But when Piers betrayed Griffin and tried to get rid of me, the explosion never happened. It was implosion instead.
“Castle Sinta, or here?” Griffin demands, crossing the sloping field with purposeful strides. “Your choice. I’ll build you a Gods damn bloody house right here and never leave.”
“I’ll run away.”
“Then it’s a good thing I have a magic rope.”
“Griffin!” He’s not being rational. I start trying to get loose, and his free hand lands on my bare bottom with a smack.
I growl as we pass in front of the pasture holding our horses. Panotii lifts his head and flicks his ears, nickering at me. Brown Horse ignores my flopping around in favor of the grass.
Griffin suddenly bends down and plops me into the spring-fed stream with a splash. I gasp, ice-cold water shocking me as it rushes over my lower half. I instinctively curl up, and my reaction must have some kind of retracting effect on my wings because they shrink with a rustling of feathers. There’s a quick slice of pain, like a shallow cut, and then they disappear into my back. I think.
I turn, trying to look over my shoulder. “What’s there?” I ask. I can’t really see.
Griffin leans over me and looks. “Nothing. Not even a scar.”
I don’t feel the wings anymore. Not a tickle of feathers. Not a flutter in my chest. Nothing.
He kneels in front of me, uncaring that he’s still partially dressed and getting soaked. He bunches up a handful of my destroyed tunic, wets it, and then presses the frigid linen against my chest. The cold stalls the breath in my lungs.
A deep groove settling between his eyebrows, Griffin starts washing the dried blood off my healed skin. Stream water sluices around my arms and middle as I lean back to brace myself, almost shivering. If this is what Griffin needs, I’ll give it to him. I needed a bath anyway. Blood to wash off. Mother to erase.
The icy water is refreshing and restorative once I get used to it. I watch my husband carefully. Griffin doesn’t look at my face. He looks everywhere else and washes me with such determination that my heart aches. His big hands are all over my body, but there’s nothing sensual about it. He’s efficient. Single-minded. Top half. Middle. Legs. Wingless back. Face. He still doesn’t meet my eyes.
When he’s finished, he rocks back on his heels, seeming immune to the cold, and stares down at his hands.
I reach out and touch his chest. His skin is hot, feverish. Or maybe it’s just my hand that’s cold. Goose bumps sweep over his torso. I shift up onto my knees, take the cloth from him, and then start to gently wash him. He stares down at his slack hands where they rest against his thighs, not stopping me. Not helping me. Not saying anything at all.
“Griffin?”
After a while, he grunts.
“It’s okay to lose control every now and then. I certainly do.”
His head stays bowed. “I’m supposed to be the steady one.”
“You are the steady one. But you’re human, too.”
Silence. Then, “I thought you were dead.” The bleakness in his voice cuts straight through me. He’s still staring at his hands, almost as if they were the very weapons used against me.
He finally looks up, regret shattering his expression. “You thought you failed Little Bean today?” He shakes his head. “I failed you both. I couldn’t protect you. I promised you I would. I promised you so many times, and you believed me.”
“No,” I tell him softly. “You believed it, but I never did.”
My heart breaks at how devastated he looks. My name is a whisper that barely crosses his lips. His eyes glass over.
Mine do, too, and as I wrap my arms around him, I tell him what I’ve always understood and believed. “From the moment I let you in, I always knew we’d be protecting each other.”
CHAPTER 17
“So…” I shiver. I’ve had it with sitting in the icy stream. Enough is enough, even for me. “Mother. Big fight. Gods. I fell apart. You fell apart.” I huff a dry laugh. “What a day.”
Griffin nods, his eyes still haunted.
“Are you still considering giving up?” I ask.
“I’m debating,” he answers.
“Don’t waste your time. I won’t let you.”
He frowns.
“You put me in charge, remember? Crown? Head? Me?” I pat the top of my head.
A small grunt escapes him.
“So what’s next?” So much for being in charge.
Griffin must see the humor in that, too, because his expression turns slightly less somber. Then, with a gusty exhale, he stands, pulling me up with him. He sweeps his hands down my chilled arms, warming my pebbled skin.
“You’re cold,” he says in surprise.
“We’re knee-deep in freezing water, it’s autumn on a mountainside, and the sun just dipped behind the trees.”
“I thought you were immune to the cold.”
“Not entirely, although Little Bean does her best to keep me warm.” I glance at my belly. “Maybe she’ll have Fire Magic,” I say, patting where her little life beat is a constant spark inside me. “Auntie Bella can show you how all that fire stuff works.”
Auntie Bella? Where did that come from? And Bellanca Tarva is hardly the epitome of control.
Little Bean’s energy tumbles under my fingers like she agrees, although I don’t know with which part. Her power branches out inside me, reassuring me. I don’t know how Hoi Polloi mothers can stand not knowing what’s going on in there, at least on some level. At this point, they probably wouldn’t feel much of anything, and maybe even think the occasional flutter low in their belly was just digestion—or rather, indigestion.
For my part, I’m so increasingly aware of the budding magic in Little Bean’s blood that it’s almost as though I can talk to her. I know when she sleeps. I know when she wakes up. I know she’s interested every time Griffin puts his warm hand over her or speaks close enough for her to hear. I know she likes riding Panotii, especially at a trot, because the bouncier the better, it seems. And I know she’s completely tuned into me as well, thumping me with her life force when I’m nervous and relaxing when I’m not.
We could communicate even more, I know. Mother obviously did.
I immediately trample the thought. Little Bean doesn’t need me in her head, even if it’s only to tell her that I love her. She already knows that. She needs me around her, protecting her, simply being her mother.
“Auntie Bella?” Griffin looks like that’s going to take some serious getting used to. I completely agree.
He dips and picks me up. Funny how he does that. He knows I can walk.
“Aren’t you cold?” I ask, looping my arms around his neck.
“Freezing. My balls are about to fall off.”
I laugh. Then scowl. “That’s not funny.”
“For either of us,” he mutters.
He strides uphill but bypasses the barn, heading toward the smoldering house instead. At the outer wall he puts me down and picks up our discarded gear. Luckily, everything was far enough from the house to be safe from the flames. He throws my cloak around my shoulders, pulling it closed. The magical threads heat, and I groan like I just took a bite out of a freshly baked spice cake.