Celeste

  The forest closed around me in the dark. Mist drifted low through the trees, clinging to roots and bramble, turning every step into a whisper. The gelding moved steady beneath me, his breath showing pale in the cold air. The road was little more than a trail now, rutted and narrow, curling north through the hills.

  I hadn’t stopped in the last village. Not after seeing the soldiers, not after realizing Art wasn’t there. I told myself I was done chasing ghosts. He told me to go north to Rodin, and instead I chased after him like a fool.

  I could’ve turned back, met the Brotherhood again on the eastern road. I was sure they’d have taken me, no questions asked. But I wasn’t sure where they traveled and where they’d go next. So I turned northwest instead, taking the shorter way through the woods, trusting the trees more than people for company.

  The forest was quieter here, older. The air smelled of rain and pine pitch, and the ground was soft where moss had swallowed the path. My thoughts wandered as aimlessly as the road.

  A crow’s call broke the quiet, harsh and sudden. The sound snapped through the branches, echoing long after it should’ve faded. I pressed my hand to the gelding’s neck, steadying him, though it was my pulse that needed calming.

  The trees thinned by degrees until the dark began to lift, replaced by a faint red wash against the low clouds ahead. Smoke. Lanterns.

  The gelding’s ears flicked forward as the path widened into a wagon rut half-swallowed by mud. The forest gave way to fences slumped under their own weight and cottages hunched close together like they were hiding from the cold.

  The village looked tired but alive. Light spilled from windows and doorways, yellow and uneven. A low murmur of voices rolled through the night. Somewhere, a fiddle scraped a tune too rough to call music. Laughter followed soon after.

  I drew the gelding a slower pace. The smell of smoke mixed with ale and something sweeter. It was a brothel town, if the smell was anything to go by. I’d heard of places like this, where travelers came to forget and locals sold what little warmth they had.

  The gelding snorted, hooves striking hollow against the stones. A few faces turned toward me as I passed, a woman leaning against a post with painted lips and a seductive smile. Two men stumbled from a tavern door, one of them shouting after the other.

  I kept my head down and my hood drawn. Just another traveler passing through.

  At the end of the lane, a single lantern swung from a crooked beam above the door of what passed for an inn. The sign creaked in the wind, the letters worn down so much that you could only make out one of them. I slid from the saddle, leading the gelding to the hitching post. His breath plumed white as I tied him off, giving his neck a slow stroke.

  “Just for the night,” I murmured.

  Then I squared my shoulders and stepped inside.

  Warmth hit me as soon as the door shut behind me. The room was thick with the smell of smoke, sweat, and roasted meat. A dozen voices tangled in the air. Laughter, arguments, a song half-remembered and badly sung.

  I pushed back my hood and stepped toward the counter. The innkeep barely looked up as I asked for a room, only grunted and slid a dull brass key across the wood. “Second floor. Last on the right.”

  I paid what he asked and added a coin more for a meal. His wife, or maybe his daughter, appeared from the kitchen with a trencher of bread, stew, and a cup of ale that sloshed close to the rim. I took them to a corner table, as far away from others as possible.

  The bench creaked under my weight. The stew was thin, mostly broth, but hot. Around me, the noise pressed close. I took a sip of the ale and it went down easier than I expected, bitter but warm. I drank deep, hoping it might dull the ache in my chest.

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  The warmth spread slow, loosening the edges of the night. I set the cup aside and reached for another piece of bread.

  “Didn’t think they let faces like yours wander without a leash.”

  The voice came from too near. I turned. A man stood beside my table, his smile uneven and his eyes glassy with drink. His clothes were travel-worn, his beard patchy, and his confidence unearned.

  He leaned one hand on the table, the other gesturing toward my untouched meal. “You eat alone, drink alone… seems a waste of good company.”

  I didn’t answer.

  He mistook my silence for invitation and pulled out the opposite chair, the legs scraping loud against the floorboards.

  “If I wanted company, I’d have paid for it,” I said coldly.

  He laughed, low and slurred. “Come now, don’t be cold. Not every night you find a face like yours in a place like this.”

  The din around us carried on, the rest of the tavern content to ignore us. I kept my gaze on my food, hand still around the cup. His shadow fell across my meal, his breath sour with ale.

