Page 151 of Feathers of Ash and Hope
I send him a look that stops him from trying to convince me otherwise. Instead, he releases one long breath.
“That bad, hmm? I’ve never seen you so in knots about a woman before.” He lifts his hands when I glare at him. “Just saying.”
Fortunately, the building is empty; everyone is out at the fire or the gathering ground celebrating the new riders. I charge into my room and make sure Jared locks the door behind us.
Now I can only hope no one saw us and that she wakes up before anyone comes looking.
Jared watchesme like I have lost my mind, and I’m very close to doing so.
Next to my worries, I’m also bombarded by Solaris, courtesy of my darling Night Raven. I get it, but if anyone is supposed to tell us anything, it’s him. He’s connected to her. He can slip into her mind, not me.
He currently sits on the roof right over my room, keeping watch, and I have to say I was astonished to see that he can douse his flames. His feathers are now coal black, with glowing lines running through them like embers, glimmering and pulsing but barely visible in bright daylight. His eyes are black as well, rimmed by gold, the same tone as his beak and talons.
I only know this because I slip into Daeva’s view occasionally to check on him, and she sits up there too, eyeing him warily, probably because of whatever he said to her.
I cross my room back and forth, watching Ara like a hawk. Waiting for her to open her eyes, twitch, do anything that tells me she’s still alive.
Who has seen Ara’s fall? The answer is easy: everyone. The Phoenix emerging out of the fiery inferno behind him drew everyone’s attention. So the question is rather how soon will someone come looking?
She has to wake up.
Ara lying on my bed is a cruel joke, considering she was so very alive the last time we were here together. I trail a finger softly over her cheek. Her skin is reddened here as well, but at least not blistered like her arms.
My arm is sticky with blood where her head rested, and I pray it’s no more than a cut.
That I can’t do anything before she wakes up is killing me. I continue pacing, my gaze searching out her face again and again.
“You want to tell me what is going on?” Jared leans against the door, his eyes flicking from Ara’s still form to me and back.
“I can’t tell you her secrets. Or at least not this one.” I busy myself by getting my emergency kit out of the wardrobe.
Maybe I can’t heal her, but I can start treating her wounds the non-magical way. I motion Jared over, and he holds her head while I look at the wound. It’s hidden beneath her braid, so I loosen it, unraveling the partly golden and soft, partly dark andstiff strands to get a clear look. Her hair flows over my lap in soft waves, and I revel in their silky texture while I work my way to her scalp.
“Something happened between you, didn’t it?” Jared’s eyes are on my fingers caressing her hair, and I know he’s wondering how much of the time I sneaked off I spent with her. Seeing the long strands of gold between my fingers reminds me of the evening at the tavern, of the moment when she hid her face by burying it in my neck, jolting my whole body awake.
“Holy mists, you let her in, didn’t you?” Jared asks.
I work my way through the last part of her hair, which is matted to her scalp and sticky with blood.
Flakes of dried blood come off and stick to the wet coating on my fingers, caking them, crumbs falling into my lap.
I tell him of the encounters he didn’t know about. He chuckles when I tell him how I caught her coming out of Cassius’s room and nearly killed him for it. Recounting it, I realize I never had a chance to stay away.
I don’t tell him about the curse. My trust in Jared is blind and complete, but the more people know about it, the bigger the threat to her.
Jared leaves to find out what is going on outside while I stay next to her, lost in thought. I cleaned away the soot on her skin and the bloodstains, so only the cuts, bruises, and burns remain. The cut on her scalp is superficial. Head wounds often look worse than they are.
I catch myself playing with the strands of her hair again. It’s clean and dry, thanks to my magic, and currently fanning out over my pillow.
I changed her into one of my shirts, leaving her other clothes folded on the bedside table. Not because they are salvageable but because it gave me one more thing to do. Now, nothing is left but waiting, and it’s driving me insane.
I watch her chest rise and fall. Her eyelids flutter occasionally, but I don’t get my hopes up anymore. The first time it happened, I thought she was waking up, but she seems to be dreaming.
I nearly lost her today.
I still might, and the reaction this triggers inside me scares me.
Jared comes back, and nothing has changed.
