A Red-Rose Chain

“It wants to come with you,” said Tybalt, from the bedroom door.

I turned to look at him, raising an eyebrow. “Please don’t tell me you speak rose goblin now. That would be one weird thing too far for my delicate nerves to handle.”

“I do not,” said Tybalt calmly. He folded his arms, causing the red flannel shirt he was wearing to wrinkle interestingly across his chest. “I do, however, speak fluent housecat, which is a frequently nonverbal language. Your resident felines are hoping you will acquiesce to its request and allow it to accompany you on whatever journey you are undertaking, as otherwise it will pace and rattle and disrupt their sleep.”

“Right. Because my cats speak rose goblin.”

Now Tybalt allowed himself a very faint smile, the corners of his mouth tilting almost imperceptibly upward. “They have had occasion to learn, given the close quarters they once inhabited.”

“It’s not my fault I kept them in an apartment for so long! I couldn’t afford the rent on anything larger.” My objections sounded weak even to my own ears, and when Tybalt’s smile grew, so did mine. I shrugged. “Okay. So I liked my apartment. It was the home I made for myself after I came back from the pond. You know? I liked having a place that was mine, that didn’t have to be anyone else’s.”

“But it didn’t remain yours alone for terribly long.” Tybalt lowered his arms and prowled into my room, moving close enough that I could smell the lingering traces of pennyroyal and musk on his skin. It was a heady perfume, and one I had become very accustomed to over the past few years. “It began with the cats—almost immediately—and then came the rose goblin, and then May . . . however did it take you so long to realize that you were not made for solitude?”

“What can I say? I’m a slow learner.” I leaned up and forward, pressing my lips to his. Tybalt’s arms slunk around my waist and pulled me close, until my heels left the floor and I was balanced on my toes. His hands found a home at the small of my back, fingers clenched tight against the ridges of my spine. I closed my eyes, sinking into the moment. We wouldn’t have it for very long. I knew that; I always knew that. Kisses like this were meant to be stolen, captured around the edges of the things we couldn’t run from.

There had been a time when I hadn’t even been willing to admit that I loved him, or more terrifyingly, that he loved me. And now he was going to marry me, assuming we both lived long enough to let that happen.

Spike’s low keening caught my ear and caused me to finally pull away, looking down at the thorny little thing. The rose goblin narrowed its bright yellow eyes and rattled its thorns at me, clearly impatient.

“Yes, you can come along,” I said, removing my hands from Tybalt’s shoulders, where they had somehow come to rest. “Just try not to get me into any trouble I wasn’t going to find on my own, okay?”

Spike rattled its thorns and made a warbling noise before trotting out of the room, presumably to do whatever sort of preparation an animate rose bush needed to do before going on an adventure.

“You’re right about one thing: I’m not good at being alone,” I said, raking my hair out of my eyes as I turned back to Tybalt. “Even when I’m trying to go on a dangerous diplomatic mission, I wind up bringing half the Kingdom of the Mists with me. Walther’s coming, too. He knows Silences, and the Luidaeg thought it would be a good idea.”

“We worry about you,” said Tybalt. He reached out and brushed back a lock of hair that I had managed to miss. “Your predilection for racing headlong into danger has left us reluctant to allow you to wander unobserved.”