Chapter 129 -Caylix-

Chapter 129 -Caylix-
\-Caylix-

I have wanted exactly three things for the better part of five days.

A bath.

Avi.

And approximately twelve uninterrupted hours in which no one requires anything from me.

Not necessarily in that order.

Avi's hand stays wrapped around mine as we make our way through the corridor. Her shoulder brushes my arm when she walks too close, her fingers are threaded through mine and I can hear the soft rhythm of her breathing instead of feeling it from hundreds of miles away.

I tighten my hand around hers.

She looks up at me.

"What?"

"Nothing."

Her eyes narrow slightly, but she doesn't push and I keep walking. The truth is, I don't particularly want to explain the thought that just crossed my mind.

The third arrow had come close enough. A few inches in another direction and this hallway would still exist… Avi would still exist… But I wouldn't be walking beside her.

I shut that thought down before it can fully form.

There are some things I have no interest in examining, especially not tonight.

We reach my chambers, and the moment the door closes behind us, I turn the lock. The sound is absurdly satisfying. Avi watches me lean back against the door. For the first time in days, there is nothing I need to listen for. No movement in the trees, no horses approaching from behind, no bowstring being drawn somewhere I can't see, no woman wearing my mother's face tied inside a wagon and no Veylan soldiers trying to kill me because a witch has convinced them I am their enemy.

Just silence.

And Avi.

The tension I've been carrying finally begins to loosen. Avi feels it and she steps closer.

"Are you all right?"

"Honestly? …No."

Concern immediately fills her face as I reach for her waist and pull her against me.

"I'm filthy."

She stares at me for a second. Then her expression softens.

"You are."

"And I'm fairly certain there is blood in my hair."

"There is."

I lower my forehead to hers.

"I missed you."

Her arms slide carefully around my waist and I close my eyes. For a moment, I just hold her.

I needed this… Her body against mine… Her face buried against my chest…  I wanted my woman in my arms where I could see for myself that she was safe.

My grip tightens as Avi presses a kiss against my chest.

"Bath."

I sigh.

"That might be the most beautiful thing you've ever said to me."

She takes my hand and leads me toward the bathing chamber. By the time I lower myself into the steaming water, every muscle in my body seems to realize at once that it has been abused. I lean my head against the back of the bath and close my eyes.

"Gods."

Avi kneels beside me.

"Better?"

"I may never leave."

Her smile is small as she reaches for the cloth beside the bath.

"Turn around."

"Avi."

"Turn."

"I can bathe myself."

"I know." There is no teasing in her voice. "But please let me."

Something about those four words stops me. So I turn. Avi dips the cloth into the water and begins carefully cleaning the dried blood from my back. Her touch is gentle around the wounds. I can feel the concentration coming through the tether every time she gets close to one of them.

"I'm not going to break."

"I know."

"You don't seem convinced."

"I watched you get shot."

There it is… The guilt that has been sitting beneath everything else since I returned. I can feel it even now. I turn my head slightly.

"Avi."

"Not tonight."

I recognize the words because they're mine. She throws them back at me without hesitation asnd I almost smile.

"Fine."

We will talk about it, just not yet. Tonight, I can give her that. Her fingers move into my hair. I close my eyes again as she works the water through it, washing away days of dirt and blood. I can't remember the last time someone took care of me like this.

Perhaps no one ever has.

Avi's fingers massage slowly over my scalp, and some last piece of tension inside me finally gives. Her fingers move down to the back of my neck. For a while, neither of us speaks. I let her wash the blood from my shoulders, my back, and the places I can't comfortably reach without pulling at the healing wounds.

Each time her fingertips brush one of my runes, warmth follows. The rune curling over my chest is faintly gold.

"Avi."

"I see it."

Gold spreads beneath her fingertips. Heat moves through my side, gathering around the wound. My body recognizes her magic instantly.

Her fingers drift over my shoulder, then her touch softens again.

"Is what Erik said bothering you?"

My smile fades. Of course she felt that too. I look down at the water.

Do you have any idea what kind of king that will make you? Veylan couldn't ask for a better one.

The words have been following me since the medical ward.

"I wouldn't say bothering me."

"But you're thinking about it."

"Yes."

Avi waits. That's one of the things she's learned about me. If she waits long enough, eventually I speak. I hate that it works.

"I don't know how to be a king, Avi."

The admission sounds strange once it's outside my head. She doesn't immediately tell me I'm wrong and I'm grateful for that. Instead, she moves around the bath until she's sitting beside me where I can see her.

"I don't think anyone knows how until they have to."

"That's reassuring."

Her fingers find mine beneath the water.

"You don't have to know tonight."

I look at her.

"I wasn't thinking about being a king when those men attacked us."

"I know."

"I wasn't thinking about being Erik's heir either. They were being controlled. Killing them would have been wrong."

"I know that too." 

Her thumb brushes across my knuckles.

"You don't need me to tell you why you did it. You need to figure out why what Erik said afterward affected you so much."

I stare at her.

"Have you been spending time with Agameus?"

"Unfortunately."

I exhale and look toward the ceiling. Maybe she's right. Erik hadn't looked at me like a father when he'd said those words…. Or not only as one. He'd looked at me as a king. 

"There was something else."

Avi waits.

"The land."

Her expression changes.

"What about it?"

I struggle for a moment to find the words.

"Erik explained what happened. The memories in the earth… The road…"

"But?"

"That's not what it felt like."

Avi goes quiet.

"When I put my hand against the ground, I wasn't looking for the road. I needed a way out. I reached for the earth because it was the only thing I hadn't tried."

Avi watches me.

"But it KNEW me."

The words hang between us. Avi doesn't laugh, she doesn't ask me how that's possible, she just listens.

"I don't know how else to explain it. The moment my magic reached into the ground, something reached back."