Page 35 of Brought to Light
“Fuck off, Oskar,” I rasped out, my throat feeling like I’d swallowed a bucket of sand. “No such luck.” Lady Lisandra frowned down at me. Shit. I had the manners of a—well, a soldier-turned-hitman with no female relatives. “Sorry, uh, ma’am. Ma’ams.” Linden’s mother. Fuck. Way to meet the parent.
“Callum,” Linden said softly. “I thought you were dying. You’ve been unconscious for half an hour.”
Took more than a magic hand grenade to kill me, apparently. I could feel my whole body now, and it wasn’t too bad, actually. A little like that one time I’d been dosed with ecstasy in a club, only not as fun. Similar tingles, but not in the same pleasant places.
“Nah.” I shoved myself up onto my other elbow, since I wasn’t letting go of Linden’s hand for anything. He looked down at the floor, his cheeks flushing. Fuck. What was I supposed to say to him, in front of all these people? I wasn’t even sure what Iwantedto say. I knew what I wanted to do: carry him off somewhere and bury my face in his hair and breathe him in like some kind of freak. Feel his slim body all wrapped up in my arms. Taste him. Not the time, not the place, and I couldn’t seem to find a middle ground between all of that and ‘Nah.’ I looked up at Oskar. “Help me up, big guy?”
Between Oskar’s tugging and Linden’s petting, I got to my feet. The giant room stood empty except for the six of us. Empty of anyone alive, at least. Evalt and the weird woman who’d screamed like a banshee still lay on the ground. Shreds of them, anyway. But all the soldiers had gone.
“Where is everyone? Lady—Lisandra, right?” She nodded. “Evalt’s soldiers. And your people, your household. What happened?”
“The compulsion broke when you killed Evalt, Lord Callum,” Lady Lisandra said. Wait, lordwhat? What the fuck? “Some of their minds broke with it. They have been removed while we separate the wheat from the chaff. Some were guilty men before Evalt changed them. Others were not.” She shrugged. “My household is well, thanks to you. They were prisoners, but have now been freed.”
“I’m glad to hear it. I’m not a lord, by the way. Just Callum.”
“You bested Evalt in single combat, Lord Callum,” Lady Lisandra said with way, way too much fucking casualness. “His lands and title are yours by right. May you enjoy them in good health.” Lands and title? Oh, what the fuck, for real. “For now, you are my honored guest, and you honor me by accepting my humble hospitality. Linden, perhaps you will show Lord Callum to the blue suite and see to it that he is given all attentions. Lord Callum, I will speak with you later this evening, as I’m sure you have many questions, as do I. Boys, you may supervise the cleaning of this mess on my floor before you see to Evalt’s men. Silvi, will you assist me with the wounded?”
Linden’s mother—Silvi, apparently—shot me a very, very suspicious look, the kind that promised future bodily harm if necessary, glanced pointedly at where I still held Linden’s hand, and then kissed Linden’s cheek and followed Lady Lisandra as she swept away out of the room.
I stared after Lady Lisandra. She and that woman who’d hired me to kill her neighbor needed to have coffee together sometime. Or maybe not. They’d probably plot world domination by the second donut.
A glance at Oskar and Kaspar showed me matching sullen frowns. “Boys?”
Kaspar grimaced. “She’s our cousin. Older cousin.”
“On two different sides of the family,” Oskar put in with what seemed like a little too much emphasis. “She is my cousin, and she is Kaspar’s cousin.Weare not cousins.”
Well, wasn’t that interesting. At another time I’d have kept pushing, just for the pleasure of watching Oskar squirm. But I had other fish to fry, like getting Linden alone as soon as humanly—or maybe not-humanly—possible. His silence had started to worry me. Did he still think I’d taken off without giving a fuck about him? Did he think I’d had a change of heart along the way, or remembered Evalt had to die to ensure my own safety too? If Evalt had lived, even if I’d escaped I’d have been stranded here, with no allies and nowhere to go. Did he think I’d been selfish to hide when he was captured and then selfish again when I came back?
That might not be completely out of character for me, granted. But I hadn’t been thinking about anything but him, and it stung that he’d believe the worst of me, even if he had every reason to. Especially if he had every reason to.
He hadn’t let go of my hand. That was something.
Right as that passed through my mind, he let go of my hand, shifting away from me at the same time to put a respectable amount of distance between us.
Well, fuck.
“Okay, not-cousins,” I said, trying for lightly sarcastic and hitting heavy and grim. “Get to work. You have a floor to clean. Linden, can we…?”
His cheeks red and his eyes downcast, Linden nodded and led the way.
He didn’t look at me or speak to me the whole way up to the room I’d been given. A long hall, and then a wide, twisting staircase, and then another long hall lined with portraits of people in bizarre clothing, and the whole way he kept his eyes fixed firmly ahead of us.
At last he opened a door and stepped inside, keeping a hand on the knob and staying well out of my way while I followed. He hovered there, not making any move to close the door behind us. I glanced around. Huge bed, blue wall hangings, lots of things trimmed with gold. Not my usual digs.
“I’ll leave you to rest, Lord Callum,” Linden said quietly while I stood there gaping at my surroundings.
And then the little fucker tried to make a break for it.
Which was not fucking happening. That or the ‘Lord Callum’ bullshit. I took his wrist in a firm grip and removed his hand from the door, and then shut the door myself. I twisted the key in the lock for good measure.
Linden finally looked up at me, his lips turned down and his eyes watery. God, fuck this. I’d saved his life and killed his mortal enemy so he wouldn’t have to be afraid, or upset, or unhappy. That smile he’d given me when I woke up…it really had been like pure sunshine. I hadn’t realized until then how dimmed he’d been ever since I’d known him.
And he’d still sucked me in, still taken my breath away. I knew that if he really did go back to normal, if he shone as brightly as he naturally should, I’d be lost. Utterly fucked.
It didn’t matter. I’d deal with that. Linden shouldn’t look like this.
“Everyone’s alive,” I said. “Everyone who should be alive, anyway. Your mom’s safe. We all survived. So all I can think is that I’ve done something wrong. You need to tell me what it is, so I can fix it.” Fuck, what if I’d hurt him the night before? What if he’d come out of all the adrenaline and worry and figured out he hadn’t really wanted me after all? “If you need me to fuck off, I will.”
