Nesta didn’t reply as his fingers flicked against her, and she came again.
Nesta did not venture down to the city to see Feyre. Or Amren.
But she kept going to the stairs. She hadn’t been able to reach the bottom again. Part of her knew that if she wanted to, she might accomplish it—just as she might open her mouth and ask Cassian to take her to the river house. But she didn’t.
So she kept trying the stairs for another week straight, always getting about halfway down before turning back, her legs absolute jelly by the time she returned to the hallway.
It was fitting, given that her arms were jelly, too. Yes, she wielded the sword with her entire body, but her arms hurt most of all. And it didn’t help that they’d started on shields now.
No one had managed to slice Gwyn’s ribbon in two.
They all tried at the start and end of every lesson, and all failed. Nesta had begun to resent the sight of a ribbon anywhere—tying back Roslin’s red hair, folded in the accessory drawer of her dressing table, even bound for place-keeping into the latest romance Emerie had loaned her. They all laughed at her. Taunted her.
So Nesta ran the steps, and practiced, and failed. She took Cassian to her bed every night and sometimes during the day, though they never slept in each other’s rooms. Not once. They fucked, they savaged each other, and then they parted.
No matter that there were some nights when she wanted him to stay. Wanted to roll off him and snuggle into his warmth and fall asleep to the sound of his breathing. But he always left before she mustered the courage to ask.
Nesta was leafing through a tome of military history in the library—that had one paragraph on Valkyrie ambush strategies—when Gwyn appeared. “Tell me you found their secret to cutting the ribbon.”
“You and that ribbon,” Nesta muttered, shutting the tome. Of all of them, Gwyn had become the most relentless about succeeding.
Gwyn crossed her arms, pale robes rustling. She winced and rubbed her shoulder. “Did you know shields weighed so much? I certainly didn’t. No wonder the Valkyries learned to use them as weapons as deadly as their swords.” She sighed. “They’d have been quite a sight in battle: cracking open enemy skulls with blows from their shields, throwing them to knock an opponent onto their backs before skewering them …” She rubbed her shoulder again. “Their arm muscles must have been as hard as steel.”
Nesta snorted. “Indeed.” She cocked her head. “Now that you’re here, I want to ask a favor.”
Gwyn arched a brow. “About the Trove?”
“No.” Nesta knew she had to scry—soon—for the Harp. She’d lost a good week in the mountains, and if Queen Briallyn already had the Crown … Time was not on their side. But she said, “You mentioned a while ago that you have evening services—with music, right?”
Gwyn smiled. “Oh, yes. You want to join us? I promise, it’s not all religious stuff. I mean, it is, but it’s beautiful. And the cave we have the service in is beautiful, too. It was carved by the underground river that flows beneath the mountain, so the walls are smooth as glass. And it’s acoustically perfect—the shape and size of the space amplifies and clarifies each voice within.”
“It sounds heavenly,” Nesta admitted.
“It is.” Gwyn smiled again, eyes lighting with pride. “Some of the songs you’ll hear are so ancient they predate the written word. Some of them are so old we didn’t even have them in Sangravah. Clotho found them in books shelved below Level Seven. Hana—she’ll be the one who plays the lute—figured out how to read the music.”
“I’ll be there.” Nesta shifted on her feet. “I think I need something like that.” At Gwyn’s quizzical look, Nesta said, “I …” She fumbled for the smoothest way to say it. “I …”
Gwyn slid her hands into the robe’s pockets, her face open—waiting.
Nesta finally said, letting herself voice the words, “After the war, I was in a bad place. I still am, I suppose, but for more than a year after the war …” She couldn’t look Gwyn in the eye. “I did a lot of things I regret. Hurt people I regret harming. And I hurt myself. I drank day and night and I …” She didn’t want to say the word to Gwyn—fucked—so she said, “I took strangers to my bed. To punish myself, to drown myself.” She shrugged a shoulder. “It’s a long story, and not one worth telling, but through it all, I picked taverns and pleasure halls to frequent because of the music. I’ve always loved music.” She braced herself for the damning judgment. But only sorrow filled Gwyn’s face.