Queen of Shadows

  Aelin took them to a truly disreputable tavern a few blocks away. With impressive swagger and menace, she kicked out a couple of thieves sitting at a table in the back. They took one look at her weapons, at that utterly wicked suit of hers, and decided they liked having their organs inside their bodies.

  The three of them stayed at the taproom until last call, hooded so heavily they could hardly recognize one another, playing cards and refusing the many offers to join other players. They didn’t have money to waste on real games, so for currency they used some dried beans that Aedion sweet-talked the harried serving girl into bringing them.

  Nesryn barely spoke as she won round after round, which Aedion supposed was good, given that he hadn’t quite decided if he wanted to kill her for that arrow she’d fired. But Aelin asked her questions about her family’s bakery, about life for her parents on the Southern Continent, about her sister and her nieces and nephews. When at last they left the drinking hall, none of them having dared to get inebriated in public, and none of them too eager to go to sleep just yet, they meandered through the alleys of the slums.

  Aedion savored every step of freedom. He’d been locked in that cell for weeks. It had hit an old wound, one he hadn’t spoken about to Aelin or anyone else, though his highest-ranking warriors in the Bane knew, if only because they’d helped him exact his revenge years after the fact. Aedion was still brooding about it when they strode down a narrow, foggy alley, its dark stones silvered with the light of the moon peeking out above.

  He picked up the scrape of boots on stone before his companions did, his Fae ears catching the sound, and threw out an arm in front of Aelin and Nesryn, who froze with expert silence.

  He sniffed the air, but the stranger was downwind. So he listened.

  Just one person, judging from the near-silent footfalls that pierced through the wall of fog. Moving with a predator’s ease that made Aedion’s instincts rise to the forefront.

  Aedion palmed his fighting knives as the male’s scent hit him—unwashed, but with a hint of pine and snow. And then he smelled Aelin on the stranger, the scent complex and layered, woven into the male himself.

  The male emerged from the fog; tall—maybe taller than Aedion himself, if only by an inch—powerfully built, and heavily armed both above and beneath his pale gray surcoat and hood.

  Aelin took a step forward.

  One step, as if in a daze.

  She loosed a shuddering breath, and a small, whimpering noise came out of her—a sob.

  And then she was sprinting down the alley, flying as though the winds themselves pushed at her heels.

  She flung herself on the male, crashing into him hard enough that anyone else might have gone rocking back into the stone wall.

  But the male grabbed her to him, his massive arms wrapping around her tightly and lifting her up. Nesryn made to approach, but Aedion stopped her with a hand on her arm.

  Aelin was laughing as she cried, and the male was just holding her, his hooded head buried in her neck. As if he were breathing her in.

  “Who is that?” Nesryn asked.

  Aedion smiled. “Rowan.”

  CHAPTER

  28

  She was shaking from head to toe, and couldn’t stop crying, not as the full weight of missing Rowan crashed into her, the weight of these weeks alone. “How did you get here? How did you find me?” Aelin withdrew far enough to study the harsh face shadowed by his hood, the tattoo peeking out along the side of it, and the grim line of his smile.

  He was here, he was here, he was here.

  “You made it clear my kind wouldn’t be welcome on your continent,” he said. Even the sound of his voice was a balm and a blessing. “So I stowed away on a ship. You’d mentioned a home in the slums, so when I arrived this evening, I wandered until I picked up your scent.” He scanned her with a warrior’s unflinching assessment, his mouth tight. “You have a lot to tell me,” he said, and she nodded. Everything—she wanted to tell him everything. She gripped him harder, savoring the corded muscle of his forearms, the eternal strength of him. He brushed back a loose strand of her hair, his callused fingers scraping against her cheek in the lightest caress. The gentleness of it made her choke on another sob. “But you’re not hurt,” he said softly. “You’re safe?”

  She nodded again and buried her face in his chest. “I thought I gave you an order to stay in Wendlyn.”

  “I had my reasons, best spoken somewhere secure,” he said onto her hood. “Your friends at the fortress say hello, by the way. I think they miss having an extra scullery maid. Especially Luca—especially in the mornings.”

