Lain pushed herself upright. Her limbs ached, but not from cold. The blankets had trapped real warmth.
Someone rapped on the wood of the cart. The flap lifted. A man in a dark tunic bowed his head slightly. “Lord Balthir says you’re to come inside when you wake. He’s prepared quarters for you.”
Quarters. The world startled her.
She followed him out of the cart, blinking against the sudden brightness. The snow had thinned to patches along the road, melting into green-brown earth. Below the slope spread a cluster of houses built of pale stone and timber, their chimneys trailing smoke. It was smaller than Vaelun, but tidy; an outpost, rather than a fortress. Men and women moved quietly between the buildings, carrying baskets of food or laundry.
Children laughed somewhere in the distance, then several of them ran from around a corner, chasing a hoop with a stick. The sound felt impossible after everything that had happened.
Morgan’s men were here too, though they seemed relaxed, not on guard. One of them talked with an easy smile to a woman with a basket of bread, as if they’d spent many days having just this conversation.
The servant led her through a narrow street to a low building at the far end of the square. “You may rest here for the evening,” he said, opening the door for her. The corridor inside was quiet, lamps burning low in wrought-iron sconces. He took her to the left of the entryway, stopping at the third door down the hall.
Inside, warmth enveloped her. The room glowed with firelight, its ceiling low and comfortable, with darkly oiled wood furniture and a four-post bed tucked into one velvet-curtained corner. At its center stood a wide copper bath half-filled with steaming water. A low table beside it held folded clothes, a brush, and a vial of golden oil. Another table beside the bed had a carafe of water and a small dish of dried fruit and nuts.
Lain hesitated at the threshold. “This is for me?”
“Yes, Sister,” the servant said. “The Master said you’d traveled far.” He bowed once more and withdrew.
She stood for a long moment, watching the steam rise. The air smelled faintly of lavender.
When she finally undressed, she did so slowly, still half-expecting someone to barge in and tell her it was a mistake. She slipped into the bath and gasped as the heat closed around her, shocking after weeks of cold. Her muscles unwound one by one.
She hadn’t had a bath since her cleansing for the ceremony.
With careful fingers she examined the bruising when the bloodwyrm had knocked her down. Her hands were scabbed from her scramble to stay out of the pit she’d sung into being. She sunk these bits carefully into the hot water.
She leaned her head back against the basin’s rim and exhaled. The sound that escaped her was almost a sob.
For the first time since she’d left Vaelun, she wasn’t afraid.
She wished she could share this comfort with Mallow.
The small table held a bar of lavender soap. She used it to scrub herself from antler to claw. She washed the crusted blood from her wool. There was no scar, only faint pink skin. Lord Balthir’s magic had left no mark. That frightened her more than a scar would have.
A knock sounded at the door. Lain startled, water rippling around her.
“Yes?” she called softly.
“I’ve been sent to assist, Sister,” came the voice of a young woman. “If it pleases my Lady.”
My Lady? “Come in,” she said.
The door opened, and a young woman entered – Kelthi ears, no antlers, her roan wool trimmed neat and glossy. She carried a small satchel of tools and bowed.
“I’m Sena,” she said. Her voice was gentle, lilting with the coastal accent, like Mallow. “You’re Sister Lain, is that so? The Master asked me to tend to your hooves, if you’ll allow.”
Lain blinked. “My…?”
Sena smiled faintly. “It’s custom. Kelthi aren’t expected to manage that alone.”
Lain flushed. “I – I’ve never had anyone do that for me.” In fact, she’d gone to the goatherd to borrow his rasp and brushes, trimming the hooves herself seated on a milking bench beside the goats and sheep.
Sena’s expression softened. “Then we’ll go slowly.”
She sat on the small bench beside the basin, unrolling her tools: a rasp, a small curved blade, soft brushes. She lifted Lain’s claw from the tub.
The touch was intense, the Heat overwhelming. Lain jerked back reflexively.
“I’m sorry,” Lain said, panting. “It’s just –”
Sena glanced at her antlers, then smiled kindly. “I know, Sister.”
Of course she did.
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Sena brought her hand gently to Lain’s bare shoulder. A shudder of pleasure wound up through that touch and Lain nearly submerged herself entirely from embarrassment.
Sena laughed. “It’s meant to feel good. Better still that you’re in season – perhaps you could let yourself… enjoy the care?”
Lain tried to get a hold of herself. She breathed deeply. Shoving down the shame, she nodded.
Sena moved back to the other end of the tub. When her fingers brushed Lain’s ankle, something inside her trembled at the shock of gentleness. It was too much like Mallow.
She fought that feeling down, too.
Sena’s touch was professional and kind, the easy familiarity of someone who had done this all her life. Before beginning to trim her hooves, Sena ran soothing fingers from claw to pastern, massaging. “This is always my favorite place to be touched, when the Heat comes on,” she said softly.
“Who –” Lain swallowed. “Does someone do this for you?”
Sena blushed, grinning, and through the Tuning a complexity of pleasure, memory, and shyness rose. “Well. There is a boy.”
“Are you both from here?” Lain asked, trying to steady her voice, trying to avoid the question she truly wanted answered, about what sort of boy he was – human, or Kelthi? – and how he touched her, and what sorts of things happened between them when her season came on.
