Page 54 of Her Shadow so Dark and Lovely
It’s so much easier to lie with my hands than my tongue. Not that I think he believes me for a second. He watches me for another long moment.
“Very well. That’s all I came to say. Please pass it along to Librarian Sila.” He sets his cup down.
I’m sorry.
Mercias narrows his eyes at me. “About Elris?”
I nod.
“Don’t be,” he says. “I’ll take care to distract him well enough.”
And with that, he takes his leave. I stare into the depths of my cup, turning Mercias’ words over in my head. I’d been so focused on Sila’s mention of her tether, been so concerned with her brush with death, that I’d forgotten her other declarations. Her demand to take my place, her insistence that she had already put me above all others, her oath to protect me, and I know, with bone-aching certainty that there is no world in which Sila allows me to go without her. Just as Mercias takes his punishments for loving Elris, Sila would bear even death for me. She wouldn’t have it any other way.
Tentative fingers thread through my hair, as soft and gentle as ever. I tip my head back to look at her, freshly bathed. Fully dressed again. Her smile is soft and a little regretful.
“I think it is time that you and I had a talk, don’t you?”
Chapter 32
Lorel
Sila’s fingerslet my hair fall away, and she moves around the table to take up Mercias’ vacated seat. She gives his cup a look and pushes it aside.
“What news did Mercias bring?” she asks. She’s circling. Trying to find steady ground again after I had upset her neat footwork with my panic.
He has informed the Head Librarian of the altercation, and the bodies have been removed. The Lightkeepers have been returned to the Keep.
Sila hisses. “Far better than they deserve. I should have liked to have them nailed to the front door.”
They would take that poorly.
It’s an understatement of the worst kind. They would seek blood for blood, and blame the Library for starting a faction war. It would not end well.
“They should consider themselves lucky that we have not taken their assault so,” Sila says, dark eyes blazing. She tears her eyes away from me, her shoulders shuddering as she masters her anger. The shadows curl at the edges of my vision. Sila takes adeep breath, turning back to me. “Sorry, little mouse, I’m getting carried away again.”
I’m sorry I ran away.
There is the barest twitch of her eyebrows. “You have nothing to apologise for, Lorel. Nothing needs to happen that you do not want to happen.”
I stare down at my hands, all I have to try and explain myself.
There is only one thing that I don’t want to happen. I never want to see you dying in my arms again. I could not bear it. Never mind the Heart’s binding, I know you want me to leave. I know I cannot let you come with me, even though I know I cannot stop you. I don’t know what I’ve done to deserve you, and it is tearing me apart to think I cannot have you. To know that it would tear me apart even more so if I did. Because I should leave you, and you should let me go.
Sila watches my hands, intent, eyes intent on my face when they still. Her expression is soft, and so lovely, and I could cut myself to pieces on it.
“Oh Lorel, how can you not know yet? I would follow you even into death. I already have. When I did not press my blade into your chest and still your heart, I chose. You cannot condemn me. I have already done that myself.”
My heart. My breath. My thoughts. The very blood in my veins. All of it stops, for a moment. All of it catches on the thought that Sila wants to keep me, forever. That I am not just a passing thought or amusement to be thrown aside. That long before I had even truly noticed her, she had already given everything up for me.
And I cannot save her. Leaving her will not save her. Denying myself will not save her. I had been entirely foolish to think that I could. There is little that Sila would let stand in her way. And now, there is little left standing in my way.
Sila smiles at me, dark-eyed, from across the table. “Now that’s a promising look,” she says.
I shouldn’t.
Dawn King have mercy on me, Iwill. To hell with the rules.
Will you take me to your bed?
