The Knight and the Moth (The Stonewater Kingdom, #1)(95)

“You needn’t wear the title if it no longer fits you,” Rory murmured. “You needn’t do anything you do not wish to.”

The king’s gaze shot to him. “Yes, she does. That’s the whole point. To swear to me is to swear to my wishes, my aspirations—my kingship. If she vows to be my knight, she vows devotion. To do as I ask, just as you and Maude have.” His eyes darted to me, then back to Rory. “Yes?”

“Yes,” Rory snapped. “We swore loyalty—but not mindlessness. She’s not here to give up more of her liberty, Benedict. The abbess did not own her Diviners, the Omens do not own Traum, and you do not own the Stonewater Kingdom, nor your knights, just for some words said in a ceremony.”

“That’s not—” Benji flushed. “You’ve never seen the importance, the virtue, of noble vows.”

A deathly calm came over Rory. “Because I’m neither noble nor virtuous?”

Maude rubbed her brow as if she were watching two siblings squabble over a toy. “Wrong time, wrong place.”

“This armor fits me better than my Divining robe ever did,” I said abruptly. “It’s an honor to wear it.” I reached up. Grazed the rim of my shroud. “But I’ve sworn to Aisling, and I’ve sworn to the Omens, and I’ve sworn to my friends, who are now forever gone.” I drew in a long breath. “I think I would like to stop promising myself away, or else there will be nothing left of me to give, King Castor.”

“A fine answer, Bartholomew,” the gargoyle commended.

Benji’s cheeks were still red. He turned away from Rory. “Fine.” The king lowered the arming sword to my left shoulder, then my right. “Sybil Delling. Your armor may dent, your sword may break, but may you never diminish.” He looked upon my shroud, searching for my eyes.

But he could not find me.

“Welcome to my knighthood.”





Hours later, when the moon was high, the gargoyle snoring and Maude lost to sleeping drafts, rest was a stranger. I wandered Petula Hall, still in my armor. I thought maybe I’d check in on Benji, but when I ambled past his door, my feet kept moving.

Taking me where I needed to go.

The door I stopped at had no light dancing under its threshold to invite me. Still, I knocked three times against the wood.

No one answered.

I pressed my brow upon the aged grain. “Myndacious?”

Again, no answer.

Maybe he was asleep. But just as I was about to go—

“Sybil.”

I breathed against the door. Clasped the cold iron knob. Turned it.

Rory was seated upon a long bed, a weary candle lit upon an adjacent table. He wasn’t in his armor anymore—just a pale shirt and trousers. His elbows rested on his knees, his hands dropped between his legs, fingers flexing as I stepped into the room. “Are you all right?”

I closed the door behind me. “I just wanted…”

He waited.

“I just wanted to see you.”

His throat hitched. Then—“Come here.”

The candle caught my visage, casting a long shadow upon the floor. I stepped into the room, walking until there were no more steps to take—until my armored toes were pointed at Rory’s bare ones. Slowly, my hand dropped into his black hair, my fingers tangling in the silken mess.

He looked up, gravel in his voice. “You’re still in your armor.”

“I didn’t let the gargoyle take it off.”

“Why?”

“I feel stronger with it on.”

Rory held me in his gaze. I thought he might lecture me on martyrdom or strength—on the impossible weight of living.

He rose to his feet instead. Put his hands to my face—held my cheeks with an imploring pressure. “What happens at Aisling Cathedral is not your fault. The Omens and the terrible things they’ve done are not your fault. Lost Diviners, past and present, are not your fault. You have no failures or falsehoods to amend for, no vows to tether you, no strength to prove.” He soothed my hair, as if to comb away the knots of my despair. “Especially to me.”

My body had always been strong—and ever just enough. But whatever my soul was made of was frail. Like birch bark, like gossamer, like the wings of a moth. When Rory brought his lips to my forehead, kissing it with unbearable softness, speaking the language of pain and reprieve into me, that frail little soul began to fortify.

“It’s heavy,” I murmured. “My armor.”

“I know.” He took a step back, eyes dropping to my mouth. “Let me help you.”

He began with my pauldrons.

Clasps were undone—armored plates removed first from my shoulders, then arms. Rory released my hands from their gauntlets. Next came my breastplate. When that had joined the pile of armor upon the floor, Rory dropped to his knees and began to work the clasps at my thighs—the cuisses, the poleyns. The greaves upon my shins fell with a clang, and then it was just the intricate web of plates—the sabbaton—over my boots.

Rory discarded them all, then removed my boots, too. When he looked up at me from his knees, it was the same way I’d looked up while being knighted. There wasn’t a sword between us, but he was just as vulnerable as I’d been.

When the armor was off, Rory rose to his feet. “Sit on the bed.”