Page 46 of Unrivaled
I reached for the protection rage and got hold of it, clasping Luca in a quick hug before stepping back.Chay was watching still.I pretended I couldn’t see him from the corner of my eye.
Luca had been sendinghima note.Why had he pushedmeaway because of it?
“What were casualties in La’Rea?”I asked Luca.
“We lost one in seven,” he said.Sympathy tugged at me.Trust Luca to be so ready with an answer to my question, one that was both simple and accurate.“I heard it’s much higher here.”
“We can’t do a proper count,” I admitted, and suddenly that overwhelmed me.“But everyone fits in the keep now.We don’t need a city, Luca.”
The pity grew.He made a soft, comforting noise and spread his arms wide.
I folded myself into Luca as I’d done as a child.He smelled like snow, pine, and dusty libraries.The fury hemorrhaged.I felt the tears rising.
I should’ve been able to trust Luca.
I should’ve been able to trust Chay, too.
I swallowed the tears, getting hold of the grief, too, pulling it back into my chest and breathing through it.
“What are you doing here?”I asked when I could trust my voice.
“I needed to see you.”He closed his hands over mine.“I heard you were alive, but hearing it and seeing it…and with the situation being so grim…”
“That’s a three-week ride on a ’Ban horse,” Chay said, from the other side of the room.“You must’ve been busy.”
Rage washed through me.I saw the shock on Luca’s face before I crushed my own response to Chay’s comment.
He had no right.
I squeezed Luca’s hands before I withdrew from his grip, trying to smile reassuringly around the tightness in my muscles and the harsh truths in my gullet.“Well, the situationisgrim,” I agreed.“We can survive for now, but the damage to trade—” I was the epitome of poise.They’d never even know how angry I was.Not until they were weeping for mercy.“I’m shoring up what I can, but I’m afraid we’re going to see a huge shift in quality of life for the people of La’Angi.Our industry could take decades to recover from this.”
“Your industry?”he was frowning.“Surely, population will improve when people migrate from the lesser-touched areas?”
“They might, if we had work.”I went to pour him a drink, only to find the pot of tisane empty.Just like me.“You didn’t come to listen to me talk about trade.”
“No, I didn’t,” he agreed, looking puzzled.“Whyareyou?”
“Because someone else ought to be doing it?Is that what you mean?”I asked him, enjoying the taste of the venom that dripped from the words.
His expression had shifted.“Yes.”
I held up a finger.“Firstly, they’re all dead.”I lifted another.“Secondly, the ones who are alive aren’t doing things correctly.”I lifted another.“Thirdly, it’s my Son-sprung city, Luca, whyshouldn’tI?”
He blinked, then gently took my outstretched hand in his, a frown between his brows.“I…suppose.You could’ve asked me for help.”
“What a brilliant idea.I wish I’d done exactly thatmore than a dozen timeswhen Ibegged for any assistance.The extent of your generosity so far has been a note about the Head Steward being alive you didn’t even send tome?”I took my hand back with a twist and saw the way Luca’s eyes flickered guiltily to Chay.Furious, I walked out from behind my desk to put space between us.“I’m not taking a beating from my father because you decided to check on me in person, Luca,” I said, without thinking about it.“You need to go.”
His mouth opened, then closed.I saw his attention skim quickly to Chayagainbefore he paid attention to me.Me, who he was apparently here to see.I don’t know what Chay thought there was between Luca and I.The man was nothing to me.
“You’ve changed,” Luca said.
“Why did you look at him before you noticed that?”I asked him, going to the fireplace to stir up the nigh-dead coals.“Mayhap the change is due less to his proximity to my person and more to the dead I’ve had to step over to help the living?”I didn’t need Isolde to be present to feel her approval.It tempered the steel in my spine.
Luca stood, hands outstretched in a gesture of peace.“Slow down, Audrey.I’m working on limited information here.”
“That’s new for you?”I asked, but resisted feigning shock to make those words crueler than they already were.
“It is, yes.”He looked at me like I’d just kicked the puppy who’d run back to him.I waited for his reprimand.
