Page 9 of A Bond of Ice and Glass
A small black curtain covers half of the window. I pull it aside, just as the door closes and Noble drops into the seat opposite me. He grins as he crosses a leg over his right knee. There’s a carefreeness about him that takes me a little by surprise. In comparison, Lochlan’s tense body pressed against me couldn’t be farther from carefree. Why is Loch so worried about me?
He catches me looking at him, and I offer him a reassuring smile.
“I’m okay,” I whisper, touching his hand gently. “I feel great.”
It’s not quite a lie. I do feel better, albeit still tender, but I don’t want Lochlan to worry. He nods and seems to visibly release some of his tension in an exhale through his nose. Still, he doesn’t say anything, but I notice his hand stays clenched underneath mine, straining the fabric of his gloves. It’s like he’s expecting Sister Gabriella to pounce out on us at any moment. It hurts to know he’s still so anxious over me, even outside of the convent.
I clasp my hands in my own lap and turn my attention to the window. It’s a short journey to the village, the ploughed roads making it easier for the carriage to pass on through. Some of the villagers walking along the road stop to make way. I peer through the window, surprised to find blank and gaunt-looking faces staring back up at me. The clothes hanging off their bodieshave clearly seen better days, reminding me of the rags I was forced to wear at the convent.
Why do they all look so… sad?
“It’s been a tough winter,” Lochlan explains, following my line of sight out the window. “Harvests have been poor after Erax burned our fields.”
My stomach clenches at that. “He burned your fields?”
“Every last one of them,” his brother answers bitterly. “We rely mostly on imports now. Until we recover, which should hopefully be in the next year.”
I look out the window, my eyes stinging while I try to pull myself together. With all the snow covering the land, it’s impossible to see the fields, but the devastation is clear from the faces passing by the window. The same devastation fell upon my home, too, when Erax burned it to the ground.
“You can always tell when Erax has paid his enemies a visit,” Lochlan snarls. “He leaves a trail of scorched ground and starving infants everywhere he goes.”
Two things he left in my kingdom, too.
Silence fills the carriage for a moment. I glance out the window again, where a small boy clings to his mother’s leg by the side of the road. His tattered shoes barely cover his feet. Why did Lochlan never tell me this? All those years I was forced to study my so-called fiancé, he never mentioned the destruction of his home. He said he was sent to the convent after his mother died because he was a bastard and his stepfather didn’t want him.
“I didn’t know about this. You never said.”
Lochlan reaches over and pulls the curtain over again. “What good would it’ve done, Lena?”
Noble stretches out his long legs. “It would’ve just frightened you. And from what Loch tells me, you were frightened enough by those whore sisters.” His eyes flick to the curtain and back tome again. “This is just one of the many atrocities committed by your husband.”
An old, familiar fire lights in me again, a pain I’ll never be able to extinguish.
“Erax isnotmy husband! He never was, and he never will be.”
Beside me, Lochlan smiles for the first time. I can’t bring myself to smile back, my excitement all but vanishing. Gods above, I wish I’d brought some food with me to give out.
The carriage lurches to a halt. Lochlan quickly throws open the door and jumps out. This time, he takes my hand to help me down. My boots slide into the slush on the ground, turned brown from the traffic. Crumbling cottages lean into crooked fences, their chimneys coughing thin trails of smoke. Mud smothers every surface. Even the air feels like it hasn’t drawn a clean breath in years.
Despite all of that, there’s a quaintness about the village that stretches back hundreds of years. Everything is old and rustic, reminding me a little of home. At least the little I was allowed to visit growing up.
Brushing something off the side of his cloak, Noble joins us by the sidewalk. Many of the villagers stop to greet him as well as Lochlan. Nearly everyone stops to gawk at me walking between them, nearly half the size of them.
It hurts my heart to see so many people looking gaunt in the face. Even all the animals are on the thinner side. The pigs shuffling around in the stye squeal loudly as they search for food, while dogs bark and beg outside the butcher’s. Mange-covered cats drink from slush-filled puddles in the gutter. And the smell coming from there…
I’d gag if I wasn’t so relieved to be outside.
“You’ll get used to the smell,” Lochlan says from my side.
“It doesn’t bother me,” I lie, not wanting him to change his mind about the visit. “My parents took me to visit the slums once. I think I told you about it.” I glance around, my heart breaking just like it did all those years ago for the suffering. “This is nothing.”
I can still remember the way my parents held handkerchiefs to their noses, terrified they might catch a disease, and the absolute terror on my mother’s face when a child grabbed the bottom of her dress, begging for food. I’ll never forget the way a guard kicked the child off before my mother dragged me back into the carriage.
“Plus, we were like this,” I say, looking up at Lochlan. “Not too long ago.”
“It’s why I wanted to visit. Help where I can, you know?”
I smile and press my head against his shoulder, letting him know that I understand. I just wish I had the means to help. I feel as powerless as I did when I was little.