  He dragged his chair closer. The smell of ale and sweat thickened between us.

  “Tell you what,” he said, voice roughening. “You share a drink with me, and I’ll make sure you have a good time tonight.”

  “You’d have to know how to give one first.”

  For a breath, the grin froze on his face. Then the color rose in his neck, blotching red beneath the stubble.

  “What did you say?”

  I finally looked at him. “I said, why don’t you try learning how before you offer.”

  He shoved his chair, the legs screeching across the floorboards before he threw it aside. It hit the wall with a crack that cut through the noise of the tavern.

  Conversations faltered. A few heads turned, only long enough to judge whether it was worth caring. When no one moved, the hum of talk crept back like nothing had happened.

  He leaned over the table, hands braced on either side of my meal. The smell of him closed in heavy. “Think you’re clever do you?” he snarled. “Got a tongue on you, I’ll give you that.”

  I met his glare, too tired to care. “Careful. Someone might mistake you for a threat.”

  The words landed sharper than his wits could keep up with. His jaw tightened and a flush crept up his neck.

  “You little–”

  He moved fast for a drunk, shoving the table hard enough that the cup toppled, ale spilling across the wood. He raised his hand, the motion clumsy but full of intent.

  I twisted, ready to dodge – and to give him one of my own for the trouble – but another hand caught his wrist mid-swing.

  “If you plan on using this hand to eat, drink, or wipe your ass again, I’d pull it back now. She’s got a temper that’ll singe this hand right off.”

  The man froze. His mouth opened, closed again. He turned, trying to wrench free, but the grip only tightened.

  Lioren stood just behind him.

  Taller than most in the room, he cut a broad shadow across the lamplight. His long black hair was pulled back in a few loose braids, a beard to match, shoulders filling the space between the tables. The drunk looked small against him, though ale made him bold enough to try pretending otherwise.

  Lioren gave a faint, almost bored sigh and released him with a shove.

  The man stumbled a step back, rubbing his wrist. “Who the fuck are you supposed to be?” the man spat, words slurring. “Another of her little whoresons? She ain’t worth the trouble, friend. Bitch’ll spurn you same as she did me.”

  The laughter died in Lioren’s throat. The smirk stayed, but it changed, gone from amused to something colder. He reached forward, caught the man by the throat, and dragged him close enough that their faces nearly touched.

  Frost bloomed where Lioren’s fingers met the man’s throat, thin crystals spidering down into his shirt. A sliver of ice shaped itself from his other hand, narrow and sharp, stopping just shy of the drunk’s eye. The tavern light bent off it like glass.

  “Keep flapping that tongue and I’ll poke that eye out just to see if there’s anything worth pokin’.”

  The drunk’s face went slack the moment the words left Lioren’s mouth. For a beat he looked like he might try to laugh it off, then his courage curdled. Lioren’s grip loosened and the man stumbled backwards, tripping over the overturned chair. He scrambled to his feet and bolted for the door.

  A few snickers hissed around the tables, the tavern didn’t seem troubled by Lioren’s display of Casting. Lioren watched the man go with one lazy blink, then shook his hands as if to shrug the frost off.

  He turned back to me, that ridiculous, pleased grin already in place. “If I remember right, last we parted you was on your way to rescue your husband. Don’t tell me this is where you thought you’d find ‘im. If it is, I’ve got bad news ‘bout the man you married.”

  “Funny. Last I saw you, you were staying behind with Brenn. The Brotherhood was supposed to pick you up when they swung back through. Didn’t think ‘back through’ meant the brothel a few towns over.”

  Lioren barked a laugh, loud enough to draw a few glances from nearby tables. “Brenn and I came through together, don’t look so shocked. Figured we’d stop here for a warm meal, and an even warmer bed.”

  “And the Brotherhood? You just walk off whenever you please?”

  “Sure. They let anyone walk off.”

  He grinned, the edge of it still smug. “They don’t keep chains love, just ledgers. Stop payin’ you the moment your boots leave camp. Can’t collect for jobs you ain’t there for.”

  I hadn’t meant to smile, but it crept in before I could stop it. of all people to run into, it had to be Lioren. Loud and impossible to ignore. And yet, somehow, it felt good seeing him here. His presence brought a kind of comfort I hadn’t realized I’d been missing in this unfamiliar place.