Sena shook her head. “He is from here. But I’m from Lethen Bay.”
Lain’s breath caught, all fantasies of Sena and her boy snuffed out at once. “You survived.”
Sena’s eyes flicked up, luminous and sad. “Barely. My family wasn’t so lucky. Lord Balthir’s men found me after the sea swallowed the docks. They brought me here.”
Lain swallowed, unable to speak.
“He says we’ll never have to bow to the Dagorlind again,” Sena went on. “That the wyrms will rise once they’re free.”
Lain didn’t answer. The rasp whispered against the edge of her hoof, the sound soothing and rhythmic.
After a time Sena looked up again, her smile small but real. “You’ve the look of someone who’s seen the wyrms up close,” she said softly. “I can smell the song still on you.”
“Can you?”
Sena nodded. “It clings to the ones they favor. Like pollen to a honeybee.”
Sena lowered her second hoof back into the water. “There,” she said. “Your frogs were quite long. When you’re finished in the tub, I can oil them.”
Lain stood to exit the bath and Sena lifted a towel for her. She wrapped Lain in the soft fabric. When Lain was seated on the bed, she wiped oil along Lain’s hooves with the brush until they gleamed. Her hands were sure, patient, and soon Lain fell back into the intensity of her Heat, allowing the pleasure of Sena’s gentle handling to envelop her. She closed her eyes, ears dropping back, tail flicking pleasantly behind her.
Sena’s methodical oiling softened. She drew her fingers between Lain’s claws, massaging the soft skin at the place where the claws met, then rubbing at the fur between her back claw and the front two. It was entirely too much, but Lain didn’t want her to stop, and it seemed clear Sena would carry on as long as Lain allowed it.
Sena’s hand trailed up once more, to oil the wool of her hocks, slowing there.
“Lady,” Sena said softly. “I could carry on, if you need… relief.”
Lain almost said yes.
But then she swallowed, remembering how Mallow had brought his mouth to her. How similar was this, that she’d nearly been killed and then saved, just to have some kind soul care for her Kelthi hooves with so much gentleness?
The Heat receded behind the heartache.
“Thank you, Sena,” she said. “But.”
Sena nodded, understanding. She stood at last.
Lain looked down, almost ashamed by how beautiful her claws were, by how cared-for she suddenly felt. Tears stung the corners of her eyes before she could stop them.
Sena noticed, but said nothing. She simply bowed again, collected her tools, and moved toward the door.
“Thank you,” Lain managed, voice thick.
The girl smiled. “It’s good to care for someone like us.”
When the door closed, Lain sat in the stillness for a long time. The fire crackled softly. The scent of the oils lingered in the air, cedar, salt, lavender.
Outside, she could hear the sounds of the outpost’s life, gentle and unreal.
For a long while, she couldn’t move. The room still held Sena’s warmth, the ghost of her fingers lingering in her wool. It left her unsteady with something raw and deeper than desire. The sensation of being seen and cared for was almost unbearable.
No one had ever touched her like that without wanting something.
No one but Mallow.
She pressed her hands together in her lap. How easily she’d almost said yes. How the ache of the Heat had blurred into something like grief. She thought of Mallow, his hands in her wool, his voice when he said her name. The tenderness there, the weight of it. He had given her gentleness too. But that gentleness had eventually bared its teeth.
Now even kindness felt like a trap.
She drew a breath, steadying herself, and rose. The clothing Morgan’s servant had left for her lay folded on a chair. It was soft wool, deep green, cut at the hips to free her tail, the sleeves long enough to brush her wrists. It fit perfectly, unsettlingly so.
When she ran her hands over the fabric, she felt the faint texture of embroidery at the seams – the curling lines of wyrm script, so subtle she might have missed it if she hadn’t been looking closely. It was warm and soft, but she couldn’t stop feeling as though she’d stepped into someone else’s skin.
A knock startled her.
She turned, tightening the sash around her waist. “Yes?”
The door opened a little, and the same servant who’d led her from the cart stood there. “My Lord requests your presence for dinner,” he said politely. “If you’ve rested enough. He’d like you to meet a few of his companions. Those who might be of help to you.”
Lain’s ears tilted back. “Help me?”
The man smiled faintly, lowering his head. “Lord Balthir believes you and he share the same hopes for the world. He wishes only to speak with you, Sister. Nothing more.”
Nothing more?
She nodded, though she steadied herself against how impossible such a thing seemed to be. “I’ll come. May I have a moment to prepare?”
The servant nodded. “I will be waiting outside.” He bowed and withdrew.
Lain turned back to the mirror above the basin. The woman looking back at her hardly seemed herself, with pale gleaming antlers, wool brushed smooth, eyes rimmed faintly red from tears. She’d lost weight on this journey, her cheeks hollow and skin red with windburn. The Heat still lingered there, soft and shimmering beneath the surface, but there was something new too. A flicker of uncertainty. Almost fear.
She touched one antler with her fingertips.
Safe. Trapped. She couldn’t tell the difference anymore.
She squared her shoulders, drew a slow breath, and went to the door.