Brightly Woven(80)

“Syd?”

I sucked in a deep breath, rubbing my face. The light in the room was a dull gray—an overcast morning. I had meant only to rest my eyes for a few moments.

North laughed as he helped me sit up. “Sleeping on the cold stone floor when you have a perfectly good bed upstairs. I was wondering where you had disappeared to.”

“I’m in hiding,” I said.

“From who?”

I sighed. “Henry. We had a fight, and it didn’t end well.”

“Does…?” North paused, taking a deep breath. “Does he need to be dealt with?”

I had to laugh. “No, nothing like that. He’s just angry that I didn’t want to go back to Cliffton with him.”

“Ah,” North said. “Well, I can’t blame you. You’d be depriving yourself of my charming company.”

I rolled my eyes. “What a loss.”

“In all honesty, though, I think you should find a way to make amends if you can,” North said. “Real friends are hard to come by, and as annoying as Henry is, he’d throw himself in front of dragon’s fire for you.”

“And that’s the definition of a real friend?”

“Oh, yes, just ask Owain.” He laughed.

“I’ll take that into consideration,” I said. I reached up to brush a splotch of dust from his cheek.

“I keep forgetting,” he said, pulling something from his pocket. “I’ve been carrying this with me for so long I just got used to having it.”

In his hand was my necklace. He put it around my neck, still warm from where it had lain against his own skin.

“The king of Auster is dead,” he said.

I looked up sharply. “What? You’re sure?”

“Word came this morning to the Sorceress Imperial,” he said. “You won’t be hearing celebrations in the streets until she deems it the right moment to inform everyone else, though.”

“That’s good news, isn’t it?” I asked. “Not for her schemes, of course, but for the rest of us?”

North blew out a long breath. “The queen of Auster and the remaining nobles want to negotiate for peace,” he said. “On one condition.”

I looked at the newly finished cloak, still hanging on the loom. I already knew what they wanted.

“They still think you’re their goddess,” he said. “What happened on the mountain only proved it to them, even with the king’s death.”

“How do they know I’m still alive?” I asked.

“They don’t,” North said, running his hand through my hair. “We’ll find another way.”

I shook my head. “I’ll go, if it means protecting you and everyone here.”

He clucked his tongue. “As if I would ever let you do that. We’ll find another way,” he repeated. “Mother is letting me accompany the diplomatic party over to Auster for the negotiations.”

He turned to look at the cloak. “You’ve been busy,” he said. “What is this?”

“A gift,” I said. “For you.”

He pulled off a glove and pressed his fingers lightly against the dragon at the center.

“It’s warm…,” he marveled, sensing the power woven into it. “But how can I take something like this into duels? I would never want to ruin it.”

“All the more reason to be careful when you fight,” I said. “Let me get scissors and a needle to hemstitch it.”

I worked quickly, feeling his eyes on me the entire time.

“When are you leaving?”

“In an hour…”

“An hour?” I said, folding the cloak across my arm. “I thought it would be another few days, at the very least!”

“The Sorceress Imperial wants to move quickly,” he said. “I think a part of her still hopes these negotiations will break down.”

The thought came to me suddenly. “But they don’t have to. Do you still think they’ll agree to peace if I’m not part of the treaty?”

“It’ll depend on a number of things. The queen has prepared a list of terms and concessions that they might agree to, but I’m still concerned.” North ran a hand through his hair. “They’ve lost their king, not their armies or their alliance to Saldorra. It won’t help that we won’t give them the one thing they truly want.”

“What if you can’t give it to them?” I asked. “What if I were dead?”

North looked horrified.

“Figuratively dead,” I clarified. “They couldn’t hold it against you if I had been killed in the avalanche as well.”

“But where’s the proof?”

I bent down to pick up one of the longer pieces of thread I had cut away. I smoothed my long hair back, tying it in place. Then the small scissors were in my hand, cutting through my hair before North had the chance to stop me.

“Don’t—!” he said, but I was too fast for him.

“This was all Dorwan needed to convince them I was their goddess,” I said, pressing the bundle of hair into his hand. “How do they usually bury their dead?”

“They don’t,” North said. “They use funeral pyres.”