Page 76 of The Scholar's Key
Noah began to walk backwards away from them.
“Rowley, where are you going?” Ashford asked.
“There is something I have to do,” he said. “And I have to do it now.”
And with that, he turned and sprinted away, out the doors that Cassandra had exited.
He did know what he had to do – he just had no idea how he was going to do it.
CHAPTER27
Noah ran out to the gardens through the terrace doors, his head swiveling one way and the next as he searched for Percy. Finally, he saw the glint of her hair when the sun kissed it, across the gardens as she was still moving, toward the lake on the other side.
He took off at a run as fast as he could, not stopping to consider what he was going to say when he caught her. All he knew was that he needed to get to her now.
“Percy!” he called out, but she was too far away to hear him. He rounded the rather unkempt gardens now, seeing that she was making for the lake in the distance. He wondered if she had any idea where she was going or why, but wherever her direction, he would follow.
She finally stopped, her shoulders rising and falling so dramatically that he knew she was either out of breath or upset, standing at the edge of the lake, her arms crossed around herself as she stared out at the water.
Noah was so focused on her that he missed the tree root in front of him, and when his toe hit the edge, he went flying down the bank of the lake, his shoulder hitting the ground as he rolled right into the shallow water.
“Noah!”
He spit water and seaweed out of his mouth as he looked up at Percy, who was staring at him from the bank with her mouth open in shock.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes,” he muttered as he got to his feet, shaking his head like a dog, Percy taking a step backward to prevent getting soaked.
“What are you doing?” she asked, her hands dropping into fists at her side. “Why are you here? Why are you chasing me? Why will you not just leave me alone?”
Noah sighed as he pushed his wet hair back away from his forehead, sliding off his spectacles to attempt to dry them. He removed his jacket and set it on the ground, searching for dry linen beneath, and finally, Percy took pity on him.
“Here,” she said impatiently, holding her hand out, and he passed her the glasses, which she surprisingly gently rubbed dry on her skirts and then passed back to him.
He set them on his nose, before holding out his hand to her. “Will you sit with me?”
“No,” she said stubbornly, and he couldn’t fault her for it.
“I made a mistake,” he said, lifting his arms to the side, deciding it was best to be honest. “Make that two mistakes.”
He saw the glimmer in her eye as she was, apparently, at least interested in what he had to say.
“I pushed you away,” he said. “That was the first. The second was not listening to you.”
“I’d saythatwas your first mistake,” she said, crossing her arms again.
“Very well. That was the first,” he said, stepping toward her, taking a deep breath, speaking in halting tones. “I have learned my lesson, Percy. I thought that I was preventing both of us from a future where we would be unhappy, but I was wrong. I heard of an engagement in your family and when I assumed it was that of you and Lord Stephen, I realized that accepting a man who you wouldn’t have chosen for yourself was what would lead to a lifetime in which neither of us was happy. And I had pushed you to it. It was stupid. I was stupid. I was protecting myself from being hurt again. I was worried that you didn’t want me for who I truly was, but even if I have to be the man you want me to be and not myself, then it would be better than being without you.”
Her face fell at that, as she listened to him earnestly, and she walked over and took his hands in hers.
“You are still wrong.”
That wasn’t what he was expecting.
“I am?”
“Yes,” she said, her lips slightly curling upward. “It is not that I do not want you for the man you are. Yes, we changed your look and practiced flirtation, but I told you, that only caused me to notice you. It didn’t change who you truly are, and you can look however you want, I do not care. I just want you. The man who has shown me what it means to be cherished, and treasured, who has allowed me to be myself and has welcomed my faults and allowed me to choose my own path. And if you will accept it, then I chooseyou, Noah Rowley. I said no to Lord Stephen. If I cannot have the man that I love, then I will have no man at all.”
