Page 12 of Crown of Storm and Silence
A bandit charges him from behind, thinking to catch him unaware, but Sinan spins with impossible grace, his blade coming up to catch his attacker's sword in a move that sends vibrations through both weapons. He follows through with a pommel strike to the man's temple that drops him unconscious to the cobblestones.
"Behind you!" I shout as I spot another bandit circling wide around the fountain, approaching from Sinan's blind side. From my position near the cottage steps, I have a clear view of the entire square while Sinan is focused on his immediate opponent.
Sinan acknowledges my warning with a brief nod, ducking under a wild swing and responding with a thrust that takes his opponent in the shoulder, disabling rather than killing. Even in the heat of battle, his strikes are precise and controlled, ending threats without unnecessary brutality.
The fight ends almost as quickly as it began. Seven bandits lie scattered across the village square, three dead, four unconscious or wounded too badly to continue fighting. Two others manage to reach their horses and flee, clearly having decided that this particular village offers more resistance than expected.
Sinan stands in the center of the carnage, barely breathing hard, his sword already cleaned and sheathed with movements so practiced they seem automatic. But as he turns toward me, I see the gentleness return to his features like a mask sliding back into place, transforming him once again into the kind traveler I thought I knew.
"Are you hurt?" he asks, approaching with careful steps as if I might bolt like a startled deer. His storm-gray eyes scan me from head to toe, cataloguing potential injuries with the thoroughness of someone who's done battlefield assessments before.
"I'm fine," I manage, though my voice sounds strange even to my ears. "But you... that was..."
"Necessary," he finishes quietly, and there's something in his tone that suggests this conversation has layers I'm not equipped to navigate.
The villagers begin emerging from their hiding places like cautious rabbits testing the safety of an open field. Some tend to the wounded bandits left behind with the grudging competence of people who know that even criminals deserve basic medical care. Others gather around Sinan with expressions of awe and gratitude that make him visibly uncomfortable.
"Thank you," says Master Henrik, the village blacksmith, clasping Sinan's shoulder with one massive hand. "Without your intervention..."
"Any man would have done the same," Sinan replies, but I can see the discomfort in his posture, the way he deflects praise like it burns him.
As the crowd disperses to deal with the aftermath of the attack, Sinan finds his way to my side with movements that seem both casual and deliberate. There's something different about him now, something that goes beyond the revelation of his fighting skills. He looks at me with an intensity that makes my pulse quicken for reasons I can't identify.
"Walk with me?" he asks, offering his arm with old-fashioned courtesy.
I find myself nodding before I can think better of it, my hand settling into the crook of his elbow as naturally as breathing. We walk toward the edge of the village, away from the cleanup and the lingering smell of blood on cobblestones.
"You're not really a merchant," I say when we're far enough from curious ears.
"No," he admits without hesitation. "I'm not."
"Then what are you?"
His jaw tightens almost imperceptibly, and for a moment I catch something dangerous flickering behind his eyes—something that speaks of violence barely held in check. When he finally speaks, his voice is low, controlled. "Someone who's killed for far less precious things than what stands before me now."
The admission should terrify me. Instead, it makes something flutter deep in my chest, a warmth that has nothing to do with the healing power that lives in my hands. There's protection in his words, a promise wrapped in threat. But alongside the flutter comes something else—a wrongness that Ican't explain, as if accepting his attention would be a betrayal of someone important.
Someone I can't remember.
"Elif." He says my name like he's tasting something sacred, his voice roughened by emotions he's clearly unused to expressing. "These past days, watching you…it’s changed something in me I thought was long dead."
We've stopped walking without my realizing it, standing now beneath an old oak tree at the village's edge. The late morning sun filters through the leaves above us, casting dancing patterns of light and shadow across his scarred hands and the hard line of his jaw. He's handsome in the way a blade is handsome—sharp, dangerous, beautiful. But there's something else drawing me to him, something in the way he looks at me like I'm both salvation and damnation wrapped in mortal flesh.
"I've done things," he says, his voice carrying the weight of old sins, "that would make you run if you knew. But watching you heal people, seeing the light that lives in your hands..." He pauses, his dark eyes searching my face. "You make me want to be the man I was before the world broke me."
His admission hangs in the air between us, heavy with unspoken truths. Then his expression shifts, becomes almost vulnerable. "Let me protect you. Both of you." His gaze drops meaningfully to my belly. "I've spent years taking life. Let me spend whatever time I have left preserving it."
The raw honesty in his words, the careful way he offers violence as protection rather than threat, should frighten me. Instead, tears spring to my eyes without warning.
This is what I should want, isn't it? A dangerous man made gentle by love, offering to shield a child that isn't his from whatever darkness hunts us. Sinan represents safety wrapped in steel, a future where predators would think twice beforeapproaching. His very presence speaks of battles fought and won, of strength earned through suffering.
So why does accepting his protection feel like the worst betrayal imaginable?
"I..." I begin, then stop, not knowing how to voice the conflict tearing me apart inside.
"You don't have to answer now," he says, but there's something in his tone—not quite command, but expectation, as if he's used to getting what he wants, one way or another. "But know this—I don't make offers lightly. And I don't abandon what's mine to protect."
He steps closer, and I catch the scent of him—leather and steel and something darker, more primal. When he reaches up to cup my face in his palm, his touch is careful despite the calluses that speak of weapons and violence. His thumb traces my cheekbone with reverent care, as if memorizing the feel of me.
