Heir of Fire (Throne of Glass #3)(112)

She didn’t want to think about what it meant that Rowan had left like that, but she did, aching and cramping from the magic. She drifted into a jerking, fitful sleep, the cold so fierce she ­couldn’t tell whether it was from the temperature or the aftermath of the magic. At some point, she was awoken by the laughing and singing of the returning revelers. After a while, even the drunkest found their bed or someone ­else’s. She was almost asleep again, teeth still chattering, when her window groaned open in the breeze. She was too cold and sore to get up. There was a flutter of wings and a flash of light, and before she could roll over, he’d scooped her up, blanket and all.

If she’d had any energy, she might have objected. But he carried her up the two flights of stairs, down the hall, and then—

A roaring fire, warm sheets, and a soft mattress. And a heavy quilt that was tucked in with surprising gentleness. The fire dimmed on a phantom wind, and then the mattress shifted.

In the flickering dark, he said roughly, “You’re staying with me from now on.” She found him lying as far away from her as he could get without falling off the mattress. “The bed is for to­night. Tomorrow, you’ll get a cot. You’ll clean up after yourself or you’ll be back in that room.”

She nestled into her pillow. “Very well.” The fire dimmed, yet the room remained toasty. It was the first warm bed she’d had in months. But she said, “I don’t want your pity.”

“This is not pity. Maeve decided not to tell me what happened to you. You have to know that I—­I ­wasn’t aware you had—”

She slid an arm across the bed to grasp his hand. She knew that if she wanted to, she could strike him a wound so deep it would fracture him. “I knew. At first, I was afraid you’d mock me if I told you, and I would kill you for it. Then I didn’t want you to pity me. And more than any of that, I didn’t want you to think it was ever an excuse.”

“Like a good soldier,” he said. She had to look away for a moment to keep from letting him see just what that meant to her. He took a long breath that made his broad chest expand. “Tell me how you ­were sent there—­and how you got out.”

She was tired in her bones, but she rallied her energy one last time and told him of the years in Rifthold, of stealing Asterion ­horses and racing across the desert, of dancing until dawn with courtesans and thieves and all the beautiful, wicked creatures in the world. And then she told him about losing Sam, and of that first whipping in Endovier, when she’d spat blood in the Chief Overseer’s face, and what she had seen and endured in the following year. She spoke of the day she had snapped and sprinted for her own death. Her heart grew heavy when at last she got to the eve­ning when the Captain of the Royal Guard prowled into her life, and a tyrant’s son had offered her a shot at freedom. She told him what she could about the competition and how she’d won it, until her words slurred and her eyelids drooped.

There would be more time to tell him of what happened next—­of the Wyrdkeys and Elena and Nehemia and how she had become so broken and useless. She yawned, and Rowan rubbed his eyes, his other hand still in hers. But he didn’t let go. And when she awoke before dawn, warm and safe and rested, Rowan was still holding her hand, clasped to his chest.

Something molten rushed through her, pouring over every crack and fracture still left gaping and open. Not to hurt or mar—­but to weld.

To forge.

43

Rowan didn’t let her get out of bed that day. He brought trays of food, going so far as to make sure she consumed every last drop of beef stew, half a loaf of crusty bread, a bowl of the first spring berries, and a mug of ginger tea. He hardly needed to offer any encouragement to eat; she was starving. But if she didn’t know better, she’d say he was fussing.

Emrys and Luca visited once to see if she was alive, took one look at Rowan’s stone-­cold face, heard the ripple of a growl, and took off, saying she was in more than competent hands and promising to come back when she was feeling better.

“You know,” Celaena said, propped in bed with her fourth mug of tea of the day, “I highly doubt anyone is going to attack me now, if they’ve already put up with my nonsense for this long.”

Rowan, who was yet again poring over the map of the location of the bodies, didn’t even look up from his seat at his worktable. “This isn’t negotiable.”

She might have laughed had her body not given a burst of twisting, blinding pain. She bore down on it, clenching her mug, focusing on her breathing. That was why she’d allowed him to fuss. Thanks to her magical meltdown last night, every damn part of her was sore. The constant throb and stinging and twisting, the headache between her brows, the fuzziness on the edge of her vision . . . even sliding her gaze across the room sent sparks of pain through her head.

“So you mean to tell me that whenever someone comes close to burnout, she not only goes through all this misery, but if she’s female, the males around her go this berserk?”

He set down his pen and twisted to examine her. “This is hardly berserk. At least you can defend yourself by physical means when your magic is useless. For other Fae, even if they’ve had weapons and defense training, if they ­can’t touch their magic, they’re vulnerable, especially when they’re drained and in pain. That makes people—­usually males, yes—­somewhat edgy. Others have been known to kill without thought any perceived threat, real or otherwise.”