Page 16 of Shadows and Flames
But he let go of Nogón and doubled his hold on me. He stared with wide eyes and his red curls bouncing around his brow. “Will…” his lip started quivering, eyes swimming, but a shuffling of passersby at the top of the hall pulled him out of the emotions about to brim over, thank godyx. He cleared his throat and dropped his hands to clutch at his front. “Will I be able to see and speak with you?”
Why in the world was he asking me? I scoffed, “Lad, this is The Shadow Well, not a prison. Keep up your training, take no shit, and you’ll be fine.”
An elbow caught me in the middle of my spine, and I glared over my shoulder. My brother’s expression was impassive, aside from that damned brow I wanted to pluck clean out of his skin.
I huffed and swiveled back to the newest Shadow-in-training, should everything go well. “We’ll be in and out, what with contracts and travels. But one of us is usually around. And quiteliterally anyone else here should help you, what with the oaths of kinship and all that.”
He continued staring at me for a few more beats before thanking Nor and Elián. And after one last look at us, he followed Briar into his new room, his new home.
As we walked back up the hall, Noruh cut a glance at me. “Marco seems to be quite taken with you, Tom.” I grunted, taking a note from my silent brother to my right. In unspoken agreement, we ascended to the Masters’ level of the Well. Activity quieted, and we passed bedrooms, vacant as their occupants were elsewhere.
The large windows of Noruh’s overlooked a cloak of misty fog hanging over the deep green forest surrounding the Well. I remembered the day she’d selected this one, admitting shyly to me that it reminded her of home in the Trylan mountains. I sank onto the cushion and mounds of pillows set against the glass.
“How long do you think it will take the boy to start calling you Papa?” My eyes sprang open to glare at her across the room. Noruh leaned against the door while Elián sat before the unlit hearth to my right. He didn’t even try to hide the snort at our sister’s comment.
“Hush.” I wiggled my road-dusty body into the clean fabric. “There will be no such thing.”
“Not sure, Tom. He’s imprinted on you like a newly hatched chick.”
“I didn’t ask for that!” My head began to pound at the thought. “It wasn’t even my idea to make a Shadow out of the boy. He knewthis one,” I pointed at Elián, “and pouted until he got us both to agree. Never in my immortal life will I want some brat to worry about.”
Noruh tsked and sat on the ornate carpet between my brother and me. She could be a pain in my rear, but Nor hadfantastic taste. “Your aversion to responsibility is unbecoming of someone of your advanced age.”
“Just because I don’t want to adopt a child, informally or otherwise, does not mean I am afraid of commitment. I’ve been loyal to you lot for centuries. Now, if you don’t want my muddy boots on your furniture, stop pestering me.”
“And what about you?” She directed her words to Elián, blonde hair brushing across her shoulders. “Are you prepared for the commitment of sponsoring an acolyte? You don’t seem the type to drop him off and leave him be.”
My brother rested his ankle on his thigh, elbow propped on the arm of his seat. He appeared stoic, pensive, but the twitch of his lip wasn’t fucking fooling me. “I do not share Tom’s reservations.”
A familiar few beats of silence coursed around us, wherein I planned the rest of my evening. A fragrant bath in my quarters, supper in the common room before prowling for someone to relieve the fucking tension in my shoulders.
Noruh broke through my reverie with a hesitant whisper. “And your queen?”
So much for daydreaming.
The hint of amusement on Elián’s face disappeared in an instant, and the stoney despair fell back into place. He’d had something to focus on while we traveled across the continent to get the lad here. While he answered a litany of questions or concentrated on the path home.
What were we to do now? “We did not find her.” His voice pressed flat the agony that I knew tore at his heart. On second thought, I would spend the evening with him, ensuring that he didn’t get lost to his sorrows. His tendency to drown it in silence or the bottle wasn’t happening under my watch.
Nor looked to me, blue-green stare asking for help, but I didn’t have any words that would make this better forhim. When he’d lost his mother, he’d leaned on Leandro and Emmett. When he’d lostthem,it wasdecadesof this. Even now, their deaths had changed something vital about him. Holding everyone else at arm’s-length, even Nor and me.
“So we go and look again. And again.”
Elián’s gaze searched me while my body frozen in disbelief. I was even shocked at myself for including the ‘we.’
My plans for the next… forever, were to take contracts, shed blood, fuck, and do what I wanted. All that could still be done while searching for this female who had his heart.
Nogón nodded swiftly. “Will you watch over Marco when we are not here?” he asked Noruh as she drummed her fingers along her silk rug. A hawk flew over the treetops outside, gliding past the window in silky arcs before diving into the branches.
“Yes. And I’ll draft a message to send to the others who are away so that we can make this vote quickly. The sooner he’s given his grays, the sooner you will be able to resume your search.”
“That is, if Varus doesn’t try to put a stop to it,” I grumbled, and Elián grunted in agreement. We were technically equals, but the old male never did like us.
Noruh stood, running a hand through her hair. “I’ll personally vouch for the boy as well. Hopefully that will ensure things go smoothly?—”
“Or maybe put a target on his back,” my brother groused. It was sudden, the change in tone with the subject of the Elders, but not without merit. Nogón’s punishment for killing Jones was utter hogwash, but at least it’d given him time to sober up some.
“I won’t let that happen. Trenton and Yara have always been friendly, and the rest are reasonable. It’ll be fine.”
