Page 54 of Jeweler to the Blessed
I didn’t think he’d ever used my real name. He spoke it hesitantly now. Which made no sense as I pulled my gaze from his and scanned the side street.
What happened to the last man who’d attacked me? The question in Hart’s gaze was the same as mine.
Six bodies lay between where he stood and where I was now. The seventh was the man he’d stabbed at my feet. I glanced south. Those who had stood there, ran. I couldn’t blame them. Turning, Hart still appraised me. His left hand lifted like he’d reach for me. Maybe in reassurance? Either way, I flinched on instinct, my body pressing against the stone wall. He tilted his head and looked to the sky, his eyes closing.
He looked longingly after those fleeing down the side street like they were a treat he couldn’t wait to consume. “Let’s get you back to the castle.”
“No.” Finally, I found my voice.
I stopped shaking as I realized the danger was gone. Hart had stopped them. Something had happened to the last man who’d touched me—I still didn’t know what—but the overwhelming fear that had overtaken me dissolved. I wouldn’t goback to the castle and cower. There was too much I had to do today, and I had wasted too much time already.
“No?” Hart asked.
If anything, this attack proved how unprepared I was for my position. Apparently, I needed a guard, one that I trusted. I had to determine whether that was Hart.
“No.”
I couldn’t sit and stew on this. Those had to have been the Feared. Hart had saved me—again. I didn’t know what more I could expect from him. He may be in league with them to take down the Blessed, but as I surveyed the bodies on the ground again, he was clearly opposed to letting them take me. I needed to know why. We needed to talk about the ring, and I needed to go through Alaric’s things.
“Take me back to Alaric’s workshop. Please.”
His nostrils flared like he’d prefer any other request. He knelt and wiped his blade on the body before us—the body that had fallen before Hart had even touched it. The one he still looked at with suspicion, or maybe that was how he looked at me.
The sound of metal sliding into his hip sheath drew my gaze. “As you wish, Chaos.”
18
I don’t want her to go, but I worry he knows she’s here.
— ALARIC SARE’S LETTERS TO ISABELLE ARKOVA
As we entered the workshop, I ignored Hart to the best of my ability. Coffee would help. I slipped behind the curtain to start the fire and fill a pot with water. My awareness of him, while he paced back and forth in the front, made me uncomfortable. He was like a caged animal deciding whether to remind his captors of what made him wild.
Whatever internal struggle Hart was fighting, he lost it.
He pushed the gold curtain back, entering the workshop space. “I gave you one instruction.”
That couldn’t have been true. He had given me plenty of instructions. I crossed my arms over my chest,then paused, remembering the stolen ring. I needed easy access to my dagger. My hand hung at my side, and I grazed where my blade rested beneath my skirt.
Hart’s gaze tracked the movement. He crossed his muscled arms over his chest as if to prove he had no interest in reaching for me. “Back to thinking I’m going to take from you, then?”
“I don’t know what to think of you.”
His brow pinched. “What does that mean?”
I pulled Alaric’s design book from my bag and opened it to the page detailing the enhancement design. “Why did you have this on your hand only days ago?”
For a moment, I thought he wouldn’t look. Our gazes locked.
He pulled his hand down his face and looked at the page I pointed to. “I can explain.”
“Can you?”
I wasn’t sure where my confidence came from. If he tried to attack me, he would most certainly win.
“I stole it for the Feared.”
My hand dropped behind me, hoping the stool was where I thought it was before I fell onto it. He’d admitted it. I should be happy. Mostly, I was scared.
