects. Archie’s room was neat and well-kept in comparison. Scanning the room with surprise and approval, Ru saw several rolled-up parchments — academic papers, most likely.

A gentleman of Mirith, an aristocrat raised to abide by social mores, would have hurried to clear the armchair for Ru. Perhaps offered her a drink, asked how her evening had been so far. But Fen, a force unto himself, leaned against the door to watch Ru, fixing her with a half-smile, a raised eyebrow.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?”

She hesitated. She ran a finger along the cover of one of the books strewn on his bed, a burgundy tome with a worn leather cover. The entire room smelled of old leather, of words on dusty pages. She chewed her lip, her gaze meeting his once again. “I was…” she paused.

He pushed away from the door, moving toward her, nonchalant. But she saw interest shining in his eyes, and concern. “You know you can trust me,” he said.

“You’ve been reading quite a lot,” she said, picking up the burgundy book and reading the title aloud. “Kings and Gods: Tales of the Immortal?” She shot him an incredulous look.

His lips parted in a true smile, shaking his head as if Ru had said something funny. “You’re deflecting,” he said. “Again.”

She set the book down, frowning. “I’m not.” She knew she was — she didn’t want to explain it, her unsettled feeling, the sense that everything she understood was somehow changed forever. And least of all, her need to be near him, his familiar steadiness, the way he had already become a pillar of safety in her life.

He stepped closer, crossing his arms, looking down his nose at her. Disapproving. “I saw you when I opened the door. Your eyes were even more troubled than usual. What’s wrong?”

There was no use avoiding it. She had come here for comfort, and now he wouldn’t let her leave without it. She flopped onto the bed, in the one empty space where, she guessed, Fen had been sitting until she knocked on his door. He watched her patiently, not moving from where he stood. Firelight danced in his eyes, on his black hair, against the partially-hidden planes of his chest.

“I need someone to talk to,” Ru admitted, staring down at her hands. “Things have been different since I came back. The Tower… it feels like home, itishome, but something’s missing. Or maybe there’s nothing missing, and I’ve just… changed.”

“You’ve endured unspeakable pain in the last few days,” Fen said gently, his accent seeming to roll the words over his tongue. “More than anyone should experience in one life. It will take a long time for those wounds to heal. And even then, your world may never fall back into place.”

She caught his gaze, those deep gray eyes that seemed to hold so much more experience than they should. “How can you be so wise?” The question sounded silly even as she asked it.

He snorted. “I’m far from wise. But I’ve experienced my share of hurt, and I know how it feels to wake up one day and wonder if it’s the world that’s changed, or you.”

“The way you talk…” Ru said, turning to watch the fire dancing in the stone hearth. “I’m not surprised you believe in magic. You seem like that sort.”

He smirked. “What, a strange old man? An eccentric hermit?”

“Hardly,” she said, laughingly. The artifact seemed to respond to her laughter — comfort from within, through an unseen thread. And there in Fen’s room, with a warm fire crackling in the hearth, the connection to the black stone felt immediate, more familiar than ever. “You see things from a new perspective,” she clarified. “So different from mine, my facts and figures, numbers and calculations.”

“I like your facts and figures.”

Ru’s heart sped beneath her ribs. Fen’s closeness was affecting her, his long lashes, that triangle of bare skin below his throat. She swallowed thickly. “You’ve been reading my paper?”

“Three times,” he said, “and I plan to read it several times more. With each read, I find something new. A shining tidbit of fascinating information. The way you write, it’s clear and factual, nothing but rational thought, and yet… you weave a story. I’m entranced by it.”

Heat surged in Ru’s cheeks, her stomach forming pleasing little knots. She found she couldn’t meet his gaze, smiling instead down at her hands. No one had ever said something like that about her work, not even close.

Apparently taking her silence as an invitation, Fen moved to the bed, stacking the books that lay scattered on the bedspread and setting them aside. Then he settled himself to face Ru, one foot braced on the floor, the other folded under him. When she glanced up at him, he was smiling.

“I’m serious,” he said. “I can’t begin to understand why the academic community has decided to dismiss you out of hand. A collection of simple-minded fools, if you ask me.”

“I never proved the hypothesis,” Ru said, fighting the pleased grin that threatened to overtake her expression. “I came close, but…”

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