“Old friend?” Gwenna asks.
He shakes his head and then pauses. A flurry of gestures quickly follows as he tries to communicate with us, and it takes a few rounds but we finally figure it out. The slitherskin was a stranger, working for a traveling merchant. He saw Kipp in his uniform (now unbuttoned and open to the waist thanks to all the full-contact slithering) and wanted to tell him how proud he was of his fellow slitherskin.
I am first, Kipp gestures to us.
“You are?” I’m startled to hear this, but not entirely surprised. I haven’t seen other slitherskins around and none of the guild’s history books refer to slitherskins in any way. They barely reference Taurians, and Magpie is the only woman I know of who has joined.
Kipp lifts his chin, full of pride.
“Bunch of horrid men,” Gwenna grumbles. “Don’t like anyone who doesn’t have the same equipment as them. The more I learn about this Royal Artifactual Guild, the less I like it.”
“Which means it’s all the more important that we join the guild,” Mereden says. “These men need to realize that slitherskins—and women—are just as competent as they are.”
Gwenna grunts.
I’m silent. So much is riding on this that the guilt is becoming overwhelming. I’m going to ruin everyone’s chances if it’s found out that I have the ring…or that I’m a noble….
“That’s why a Five is so important,” Lark says, speaking up. She puts a hand on my shoulder and one on Mereden’s, drawing us closer in the middle of the street. “The guild wants to emphasize teamwork so Fives work together, but doing this has made us more than a team. We’re friends. We have one another’s backs. And we’re going to join this fucking sausage party of a guild and turn it inside out.”
We laugh at that, but I blink back tears again.
Before leaving home, I had no friends. Now I have four of them, and it feels like I’m the richest person in all of Vastwarren.
Once the last of the letters are delivered, we opt to head back to the dorm and train ourselves. Kipp teaches Mereden and Lark some basic stabbing moves with short swords, and I go over a few of the more common Prellian glyphs with Gwenna in the kitchen. I want her to be able to recognize them to give her an advantage over some of the men in the guild.
We’re basically waiting and passing time until something happens. Either Lark can approach her aunt and see if she’ll help us with our plan, or we’ll get permission to go back down to the drop due to the appeals we dropped off earlier today. Until then, all we can do is stay busy.
“The lovely thing about Prellian magic is that it’s considered female,” I tell Gwenna enthusiastically as I flick through a book I borrowed from Hawk’s small store of guild tomes. I pause on a rendering of a common vase covered in glyphs and point it out. “So you’re always going to see the glyph for a female if there’s magic referenced.”
Her brows furrow. “What are you talking about?”
“When you reference magic, it’s considered female,” I explain, delighted to be able to talk about my favorite subject. “And it was Prellian law that every object had to be labeled clearly with what it did for public safety. They were really very advanced with law for their time. So every object will have a statement of some sort as to what the magic is, and since it’s referencing magic, you can look for the egg symbol around this particular glyph. The arrow over this figure means ‘man,’ but when it’s encased by an egg, it changes the symbol to ‘woman.’ ”
“Is the arrow supposed to be a cock?” Gwenna asks.
Her blunt words make my face heat. Good gods, it seems I’m blushing all the time now. “No, of course not! It’s an arrow, at least that’s what scholars believe. They think that it references back to the time when men were hunters and would use arrows to feed and provide for their families.”
“Looks like a cock to me,” she says, and then adds, “I’m probably spending too much time around Lark.”
“Probably.” Though now it looks a bit like a cock to me, too.
The doors to the kitchen open and Hawk strides in. Gwenna and I immediately grow quiet, watching as he marches over to the water pitcher and pours himself a drink. He looks dusty and dirty, as if he’s been in the tunnels, but I don’t want to ask. The last thing I need is a more cranky Hawk jumping down my throat.
I’m sure I deserve some of the throat jumping but not all of it.
Hawk drinks his water, leaning against the counter, and I pretend to focus on the book in front of me instead of my very large Taurian husband, who might possibly hate me. He’ll just finish his beverage, I think, and then we’ll be alone again and ready to continue our lessons—
“Aspeth,” Hawk says. “We need to talk.”
I put on my best gracious-holder’s-daughter smile. “We are in the midst of a lesson.”
“Oh, it can wait,” Gwenna blurts out, betraying me. She jumps to her feet and moves to stand behind my chair. She leans in and whispers in my ear, “Distract him and I’ll check on the situation with Magpie.”
And then with a brilliant smile, she leaves me alone with the moody Taurian.
I give him an impatient look. “You decided now is the best time to talk despite ordering me to sleep next to you tonight? It couldn’t wait until then?”
“I didn’t know if you were going to come to bed.”
“Because you don’t trust me, right?” I keep the words light and playful even as they cut.
He sighs heavily. “Because I wouldn’t want to come to bed with me, either. Whatever frustration or anger you’re feeling right now, I deserve it.”
I run a finger down the front of the book, not looking him in the eye. I don’t know what to say to that. It certainly wasn’t what I expected to hear from him. “Was that an apology?”
“More of an explanation,” he says. “Can we go talk in our room?”
Now I glance up at him, suspicious. Is this going to turn into another spy inquisition? But…Gwenna did tell me to distract him. Hells. I get to my feet, my chin held high. “If you’re a boor, I’m going to leave again, fair warning.”
“If I’m a boor to you, I’ll absolutely expect it,” he says, and moves to my side, putting a hand to the small of my back to lead me to our room.
Standing this close to Hawk always makes me feel slightly breathless. I’m a big woman—tall and strong and the opposite of dainty—but his hand on the small of my back makes me feel delicate. Like a thing to be protected. It’s not something I’m used to—both the touch and the feeling of being something worth protecting—but I like it. And I hate that I like it, because it makes me feel vulnerable, like it can be used against me.
We head down the hall from the kitchen and into Hawk’s private chamber. Squeaker is curled up on the window seat, spreading orange cat hair all over the cushions. She yawns when we enter and stretches in place but makes no effort to get up, and Hawk doesn’t ask me to remove her. That means we’re probably not going to get intimate.
I…can’t decide if I’m disappointed or relieved.
He gestures that I can sit on the bed, and I move to sit on the edge, clasping my hands in my lap. I’m doing my best to remain composed, but being alone with him brings on floods of memories and scandalous thoughts, and it’s hard to concentrate. Hawk paces at the far side of the room, his tail flicking back and forth, and I notice that the sleeves of his shirt are rolled up, revealing bulging muscles. He’s discarded his guild jacket somewhere, too, and when he paces, I can see the fine, thick shape of his thighs and the rounded strength of his backside.
If he’s trying to appeal to me by simply looking intense and delectable, he’s doing an excellent job.
Hawk tugs on the ring that hangs from his broad nose. “Aspeth…I know I’ve behaved cruelly toward you.”
