The Winner's Kiss (The Winner's Trilogy, #3)(93)

This, he wouldn’t relinquish. This, he would hold and remember.

He saw Kestrel’s hands on the reins. He felt his body slacken. Hoofbeats hammered his skull.

Someone—deep voice—swore. “You tied him to you?”

“He nearly fell,” he heard Kestrel say.

Arin opened his eyes. Roshar was untying the rope that bound him to Kestrel, the prince’s gaze fixed on the knots. It wasn’t like Roshar not to look at him. “Well, that was stupid,” the prince told her. “Didn’t you consider that if he truly started to fall, his weight would drag you off, too?”

She was silent. She had considered this. Arin could tell from her silence.

Roshar’s arm went around Arin’s waist. “Come on,” he said. Arin sort of slid down from the horse and was steadied and held.

“You’re bleeding on me,” Roshar complained.

Yes. Arin supposed that he was bleeding. But his head. The ache was worse than anything. Arin let himself sag against Roshar, dropped his brow to the man’s shoulder. Then he made himself open his eyes again.

Kestrel stood to the side, arms tightly held to her chest. Beyond her lay an army encampment, hastily thrown together. Smaller than before.

“What happened?” Arin asked.

“A bloodbath,” Roshar said. “We retreated. They seized the beach. I blame you.”

Kestrel sucked in a furious breath.

“He doesn’t mean that,” Arin muttered.

“Are you going to make me carry you?” Roshar said.

Kestrel said something sharp. It wasn’t that Arin didn’t hear the words; he was just too weary to absorb them. He heard Roshar’s slow, drawling tones, Kestrel’s hiss. Arin wanted to tell her, He’s hiding from you. He wanted to say, He’s worried. Arin was suddenly overwhelmed by their worry, by how every thing was so unspoken. He stepped away from Roshar’s supporting arm and began to walk with no real destination in mind.

Roshar called him a filthy name. Caught him before he fell.

“Bone and blood and breath of the goddess,” Roshar said. “What were you trying to prove?”

Arin was on his back in Roshar’s bed, in his tent. The prince stood next to his bedside, posture taut and jumpy.

A heavy warmth rested on Arin’s chest. Kestrel, her head pillowed against him as she slept, knelt on the ground, her upper body loosely draped over the bed’s edge. His armor and tunic were gone. His ribs were bandaged. Her palm lay on his belly.

“I would have carried you,” Roshar said more quietly.

“I know.”

Arin’s voice woke her. She lifted her head, moved away. Her mouth was thin, her eyes smudged with shadows, braid half undone.

“The war,” Arin asked.

Kestrel and Roshar exchanged a glance.

“That bad?”

“Rest, Arin,” Kestrel said.

Roshar clicked his teeth. “Not too much. He keeps drifting in and out. Not good for a head injury like that. Keep him awake. Don’t let him sleep.” To Arin, he said, “I can’t stay. I have to organize the retreat to the city.”

Arin’s stomach lurched. Retreat to the city was a last resort. “Don’t.” He scrounged for a better idea. Kestrel looked silent and grim.

Roshar said, “I want to stay with you. I can’t.”

Arin lifted his palm to his friend’s cheek. This startled the prince. Arin saw him remember the Herrani gesture, yet hesitate before returning it. It made Arin sad. His hand fell. He traced a carving in the cot’s frame, feeling awkward to have displaced Roshar from his bed. “Where will you sleep?”

“Have no fear. Many a bed would welcome me.”

After the prince left, Arin asked Kestrel, “Why did the battle go so badly?”

The question upset her. “That’s what you want to know?”

“It’s important.”

“More important than how you nearly died?”

“But I didn’t.”

Her voice was clipped. “My father has too much black powder. Too many soldiers. Too much experience.”

“But how exactly did he win?”

“A full frontal attack was enough, once he eliminated the guns. I didn’t see every thing that happened.”

Guilt pulsed with the doubled heartbeat in his head. “Because you rode away with me.”

Her eyes welled.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Talk of something else. What you like.”

She opened her mouth. Closed it. Her voice hushed, she said, “Do you remember the mosaic?”

“Yes.”

“How every thing fit. As if each tile wanted to be next to each other.”

“Yes.” But he was confused, he wasn’t sure what the mosaic meant to her, or why she thought of it now. She talked about it as if trying to explain that left was really right, or that it was both left and right . . . which made him realize that he knew that left and right were important, but he couldn’t grasp their meaning or difference. He closed his eyes.

“Arin, don’t.”

“Only for a little.”

“No.” She gripped his hand.

“Shh.”

“Stories,” she blurted. “The mosaic told stories, didn’t it?”