  She laughed, and squeezed him. He was here, and he wasn’t something she’d made up, some wild dream she’d had, and—

  “Why are you crying?” he asked, trying to push her back far enough to read her face again.

  But she held on to him, so fiercely she could feel the weapons beneath his clothes. It would all be fine, even if it went to hell, so long as he was here with her. “I’m crying,” she sniffled, “because you smell so rutting bad my eyes are watering.”

  Rowan let out a roar of laughter that made the vermin in the alley go silent. She at last pulled away, flashing a grin. “Bathing isn’t an option for a stowaway,” he said, releasing her only to flick her nose. She gave him a playful shove, but he glanced down the alley, where Nesryn and Aedion were waiting. He’d likely been monitoring every move they made. And if he had deemed them a true threat to her safety, they’d have been dead minutes ago. “Are you just going to make them stand there all night?”

  “Since when are you a stickler for manners?” She slung an arm around his waist, unwilling to let go of him lest he turn into wind and vanish. His casual arm around her shoulders was a glorious, solid weight as they approached the others.

  If Rowan fought Nesryn, or even Chaol, there would be no contest. But Aedion … She hadn’t seem him fight yet—and from the look her cousin was giving Rowan, despite all of his professed admiration, she wondered if Aedion was also wondering who’d emerge from that fight alive. Rowan stiffened a bit beneath her grip.

  Neither male broke their stare as they neared.

  Territorial nonsense.

  Aelin squeezed Rowan’s side hard enough that he hissed and pinched her shoulder right back. Fae warriors: invaluable in a fight—and raging pains in her ass at all other times. “Let’s get inside,” she said.

  Nesryn had retreated slightly to observe what was sure to be a battle of warrior-arrogance for the ages. “I’ll see you later,” the rebel said to none of them in particular, the corners of her mouth twitching upward before she headed off into the slums.

  Part of Aelin debated calling her back—the same part that had made her invite Nesryn along. The woman had seemed lonely, a bit adrift. But Faliq had no reason to stay. Not right now.

  Aedion fell into step in front of her and Rowan, silently leading the way back to the warehouse.

  Even through his layers of clothes and weapons, Rowan’s muscles were tense beneath her fingers as he monitored Rifthold. She debated asking him what, exactly, he picked up with those heightened senses, what layers of the city she might never know existed. She didn’t envy him his excellent sense of smell, not in the slums, at least. But it wasn’t the time or place to ask—not until they got to safety. Until she talked to him. Alone.

  Rowan examined the warehouse without comment before stepping aside to let her go in front of him. She’d forgotten how beautifully he moved that powerful body of his—a storm given flesh.

  Tugging him by the hand, she led him up the stairs and into the great room. She knew he had taken in every detail, every entrance and exit and method of escape, by the time they were halfway across it.

  Aedion stood before the fireplace, hood still on, hands still within easy reach of his weapons. She said over her shoulder to her cousin as they passed, “Aedion, meet Rowan. Rowan, meet Aedion. His Highness needs a bath or I’ll vomit if I have to sit next to him for more than
a minute.”

  She offered no other explanation before dragging Rowan into her bedroom and shutting the door behind them.

  Aelin leaned against the door as Rowan paused in the center of the bedroom, his face darkened by the shadows of his heavy gray hood. The space between them went taut, every inch of it crackling.

  She bit her bottom lip as she took him in: the familiar clothes; the assortment of wicked weapons; the immortal, preternatural stillness. His presence alone stole the air from the room, from her lungs.

  “Take off your hood,” he said with a soft growl, his eyes fixed on her mouth.

  She crossed her arms. “You show me yours and I’ll show you mine, Prince.”

  “From tears to sass in a few minutes. I’m glad the month apart hasn’t dimmed your usual good spirits.” He yanked back his hood, and she started.

  “Your hair! You cut it all off!” She pulled off her own hood as she crossed the distance between them. Indeed, the long silver-white hair was now cropped short. It made him look younger, made his tattoo stand out more, and … fine, it made him more handsome, too. Or maybe that was just her missing him.

