The Knight and the Moth (The Stonewater Kingdom, #1)(99)

I lifted it slowly, the journey to my own reflection arduous. I saw my face bereft of gossamer. Pale skin and a flushed, swollen mouth. Silver eyebrows and hair—unkempt. A slightly crooked nose.

Eyes.

My breath went out. Because of all the lies the abbess had told me at Aisling, all her falsehoods regarding signs and gods, there was one truth hidden among them. I had been forever changed by drowning in the spring upon the chancel. The eyes I looked upon were not the eyes of a young woman. They were not the eyes of a human at all.

They were pallid. White. Completely bereft of iris or pupil, like those of an unpainted statue. Hewn entirely of stone.

Just like an Omen.

I dropped the looking glass onto the table and fumbled for my shroud.

The chamber door opened.

Rory was there in poorly fastened pants, holding a tray. There was a pitcher, bread, and berries upon it.

I froze, and so did he.

“You look like you’ve just robbed me.” His eyes fell over my naked body, and I heard his breath leave him. But then his gaze snagged on the shroud in my hand, then the looking glass, still wobbling on the table. His foot swung back, and the chamber door slammed shut. “What’s wrong?”

I look like a monster.

My fingers twisted in my shroud. I turned to his shelves, my voice shaking. “Your room is an impressive collection of… everything.”

Rory said nothing, the line of his shoulders drawing tight.

“Where did you get it all?”

It took him a moment to speak. “I never had anything,” he said. “Not at Pupil House II, and not in Coulson Faire. The Artful Brigand… He thought it funny, denying me basic necessities in a place as opulent as Castle Luricht.” He touched the three gold rings in his ear. “Benji’s grandfather gave me these. They were the first things I ever truly owned. But even when I was out from the Brigand’s yoke and Maude’s squire, my hands felt empty, so I tried to fill them. A bad habit, I know.”

I realized with a sinking stomach that his pause was for shame. He thought that I was looking down at him.

“I assumed Maude would beat me or at the very least dismiss me when she found out I was a thief. She fit me with armor instead. Said fingers were not so light when clasped by gauntlets.” Rory’s voice quieted. “She looked out for me. Even pulled the weight of her family name that I might be knighted.”

He nodded at his shelves. “I’ve paid for these. Or replaced them with something of value. It took time, and the habit’s hard to kick, but I went back and paid—”

“I don’t care that you steal things, Rory.”

His shoulders eased a whit, but his gaze remained strained. “Then why are you looking at me differently?”

“How could you say I was beautiful?” My whisper was a horrible rasp. “My eyes. I’m like them.”

It took him a moment to catch up. When he did, his face was a charming conflict of relief and concern. “It’s Aisling’s spring water,” he said. “You’ve been swallowing it for ages.”

I didn’t want to look at him. “I guessed they’d be horrible. That they might be stone. That dreaming and drowning had altered me in some vital way. When the Ardent Oarsman knocked off my helmet and glimpsed them, he dropped his guard, like he couldn’t fathom what he was seeing.” My chest was heavy. “Maybe he couldn’t believe, beneath gossamer, that a Diviner and an Omen were not so different.”

Rory’s throat hitched and his voice hardened, like he was trying to steel me with his assuredness. “You’re nothing like them, Sybil.”

“I needed to know. I’ll never be able to see myself clearly if it is ever through Aisling’s shroud. But knowing you’d seen my eyes and had left the room… I thought maybe you’d changed your mind about me. That you were repulsed or regretful—”

Rory was across the room in a moment. His tray hit the table with a raucous clatter and he ripped the shroud from my hands, tossing it onto the floor. He kissed me. Hard. “You don’t like me when I’m a good knight,” he said over my lips. “And you don’t like me when I’m bad.”

I let out a startled laugh, nodding at the mess of blankets upon his bed. “Evidence to the contrary.”

He grinned against my skin, then withdrew to look into my eyes. “You are beautiful, Sybil Delling. So fucking beautiful. You’re strong and smart and noble.” He grasped the nape of my neck, and I wondered if he liked to touch me there because he could aim my gaze. “But I think I like it best when you’re wrong.”

I shook my head. But I was a poor player at derision—I smiled.

“I left to get us food.” Another kiss, this time on my cheek. “I haven’t changed my mind about anything.” Another, on my neck. “I’m so far the opposite of repulsed or regretful about you that I’m lost.”

Rory took my hand. Put my fingers to his lips. “Don’t go.” The moon shone over us, just a young man and a young woman standing together, a strange sacrality between us that had nothing to do with portents or Aisling Cathedral or Omens. “I want to keep looking at you,” he murmured into my knuckles, “all night.”

“And the rules?” My pulse was a torrid rush. “The knighthood bans bed relations. You said so yourself.”