Total pages in book: 142
Estimated words: 134898 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 674(@200wpm)___ 540(@250wpm)___ 450(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 134898 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 674(@200wpm)___ 540(@250wpm)___ 450(@300wpm)
Her reaction makes me tense inside. I’ve surprised her that much? “Is it that bad? For me to be in love with you?”
Her expression immediately changes to defensive. “I didn’t say it was bad. Don’t tell me what I’m thinking.”
“Then what are you thinking?” I ask, deciding to be blunt about it. “Because I’d really mucking love to know.”
She swallows hard, avoiding meeting my gaze.
I tip a finger under her chin, forcing her to look into my eyes. “Well?”
“I’m not good with saying what I’m feeling,” Gwenna confesses, her voice small. “All my life, I’ve been taught to put on a smile and hide what I’m really thinking. So it’s hard for me to be vulnerable. To tell you what I feel.”
In a strange way, I understand. She’s never had the freedom to wear her emotions as plainly as Sparrow. “Try? For me?”
Gwenna gives me a tiny smile. “I love you, too. It’s impossible not to love you, Raptor. You’re the best male I’ve ever met, and you’ve had my back always. Of course I love you. Even saying that sounds weak.” She pauses, frustrated.
“Go on.” Mostly because my ego is loving hearing all this from her. What male wouldn’t love to hear his woman gushing about how great he is?
She pulls my hand from her chin and tangles her fingers with mine once more. Her gaze stays on our joined hands, so different in size but so perfect together. “It feels like…you know the chalice at the King’s Onion? How it’s constantly dropping one onion after another? I imagine that in the morning they have to pick up a massive basket of onions, all the ones that dropped overnight. And just when you think it’s got nothing more in there, another onion rolls out. I’m not good with flowery words, Raptor, but what I feel for you feels like that cup. That no matter how deep I dig, I won’t hit the bottom of how I feel for you. That there’ll always be another onion ready to drop. It’s a terrible comparison, I know.”
It’s a remarkably touching comparison, actually.
She lifts her head and narrows her eyes at me. “Laugh at me, and I’ll bloody kill you.”
“I would never. Not when you’ve given me the greatest gift.” I lift our joined hands to my muzzle and kiss them.
“I thought me bouncing on your knot was the greatest gift?” She arches a brow, falling back on her playful banter. There’s bright red in her round cheeks that tells me she’s still feeling vulnerable, though, and I vow that I’m never going to make her feel like less.
“Second-greatest gift,” I amend, and smile down at her. “I adore you, woman. You know that, right?”
Her cheeks grow even pinker. It seems she does know that.
Forty-One
Gwenna
I’m a nervous mess as we leave the dorm and head across the square toward the nest that Hawk shares with Sparrow. Neither Arrod nor Kipp has returned, and Raptor thinks they’re with Master Jay, comforting him—or getting comforted—and won’t be back for a while. This gives us time to talk to Sparrow and her husband.
Gods, this truly is the longest day ever. I’m exhausted from everything that’s happened, but we’ve got a while longer before we can relax.
I cling to Raptor’s hand as we walk through the streets. He made me change clothes and wash up before we headed over, and I’m glad he’s thinking clearly. I’m in a daze. Every time I close my eyes, I can still hear Hemmen’s voice, speaking in the strange unearthly babble of the dead.
And now our Five is down to four. And four is not the sacred number. We won’t have enough to pass the guild test to become artificers, much less the individual tests. We’ve failed this year, all because Hemmen has been murdered. Gods. A coworker has been murdered and I felt his last moments, his fear as he died. A hard knot forms in my throat, and I try not to choke on my emotions. He didn’t deserve this. No one deserves this.
I tell myself that if Hemmen is part of this group of thieves, it means he wasn’t innocent. It means he was caught up in something he shouldn’t have been. But he’s dead now, and it seems cruel to get hung up on something like that. When I think of him, I want to think of him as the disheveled student who loved his books so much he slept with them in his bed. Not as a thief.
Not as a dead man, clutching his throat and screaming for help in my mind.
I shiver, pushing away terrible thoughts as we approach Hawk’s dorm. My hand is sweaty as I clutch Raptor’s desperately, but if he’s noticed that I’m on the verge of panicking, he hasn’t said anything. He just strides forward, assured, and knocks on the door. Then he glances down at me. “Let me handle all of this, all right? I’ll protect you.”