  “Since you seemed to think that we would be doing a good amount of fighting here, shorter hair is more useful. Though I can’t say that your hair might be considered the same. You might as well have dyed it blue.”

  “Hush. Your hair was so pretty. I was hoping you’d let me braid it one day. I suppose I’ll have to buy a pony instead.” She cocked her head. “When you shift, will your hawk form be plucked, then?”

  His nostrils flared, and she clamped her lips together to keep from laughing.

  He surveyed the room: the massive bed she hadn’t bothered to make that morning, the marble fireplace adorned with trinkets and books, the open door to the giant closet. “You weren’t lying about your taste for luxury.”

  “Not all of us enjoy living in warrior-squalor,” she said, grabbing his hand again. She remembered these calluses, the strength and size of his hands. His fingers closed around hers.

  Though it was a face she’d memorized, a face that had haunted her dreams these past few weeks … it was new, somehow. And he just looked at her, as if he were thinking the same thing.

  He opened his mouth, but she pulled him into the bathroom, lighting a few candles by the sink and on the ledge above the tub. “I meant it about the bath,” she said, twisting the faucets and plugging the drain. “You stink.”

  Rowan watched as she bent to grab a towel from the small cabinet by the toilet. “Tell me everything.”

  She plucked up a green vial of bath salts and another of bath oil and dumped in generous amounts of each, turning the rushing water milky and opaque. “I will, when you’re soaking in the bath and don’t smell like a vagrant.”

  “If memory serves, you smelled even worse when we first met. And I didn’t shove you into the nearest trough in Varese.”

  She glared. “Funny.”

  “You made my eyes water for the entire damn journey to Mistward.”

  “Just get in.” Chuckling, he obeyed. She shrugged off her own cloak, then began unstrapping her various weapons as she headed out of the bathroom.

  She might have taken longer than usual to remove her weapons, peel off her suit, and change into a loose white shirt and pants. By the time she finished, Rowan was in the bath, the water so clouded she could see nothing of the lower body beneath.

  The powerful muscles of his scarred back shifted as he scrubbed at his face with his hands, then his neck, then his chest. His skin had deepened to a golden brown—he must have spent time outdoors these past weeks. Without clothing, apparently.

  He splashed water on his face again, and she started into movement, reaching for the washcloth she’d set on the sink. “Here,” she said a bit hoarsely.

  He just dunked it in the milky water and attacked his face, the back of his neck, the strong column of his throat. The full tattoo down his left arm gleamed with the water sliding off him.

  Gods, he took up the entire bathtub. She mutely handed him her favorite lavender-scented soap, which he sniffed at, sighed in resignation, and then began using.

  She took a seat on the curved lip of the tub and told him everything that had happened since they’d left. Well, mostly everything. He washed while she spoke, scrubbing himself down with brutal efficiency. He lifted the lavender soap to his hair, and she squeaked.

  “You don’t use that in your hair,” she hissed, jolting from her perch to reach for one of the many hair tonics lining the little shelf above the bath. “Rose, lemon verbena, or …” She sniffed the glass bottle. “Jasmine.” She squinted down at him.

  He was staring up at her, his green eyes full of the words he knew he didn’t have to say. Do I look like I care what you pick?

  She clicked her tongue. “Jasmine it is, you buzzard.”

  He didn’t object as she took up a place at the head of the tub and dumped some of the tonic into his short hair. The sweet, night-filled scent of jasmine floated up, caressing and kissing her. Even Rowan breathed it in as she scrubbed the tonic into his scalp. “I could still probably braid this,” she mused. “Very teensy-tiny braids, so—” He growled, but leaned back against the tub, his eyes closed. “You’re no better than a house cat,” she said, massaging his head. He let out a low noise in his throat that might very well have been a purr.

