And then he saw me.

He went still, mouth half-open. There was blood on his bottom lip. Some near his left brow as well. The charcoal around his eyes was smeared, staining his sweat black. I’d never seen a knight so filthy—so physically degraded by his craft. He looked entirely ignoble.

I couldn’t look away.

“Diviner.”

I jumped. A knight stood to my left, his helmet under his arm. It took me a moment to tear my gaze off Rory and recognize him. “Oh. Hamelin, isn’t it?”

He gave half a smile. “And you’re—well, you’re Six. Obviously I don’t know your real name.”

“Tried to, though.”

He laughed. “Sorry about that. I felt a little guilty for asking. Especially after I’d, you know…” He ran his hand down the back of his neck. “Ruined the moment with talk.”

I shrugged. “It doesn’t matter now.”

My lack of insult, or interest, seemed to bolster him. He put on the charm, setting those perfectly straight teeth to good use with a blinding smile. “I’d do it differently, you know. If you ever had it in mind to try me again, I’d—”

“Hamelin.”

We both turned. Rory, slouched and lazy, arms crossed over his chest, was watching his fellow knight with so much blackness his eyes looked like open graves. “You and Rothspar are up next.”

“I’m talking.”

“Not anymore. Put your fucking helmet on.”

Hamelin’s smile waned. He took a step back from me. “Right. I should really—”

I didn’t watch him go. My gaze was on Rory. On his bloodied lip. He kept his eyes on me, too, then lifted his hand. Curled a single, beckoning finger.

I joined him in the heart of the yard. “Quite the spectacle.”

He was still breathing hard from combat. “You’ve spoken with Benji?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“He’s answered your questions?”

“As well as he’s fit to.”

His eyes narrowed. “And?”

“And…” My gaze fell to my bare feet. “What would you have me say? I have nowhere to go but forward.”

“Then you’ve agreed to come with us.”

“I will. To find the Diviners, I will.”

I watched his throat work, like he was swallowing what I’d said. Then he jerked his head. “Follow me.”

“Where?”

He was working the straps of his armor. Pulling it off himself as he left the yard. I muttered a swear and hurried after him. “Myndacious.”

“The knighthood leaves tomorrow,” he said. “Traum is full of danger. There are all manner of sprites.” He looked behind us to make sure no one was listening. “Not to mention the Omens. You’ll need better clothes. Fortifications. Better… everything.” It could have been blood. Or maybe, just maybe, I caught the hint of a flush in his cheeks. “I’m fitting you with armor.”

OceanofPDF.com

CHAPTER FOURTEEN WAX

The forge was fixed at the back of the compound, behind the barracks. Its hearth was lit but not roaring—there was no steam, no oppressive heat, no blacksmith or armorer in sight.

A tragedy. I wanted to see how they worked their hammers, shaping, reshaping. There was something enticing about hitting something again and again and not breaking it.

Rory dropped his breastplate on the floor, his gauntlets—and the rest of his upper-body armor I did not know the name of—upon the floor. He wasn’t wearing chainmail, just a pale, padded shirt.

“So.” I tapped my foot. “You’re going to kill the Omens.”

“Happily.” Rory dragged a low footstool into the middle of the wide room. “Your pedestal.”

He retreated to the wall, losing himself at a long row of shelves—digging and fidgeting and flinging. “We start the armor today, then I’ll send the order to the blacksmith at Petula Hall. We’ll find chainmail you can wear in the meantime.”

“Where’s Petula Hall?”

“The Chiming Wood. It’s Maude’s house.”

“And where is your house, Myndacious?”

“Don’t have one.” There was more flinging, fidgeting. He pulled several glass jars from the cabinetry. They were filled with rough chunks of a cloudy, yellowish material. “Still fixed on Myndacious, I see.”

“I like the way it rolls off the tongue.”

“I’ll bet.” The last thing he pulled from the cabinet was a cast iron pot the size of my head. He brought them to the hearth, an impressive juggling act, then upended the jars into the pot and set it over the grate. “What did Hamelin want?”

“To reminisce. Nothing breathtaking.”

Glass clinked. “Not a shining review.”

“I didn’t bed him, you know.”

The lines of Rory’s back went taut.

“What you said. The night we met. About me being sheltered and indistinct—bereft of fun.” I bit the inside of my cheek. “I took it to heart. So I arranged our excursion to Coulson Faire with every intention of getting naked with Hamelin in the grass and doing something adventurous. To prove you wrong.” Heat touched my cheeks. “I wanted to show you that I wasn’t too good for a knight—just too good for you.”

His hands had stilled. When he spoke, his voice was low. Tight. “What stopped you?”

“Turns out fucking someone just to spite you leaves a lot to be desired.”

Arms braced, Rory’s hands splayed on the counter. “I wanted to get under your skin,” he said quietly. “I saw you on the wall that first day at Aisling, all in white, looking down your nose at me, so patronizing and pious. I wanted—” He peered over his shoulder at me. “I don’t know. To sully you, maybe. To rip the shroud from your eyes so you’d know what I knew—that nothing is holy. That the Omens were a lie. That you were no better than me.”

He looked away. “But I regretted it. You should not have to bear, nor marshal, my derision. I was cruel. And whatever you did to spite me after—well. I deserved to hate it, watching you disappear into the trees with Hamelin.” He gave me his eyes over his shoulder once more. “I’m sorry I was such an ass.”

I didn’t know what to say to that, so I said nothing.

The forge remained quiet but for the sounds of Rory at the hearth. Slowly, a sweet smell filled the space. Not saccharine or fetid but… inviting. “What are you heating?”

“Beeswax.”

“You’re making me armor. Out of wax.”

“It’s to measure you, you twit. I’m going to put it on your clothes.”

I looked down at my billowing Diviner dress. “I hate to break it to you, but this is hardly the shape of my body.”

“I’m acutely aware of that, thank you.” He hunched over the pot, muttering aspersions into the wax as it melted. “First things first.”

He dipped his thumb into the wax, came forward—planted himself in front of me. Even with me upon the footstool, he was taller. “I need to clean your mouth.”

“Because I said fucking?”

He bit down on a smile, then nodded at my bottom lip, split by the Harried Scribe’s blow, then again from the tussle in the alley. “It’s for your wound. The cut on your lip.”

“Oh. Sure.”

He waited.

“Must I spell it out? I permit you.”

Rory rolled his eyes. Brought his wax-laden thumb to my mouth. “You don’t like it when I’m a bad knight,” he muttered, “and you don’t like it when I’m a good one.”

I reached out. Smudged blood he’d shed sparring from his own bottom lip and wiped it on my dress. “Have you considered that’s because I don’t like you at all?”

There it was again. The stain of a flush upon his olive cheeks. “Yeah. I’ve considered that.”

It stung a bit—the stroke of his thumb over my bottom lip. Rory kept his gaze to my mouth, pressing wax over my swollen, broken skin. “What were they doing?” he asked. “The men you brawled with?”

“Stalking girls.”

“And that made you angry?”

“Shouldn’t it?”

“Of course.” Each word held an edge. “I think children are particularly vulnerable in Traum.”