Page 51 of Untempered
At the top of the spire, my mother’s old room had been cleaned but left completely bare.
We sat, my first morning there in perhaps two decades. Just Isolde and I, breathing in unison, emptying our minds, sitting in the chill of early morning and sharing the quiet. Mayhap I should’ve felt some sort of connection with my mother, but it was just a big, empty room. I listened for her, but she wasn’t here.
Instead, it was Isolde’s breath I heard.
When my mentor stood, we trained. Stretching, strengthening, drilling hand-to-hand combat skills. We were silent, not out of need now, but out of long habit born of secrecy. She’d taught me to make my fighting stance my everyday stance, and I saw no need to break that now. Better to keep the habit of minimizing noise. It might be critical, one day.
By the time we went down for breakfast Chay had been replaced by Thomas. Isolde left to gather information, and I settled in with my books.
When Isolde returned, it was to tell me that Luca was gone. She knew more. I couldseeshe did.
“What else?” I asked as she paced across the worn rug.
“Too much is happening,” she said, frowning. “Wecouldget out in the darkness and get lost in the chaos.” The idea made terror rush through me like the cold winter wind, and I shuddered in on myself. “But waiting until your father is over the Brannough is a fair option.”
Before I could question further, a knock at the door interrupted us. Mortemon walked in with a crisp bow. “My lady, I’ve come to accompany you to care for your horse. I understand you usually do this later in the day, but it suits to do it now.”
It suitswhom?But I smiled at him, hearing Chay come jangling up behind him. A lump formed in my throat at the sound of the knight’s belt loops and scabbard.
Everything about this was unnatural. The setting. The company. The way this was unfolding around us. It wasn’t how it was supposed to happen.
I was accompanied to the stables not by just two, butthreeBlackguard. When I went to Storm’s stall, I saw Chay veer toward his horse, only to be stopped by Mortemon’s hard hand on his shoulder and a, “You have one job when you’re in the tabard.” Isolde lifted a brow.
Chay was being taught the ropes, and not, I noticed, by Thomas. It made sense because Thomas was new to the station, but it still seemed strange to see the man with more gray than brown in his hair deferring to the younger, whipcord-lean Mortemon.
Restless, I tried to focus on Storm, but didn’t get the pleasure I usually would from her company. I drew the weighted coins Luca had given me and rolled them around in my palm, but they didn’t change the feeling of too many eyes on me. I went from the stables to the library, not caring that I was covered in horse hair, and took out a pile of tomes on the South. All were written by Arcanloc scholars, of course. Anything else would have been censored or just burned. It was something, though, and it gave me a purpose while Isolde vanished to find out whatever it was she needed to know.
While I read the one-sided information about past uprisings and rolled the weighted coins in my fingers, all I could think of was the ferocity of the woman I’d fought.
They knew what they were up against. They knew the price. And yet they still tried.
I hoped, for their sakes, that their resourcefulness matched their courage.
When Chay came in that evening, he brought with him the smell of the autumn orchards and a small, folded note from Luca. He waved it at me, tossed it onto the chessboard, and walked out.
He’d seen me. I’d felt it in the orchard, but I hadn’t really trusted it. But in the city, when the world had been whirling, and my heart had been racing, he’d pressed the knife into my hand. And he’d seen me. Just for a moment. I was sure of it. He’d seen me the way no one else had, and still, he didn’t care about me. Not beyond his oath.He doesn’t have to.
No one hadto give a single Wife-paling cuss about another person.
But, if I desired his care, was that so strange?
The letter held no real information except confirmation that Luca was thinking of me. How was I supposed to feel? How should I respond? The parchment in my hand felt flimsy, the indentation of Luca's pointless words light on its surface. The night we'd met, he'd had me stand on his feet to save me the humiliation of not knowing the dance steps, and the gratitude I'd felt hadn't faded in the decade that had passed. That was Luca. Kind, thoughtful. Willing to help me within the locways but not willing to challenge them.
The parchment balled in my hands. I didn't know what my future held, but I wasn't sitting around waiting for him to contact me.
"I want to roll," I told Isolde, standing, book falling from my lap. Impatiently, I picked up the book, setting it aside.
Her brows arched. "Let's roll, then."
It was that simple because she made it so, and I did, too. I went up the half-remembered steps of the tower that had been my mother's, anger simmering in my belly, in my bones, to combat the helplessness, that childish gratitude that Luca evoked.
He hadn't refused to dance. Hadn't pointed out it was unfair. No, he'd smiled and whispered about secrets we could share. And that was Luca. That was all I could expect from anyone. All I could hope for.
I tossed my skirts aside. They just got in the way. The woolen tights and the shirt held snug by the war belt at my waist were protection enough against the cold.
Isolde didn't ask why. Her feral smile was full of glee, shared challenge, and frustration. She offered me her empty hand, her bare feet perfectly balanced on the stone.
I tapped her hand.Fight, begin. And I didn't waste time circling, looking for openings. I launched myself at her, held that anger in check as I'd been taught. A power source, yes, but not a guide. My legs locked around her waist, and she held us both up, fighting to get one of my knees free. I locked my arms around her, and in response, she took me down, hard. The anger in my bones rattled and roared. I clamped down on it and on her when she tried to make some space. I took a chance and bridged, sending her tumbling. Before I could follow up and press the advantage my weight and height gave me, I felt her grab my foot and instead was forced to defend against her ankle lock.