  Washing his hair was intimate—a privilege she doubted he’d ever allowed many people; something she’d never done for anyone else. But lines had always been blurred for them, and neither of them had particularly cared. He’d seen every bare inch of her several times, and she’d seen most of him. They’d shared a bed for months. On top of that, they were carranam. He’d let her inside his power, past his inner barriers, to where half a thought from her could have shattered his mind. So washing his hair, touching him … it was an intimacy, but it was essential, too.

  “You haven’t said anything about your magic,” she murmured, her fingers still working his scalp.

  He tensed. “What about it?”

  Fingers in his hair, she leaned down to peer at his face. “I take it it’s gone. How does it feel to be as powerless as a mortal?”

  He opened his eyes to glare. “It’s not funny.”

  “Do I look like I’m laughing?”

  “I spent the first few days sick to my stomach and barely able to move. It was like having a blanket thrown over my senses.”

  “And now?”

  “And now I’m dealing with it.”

  She poked him in the shoulder. It was like touching velvet-wrapped steel. “Grumpy, grumpy.”

  He gave a soft snarl of annoyance, and she pursed her lips to keep the smile in. She pushed down on his shoulders, beckoning him to dunk under the water. He obeyed, and when he emerged, she rose from the tiles and grabbed the towel she’d left on the sink. “I’m going to find you some clothes.”

  “I have—”

  “Oh, no. Those are going right to the laundress. And you’ll get them back only if she can make them smell decent again. Until then, you’ll wear whatever I give you.”

  She handed him the towel, but didn’t let go as his hand closed around it. “You’ve become a tyrant, Princess,” he said.

  She rolled her eyes and released the towel, turning as he stood in a mighty movement, water sloshing everywhere. It was an effort not to peek over her shoulder.

  Don’t you even dare, a voice hissed in her head.

  Right. She’d call that voice Common Sense—and she’d listen to it from now on.

  Striding into her closet, she went to the dresser in the back and knelt before the bottom drawer, opening it to reveal folded men’s undershorts, shirts, and pants.

  For a moment, she stared at Sam’s old clothes, breathing in the faint smell of him clinging to the fabric. She hadn’t mustered the strength to go to his grave yet, but—

  “You don’t have to give those to me,” Rowan said from behind her. She started a bit, and twisted in pla
ce to face him. He was so damn stealthy.

  Aelin tried not to look too jolted by the sight of him with the towel wrapped around his hips, at the tan and muscled body that gleamed with the oils of the bath, at the scars crisscrossing it like the stripes of a great cat. Even Common Sense was at a loss for words.

  Her mouth was a little dry as she said, “Clean clothes are scarce in the house right now, and these are of no use sitting here.” She pulled out a shirt and held it up. “I hope it fits.” Sam had been eighteen when he died; Rowan was a warrior honed by three centuries of training and battle.

  She pulled out undershorts and pants. “I’ll get you proper clothes tomorrow. I’m pretty sure you’ll start a riot if the women of Rifthold see you walking down the streets in nothing but a towel.”

  Rowan huffed a laugh and strode to the clothes hanging along one wall of the closet: dresses, tunics, jackets, shirts … “You wore all this?” She nodded and uncoiled to her feet. He flicked through some of the dresses and embroidered tunics. “These are … very beautiful,” he admitted.

  “I would have pegged you for a proud member of the anti-finery crowd.”

  “Clothes are weapons, too,” he said, pausing on a black velvet gown. Its tight sleeves and front were unadorned, the neckline skimming just beneath the collarbones, unremarkable save for the tendrils of embroidered, shimmering gold creeping over the shoulders. Rowan angled the dress to look at the back—the true masterpiece. The gold embroidery continued from the shoulders, sweeping to form a serpentine dragon, its maw roaring toward the neck, the body curving down until the narrow tail formed the border of the lengthened train. Rowan loosed a breath. “I like this one best.”

  She fingered the solid black velvet sleeve. “I saw it in a shop when I was sixteen and bought it immediately. But when the dress was delivered a few weeks later, it seemed too … old. It overpowered the girl I was. So I never wore it, and it’s hung here for three years.”

  He ran a scarred finger down the golden spine of the dragon. “You’re not that girl anymore,” he said softly. “Someday, I want to see you wear this.”