Page 36 of Tusk Love

Something terrified flashed in her eyes. “Isn’t their comfort mine as well, though?”

No other words could have been as much of a death knell to whatever it was he’d been hoping. He thought about how her first instinct upon seeing her Shimmer Ward neighbor had been to conceal the shabby dress that she’d enjoyed bargaining for. He thought about how reluctant she’d been to introduce the likes of him to Lady Foxhall. She belonged in her world, not his. Never his.

“Go inside.” He jerked his head toward the inn’s front door. “I’ll stable the horses.”

Guinevere wrung her hands. “I’m sor—”

“What did I say about apologizing for things that aren’t your fault?” Oskar cut across her as blandly as he could. She had no idea what he was thinking, but he’d brusquely changed the subject, and soshe’d realized that something was wrong and immediately assumed that she was to blame. Gods, he couldstrangleher parents.

She chewed on her bottom lip, then nodded and shuffled into the Song and Supper with a slumped, dejected sort of gait. His chest ached, but he determinedly turned his mind to practical matters and led Pudding and Vindicator to the stables behind the inn.

When he rejoined Guinevere, it was in a lobby whose glory days were long past. The paint was peeling from the walls, and there was a certain odor that permeated everything, musty and bordering on rank, as though a large rat had curled up and died in a forgotten corner long ago and the smell had never been aired out. But the tavern area was lively, with a ragtag group of musicians playing to a boisterous crowd. While Guinevere hung back by the chipped old wall, more than a few people noticed her and began to stare. Oskar glared at all of them as he drew the hood of her cloak over her face.

They went over to the innkeeper and negotiated for a room. The nightly rate was staggeringly cheap; as Oskar soon found out, however, that—as with all things—had its price.

“What in the hells happened to all the beds in Wildemount?” he thundered. “Are we in a shortage?”

The innkeeper scratched his head. “I don’t know what to tell you, lad. It’s peak travel season, isn’t it, with the harvest at an end…You get the last available room, which has one bed, or I give you back your coin and you try to find somewhere else.”

Oskar was incandescent with rage. He snatched the brass key from the innkeeper’s hand and gave it to Guinevere. Loaded down with most of their luggage, he followed her as she made her way to the staircase that led to the second level, where the rooms were.

But there it was again—that prickly feeling. An intent gaze from the shadows. Oskar paused with one foot on the lowermost step, turning slightly to assess the crowd.

Through the haze of tobacco smoke, over a sea of chatter and clinking tankards, his eyes met emerald-green ones. The uniya mercenary from the Amber Road sat at a corner table, half-shrouded in darkness. She wore a red dress, and her black hair was loose and flowing ratherthan in braids; he wouldn’t have recognized her, if not for those eyes that he’d first looked into while in the heat of battle. She smiled at him over the rim of her tankard before downing its contents.

“Oskar?” Guinevere called from several steps above him. “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.” He continued walking up the stairs.

The other mercenaries were nowhere in sight, and he rather doubted that they would try anything funny within the walls of Zadash, where the Crownsguard were never far away. Still, once they got to their room, he told Guinevere to bolt the door after him and to not open it for anyone else.

“But where are you going?” she cried.

“I’ve heard there’s a place nearby that does the best sandwiches in Wildemount,” Oskar lied through his teeth. “So that’s our supper settled. I’ll go and buy them. You need to freshen up and rest.”

“We can just eat here at the inn—”

Oskar shook his head. “These sandwiches apparently have to be tasted to be believed.” He removed his hunting knife from his belt and gave it to her. “Just in case.”

Wonderful,he groused to himself a minute later as he headed back down the stairs.Now I have to go find a sandwich shop.

First things first, though. As soon as Oskar had drifted back into the uniya’s line of sight, she stood up and left. He followed her to an alley that the front of the inn overlooked and leaned against the wall, arms crossed, while she claimed the opposite wall and mimicked his pose.

“I’m Selene,” she said. “It’s nice to meet you under less…volatile circumstances.”

Oskar grunted. From here, he had a good view of the Song and Supper. He watched it intently, ready to charge in if anyone even remotely suspicious entered or if there were signs of a scuffle.

“There’s no need for that.” The uniya had a rich, throaty voice, with a hint of a twang that had most definitely been picked up from the streets. “We wouldn’t dare. Not here. You know as well as I do that the Crownsguard are always watching.”

“Who’s ‘we’?” Oskar demanded. “Who are you working for?”

“Someone who wants the trunk and the girl. Who will pay handsomely for both,” Selene replied. “Handsomely enough that my men and I won’t mind giving you a cut.”

“Not interested.”

“I haven’t even told you how much—”

“It doesn’t matter how much,” said Oskar. “I’m not interested.”

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