until finally she broke away and he took her hand. ‘Come on,’ he said hoarsely. ‘I will find us some company.’
‘Christopher?’ Wynter murmured, not certain if he was awake. ‘Thank you for the scòns. They were delicious.’
Christopher squeezed her waist in silent reply and Wynter shifted her head against his shoulder, gazing out into the gloom of the tent. Across the gentle rise and fall of his chest she could just make out Frangok’s back, and a tuft of Soma’s pale hair. Somewhere beyond that again, Hallvor snored softly.
At Christopher’s whispered request, the three Merron women had wordlessly risen from their beds, stumbled into Razi’s tent, flung their covers onto the ground and lain straight back down again. Wynter suspected that they had barely even woken from their sleep to do so. She was so painfully grateful to them that she hardly knew how to express it. But, despite their presence and despite her very great tiredness, she found it no easier to be with Christopher without wanting to kiss him, without wanting to touch him, and she lay tensely by his side, longing to run her hand beneath his shirt, just to feel the warmth of his bare stomach beneath her palm.
Christopher lay on his back, Wynter’s head on his shoulder, her arm curled on his chest. He seemed perfectly happy just to have her by his side, and was idly running his thumb across the twisted woollen bracelet she wore around her wrist.
He spoke softly, his voice a gentle vibration beneath her cheek. ‘What do you wish for, Protector Lady? When this is all over and our lives are our own. What is it that will make you happy?’
The answer to this unexpected question was so clear and sudden and complete that it almost brought tears. A cottage shaded by walnut trees, she thought. Beside a river filled with trout. A workshop, spicy with wood shavings and resin. Somewhere that I can make good things, strong enough to last a lifetime.
Christopher waited patiently for her reply, but Wynter did not answer. She might as well just say why wish for the impossible, and leave it at that. Her desire for Christopher faded slowly beneath the terrible knowledge that everything else she had hoped for was lost. In the softly breathing silence, she closed her hand around a fistful of Christopher’s shirt and tried to figure what it might be that he would wish for. Wynter had an awful feeling that everything he had ever truly wanted had already been irretrievably stolen from him by Wolves. Still she turned her head and whispered, ‘What is it would make you happy, love?’
‘Oh, you know,’ he said softly, ‘all the good things – a big shiny palace, solid gold servants, diamond-studded concubines.’
Wynter chuckled. That was so utterly not what he wanted. ‘You’re a menace.’
‘Oh, aye,’ he murmured, ‘I am that.’
There was a moment’s silence, during which Christopher’s scarred hand closed gently around Wynter’s wrist. She felt him relaxing into sleep.
‘Christopher,’ she whispered. ‘We should talk. There are things we should discuss about court life. Things that we—’ ‘No.’ Spoken softly, the gentlest of sounds.
‘No?’
‘I know all I need to know.’
‘Chris—’ ‘Protector Lady. I know all that I need to know.’
She lay in uncertain silence for a moment, then went to speak once more.
Christopher tilted his head. His whisper caressed her cheek. ‘Settle your head down, lass, and stop your fretting. Razi will be here soon.’
Wynter settled her head back onto his shoulder. Frowning, she tightened her fingers in his and watched as their joined hands rose and fell with the easy motion of his chest. Eventually his steady breathing lulled her, her blood slowed to a peaceful rhythm, and she slept.
A ROAR OF SMOKE
WYNTER STOOD in the main thoroughfare of the camp and listened to the silence. The road was a humpbacked ribbon of moonlight stretching away to the deserted barricades. Behind her, Alberon’s tent slept beneath the wide-eyed moon.
Why was it so quiet? Where were all the subtle noises of a night-time camp? Wynter listened in vain for the discreet tramp and murmur of the sentries, the snores, the sighs, the coughs of sleeping men. There was none of that – just a low creaking, like a heavy sack swinging idly from a pulley rope. She looked up and down the road, but could find no source for the sound.
Alberon’s voice drifted from the tent above, his words clear, though softly spoken.