Page 57 of Lies Within the Darkest Tower

“I can’t believe you scored a point,” he said, grabbing a pair of long daggers and hurrying after the rest of the group before Sawyer could answer.

“I didn’t score a point,” Sawyer said to himself.

“Pretty sure I saw a point and called it.” I grabbed the three remaining practice swords and held out the lightest one, hilt first, for Sawyer to take.

“The Lord Commander gave it to me.” Sawyer’s gaze slipped up to mine then jerked away and he took the offered sword. He still held his side like it hurt but just like when he’d first stumbled into my bathing room and I’d climbed out naked and exposed him being fae-touched, I got the impression that one wrong move would scare him away.

“Rider picks one skill level above the one he thinks you’re at,” I said, heading after the others, my pace slow hoping Sawyer would walk with me. “Just enough to see how far you can stretch then slowly builds depending on how you respond. That point was all yours and it shocked the hell out of him. Everyone, actually.”

“But that doesn’t make the point mine. I’d never had scored if it had been a real fight, and he ended it after he scored his like with the other inexperienced novices.” He ran a hand through his red hair, mussing the already wild locks. “I don’t know why it bothers me. There’s no way I’d win a fight against him.” He snorted. “Unless I was fifty yards away with a bow.” Then his expression turned sour. “And he gave me the time to line up my shot.”

“The point was yours. With the exception of most of the fae novices, Mikel, Ambrose, and Durand, you’d have scored a point on any of the other novices. That includes Bramwell and Hamelin.” One of whom had been raised to be a guardsman and the other had been a professional soldier before his name had been drawn in the lottery.

“Bramwell and Hamelin are slow, but one hit from them and I’d be seeing stars for days,” Sawyer said.

“And that one hit from Rider could have seriously hurt you,” I replied, trying to broach the topic of his injury without making him clam up or run away. “He pulled it, but if you have broken ribs, he could have done more damage.”

Thankfully, from the way he’d stopped holding his side and was breathing normally, it didn’t look like the injury was that bad… although I was getting the impression Sawyer was too stubborn for his own good. If Rider hadn’t ended the fight, he would have kept going, and I suspected from the looks a bunch of the novices had shot each other when I’d asked Sawyer about it, his trip on the running trail wasn’t because he was clumsy, either.

I grabbed Sawyer’s arm and stopped him before we passed through the pasture gate. “If you’re injured, you report to the infirmary.”

Sawyer froze, his gaze locked on mine, and his lips parted on a sharp, soft breath. Then red, brighter than his hair, raced overhis pale cheeks and down his neck, disappearing beneath the collar of his too-big shirt and jerkin.

“It’s just a bruise,” he breathed.

“You should go to the infirmary and have Flint check you out,” I pressed.

“It’s fine. It’s just fresh.” His voice trembled along with his body and panic filled his eyes as he tried to look away from me and couldn’t.

I hadn’t expected his reaction to my unwanted allure to be so powerful. I wasn’t even naked. But he was so ensnared, I could see his pulse fluttering in the large vein in his neck. And while I should have let him go and broken eye contact, I knew if I did, he’d continue to lie about his injury.

“Prove it,” I forced out, my insides twisting with shame. “Show me.”

CHAPTER 36

Talon

Sawyer’s eyesflashed wide at my command and the panic grew. “You want me to what?”

“Take off your shirt and show me.” Goddess above I was disgusting. I hated using my allure like this. I hated using my allure at all and yet in this case, I needed to be able to tell Rider that the boy was all right and he hadn’t done more damage by sparring with him, or I needed to drag the boy to Flint and get him fixed up or put on bedrest.

Boy was Rider going to be pissed at himself if he forced someone who should have been on bedrest to muck out the stables all morning. Of course, if that was the case, part of it was Sawyer’s fault for not saying anything.

“I, ah…”

The fear in his eyes grew and his breath turned sharp as he tried to look away from me but couldn’t, reminding me that he was just a boy and human. What he felt for me came with other issues, ones that might have been the reason he’d flinched at Rider’s sharp dismissal and how I knew he had experience with being beaten.

Fuck. What was wrong with me?

I released him and forced myself through the pasture gate into the bailey. A few of the novices were on the other side of the bailey headed toward the barracks and Quill stood in the doorway of the indoor practice hall, waiting for me and the last of the weapons.

“Quill,” I said, grabbing Quill and pulling him back inside the building. As feared, even though I’d stopped making eye contact, my allure on Sawyer was still strong and it compelled him to stumble after us. “Show Quill.”

“I’m not— It’s just a bruise. I swear,” Sawyer insisted, his voice regaining strength now that he wasn’t captured within my gaze. “There’s no point in bothering the healer. I— I’m used to it.” He undid the clasps of his jerkin with trembling fingers and raised his shirt just enough to reveal the large dark purple bruise staining across his ribs and up his chest. “The Marquis of Herstind March has a temper.”

Quill stiffened, his sudden change in demeanor shocking and not like Quill at all. “What about your sister? Does he hurt your sister?”

Sawyer’s hands shook harder as he tried to reclasp his jerkin.

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