Page 92 of A Tale of Ice and Ash
“Do you think my sister’s pretty?”
Eirwen placed her hand across his mouth and yanked off the ring. “He doesn’t need to answer that.”
Ivy pouted. “It would be nice to know, though…”
Eirwen seized his arm and dragged him towards her tent. Cole turned and mouthed something over his shoulder, but she didn’t know what. Ivy giggled in response.
She sat him down on the bunk. “What are you doing here?”
“I wish I had something helpful to report, something useful, but I don’t,” he said. “The truth is, honestly, I just wanted to see you.”
Eirwen blushed. “Oh, I… I see.”
“You’re the only one who… who understands–”
“Niamh,” said Eirwen, with sudden realisation. “Of course.”
“There’s… there’s something else, too. My mother has a magic mirror. It can show her almost anything. That’s how she got your location before.”
“That’s… troubling.”
“It looks like dwarves dampen its effects, but I’m guessing the Mirror could just tell her where someone who knew the location was, so… so I’m not sure you’ll ever be that safe.”
“That is bad news, but… thank you for bringing it to me.” She looked up at Cole, only to find his eyes studded with tears. “Cole! What is it?”
“I don’t want to go back there,” he whispered hoarsely. “I don’t want to go back to that place and look at her and lie to her and wonder what she really is and where my mother went and what I’m doing still loving this facade when I know there’s a monster beneath and–”
Eirwen pulled him into her arms and dragged him down to her bunk. “I’m sorry,” she breathed, “I’m so sorry.”
Cole said nothing. He buried his face in her shoulder and wept while she stroked his back, whispering words of comfort as their grief unbound around them. They could have been there for minutes or hours.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“Why are you apologising?”
“Niamh,” he said, pulling himself back. “You’re here being so…youtowards me, and you lost her too.”
Eirwen took his hands. “We both did.”
“I keep wondering if there was something I could have done–”
“Me too.”
“And replaying it in my head.”
Eirwen swallowed, a tightness forming in her throat. “Me too.”
“I don’t think I’m ever going to scrub it away, or stop blaming myself.”
“Me neither.”
“I know I should be grateful that she came to save us, and I’m sure… I think she would have done it even if she knew what would happen, but… I’m still somad.I’m mad that she’s gone and I’m not.”
“Cole–”
“What? Come on, don’t tell me you wouldn’t have picked her over me.”
Eirwen yanked her hands away. “That’s unfair.”
