Page 35 of The Queen's Huntsman
“In the tree?”
“Yes… though neither of us were actually in the tree,” he explained. “It was only an illusion—aglamour.” He must have sensed her confusion because he lifted both brows. “Let me put it another way:Howdidyouknow it was me?”
“Because…”
Gwendolyn tried to remember when exactly that she’d realized it was him, but, truly, she’d understood it from the first—even before Loc’s hound came sniffing… certainly before Málik had whispered into her ear.
“In order to include you in myglamour, myanamabsorbs yours. For this interim, we are one,” he explained. “Like the trees. All that transpired before… I may perceive… as clearly as though it happened to me. Do you understand?” he asked again.
Gwendolyn blinked. “So… now you know… everything?” She didn’t know if it was wonder or mortification that made her voice sound so small.
“Everything you know I may know,” he said, with a nod, and for a long, uncomfortable moment, silence fell over the woodlands.
“I cannot lie,” he said. “I went searching for Loc tonight.”
In the shadows, his hand slid to his dagger. “I regret no choice I’ve ever made, save one. But here and now I will make you a promise, Gwendolyn…” A pinprick of blue flared in his eyes, like twin flames. “I spared him that day in your Dragon’s Lair. I spared him again whilst I held you in my arms by the tree. I’ll not make that mistake again.”
Gwendolyn blinked. All the while she’d been sitting here, cursing him, he’d been out there searching for Loc… intending to kill him?
Those weren’t the actions of a man who did not care for her, and some part of her thrilled over the revelation, even as it confused her. But then… quickly on the heels of this revelation came another, and this one shook her to her bones.
Málik knew everything.
Gods, oh gods, oh gods.
He’d been privy to her heart, and still he’d called her spoilt!
He knew what she felt for him—knew it, and still could not say the same.
He knew that too oft when she looked at him, she was staring with deepest longing at his mouth…Willing him to kiss her.
Remembering his taste.
Wishing for his love.
He understood how desperately she’d prayed for his return, how heartbroken she was when he did not come. He’d tasted her tears as though they were his own and knew how humiliated she was when Loc repudiated her before the marriage bed—how enraged she’d grown over the ensuing months, weltering in fury until it stole her breath and even her will.
Even now, he must have sensed her crippling doubts. Every fervent wish. Every fear. He knew every time she’d thought of him, and how long she’d dwelt upon his kiss. And he knew all this because of his enchantment—Fae magic that gave him admission to her most private thoughts. And so much as she wished to regret it, she couldn’t, because if he had not, she’d have taken her final breath against that oak, with Loc’s hound drooling on her toes.
I cannot change my actions,he’d said—nor do I wish to.
Had he to do it all over, he would do it again.
That admission stole any words she might have uttered. She laid down and turned away from him, snuggling under his cloak, grateful to have it so she could hide her ruby-red face.
Sleep came with difficulty.
ChapterFourteen
If yesterday the hob cake gave her too much energy, this morning Gwendolyn felt precisely the opposite. Already, she was bone-weary, and she had only just opened her eyes.
For so long she’d lain awake, trying in vain to sleep, alternating between feelings of hurt, fury, resentment and chagrin, fearing every indiscretion she ever committed must be etched irrevocably into Málik’s brain.Bloody, rotten elf.
Nay, that wasn’t a nice thing to say, and still she hoped he could read her mind, and just in case he could, she mentally called him every terrible epithet she’d ever heard slip from her father’s mouth—and then a few more.
Bleary-eyed, she rose at first light, and with no need to repair the camp, she returned Málik’s cloak, dumping it unceremoniously over his resting form.
He didn’t stir, but she knew he wasn’t sleeping.
