Queen of Shadows (Throne of Glass 4)

His nostrils flared, and she clamped her lips together to keep from laughing.

He surveyed the room: the massive bed she hadn’t bothered to make that morning, the marble fireplace adorned with trinkets and books, the open door to the giant closet. “You weren’t lying about your taste for luxury.”

“Not all of us enjoy living in warrior-squalor,” she said, grabbing his hand again. She remembered these calluses, the strength and size of his hands. His fingers closed around hers.

Though it was a face she’d memorized, a face that had haunted her dreams these past few weeks … it was new, somehow. And he just looked at her, as if he were thinking the same thing.

He opened his mouth, but she pulled him into the bathroom, lighting a few candles by the sink and on the ledge above the tub. “I meant it about the bath,” she said, twisting the faucets and plugging the drain. “You stink.”

Rowan watched as she bent to grab a towel from the small cabinet by the toilet. “Tell me everything.”

She plucked up a green vial of bath salts and another of bath oil and dumped in generous amounts of each, turning the rushing water milky and opaque. “I will, when you’re soaking in the bath and don’t smell like a vagrant.”

“If memory serves, you smelled even worse when we first met. And I didn’t shove you into the nearest trough in Varese.”

She glared. “Funny.”

“You made my eyes water for the entire damn journey to Mistward.”

“Just get in.” Chuckling, he obeyed. She shrugged off her own cloak, then began unstrapping her various weapons as she headed out of the bathroom.

She might have taken longer than usual to remove her weapons, peel off her suit, and change into a loose white shirt and pants. By the time she finished, Rowan was in the bath, the water so clouded she could see nothing of the lower body beneath.

The powerful muscles of his scarred back shifted as he scrubbed at his face with his hands, then his neck, then his chest. His skin had deepened to a golden brown—he must have spent time outdoors these past weeks. Without clothing, apparently.

He splashed water on his face again, and she started into movement, reaching for the washcloth she’d set on the sink. “Here,” she said a bit hoarsely.

He just dunked it in the milky water and attacked his face, the back of his neck, the strong column of his throat. The full tattoo down his left arm gleamed with the water sliding off him.

Gods, he took up the entire bathtub. She mutely handed him her favorite lavender-scented soap, which he sniffed at, sighed in resignation, and then began using.

She took a seat on the curved lip of the tub and told him everything that had happened since they’d left. Well, mostly everything. He washed while she spoke, scrubbing himself down with brutal efficiency. He lifted the lavender soap to his hair, and she squeaked.

“You don’t use that in your hair,” she hissed, jolting from her perch to reach for one of the many hair tonics lining the little shelf above the bath. “Rose, lemon verbena, or …” She sniffed the glass bottle. “Jasmine.” She squinted down at him.

He was staring up at her, his green eyes full of the words he knew he didn’t have to say. Do I look like I care what you pick?

She clicked her tongue. “Jasmine it is, you buzzard.”

He didn’t object as she took up a place at the head of the tub and dumped some of the tonic into his short hair. The sweet, night-filled scent of jasmine floated up, caressing and kissing her. Even Rowan breathed it in as she scrubbed the tonic into his scalp. “I could still probably braid this,” she mused. “Very teensy-tiny braids, so—” He growled, but leaned back against the tub, his eyes closed. “You’re no better than a house cat,” she said, massaging his head. He let out a low noise in his throat that might very well have been a purr.

Washing his hair was intimate—a privilege she doubted he’d ever allowed many people; something she’d never done for anyone else. But lines had always been blurred for them, and neither of them had particularly cared. He’d seen every bare inch of her several times, and she’d seen most of him. They’d shared a bed for months. On top of that, they were carranam. He’d let her inside his power, past his inner barriers, to where half a thought from her could have shattered his mind. So washing his hair, touching him … it was an intimacy, but it was essential, too.

“You haven’t said anything about your magic,” she murmured, her fingers still working his scalp.

He tensed. “What about it?”

Fingers in his hair, she leaned down to peer at his face. “I take it it’s gone. How does it feel to be as powerless as a mortal?”

He opened his eyes to glare. “It’s not funny.”

“Do I look like I’m laughing?”

“I spent the first few days sick to my stomach and barely able to move. It was like having a blanket thrown over my senses.”

“And now?”

“And now I’m dealing with it.”

She poked him in the shoulder. It was like touching velvet-wrapped steel. “Grumpy, grumpy.”

He gave a soft snarl of annoyance, and she pursed her lips to keep the smile in. She pushed down on his shoulders, beckoning him to dunk under the water. He obeyed, and when he emerged, she rose from the tiles and grabbed the towel she’d left on the sink. “I’m going to find you some clothes.”

“I have—”

“Oh, no. Those are going right to the laundress. And you’ll get them back only if she can make them smell decent again. Until then, you’ll wear whatever I give you.”

She handed him the towel, but didn’t let go as his hand closed around it. “You’ve become a tyrant, Princess,” he said.

She rolled her eyes and released the towel, turning as he stood in a mighty movement, water sloshing everywhere. It was an effort not to peek over her shoulder.

Don’t you even dare, a voice hissed in her head.

Right. She’d call that voice Common Sense—and she’d listen to it from now on.

Striding into her closet, she went to the dresser in the back and knelt before the bottom drawer, opening it to reveal folded men’s undershorts, shirts, and pants.

For a moment, she stared at Sam’s old clothes, breathing in the faint smell of him clinging to the fabric. She hadn’t mustered the strength to go to his grave yet, but—

“You don’t have to give those to me,” Rowan said from behind her. She started a bit, and twisted in pla

ce to face him. He was so damn stealthy.

Aelin tried not to look too jolted by the sight of him with the towel wrapped around his hips, at the tan and muscled body that gleamed with the oils of the bath, at the scars crisscrossing it like the stripes of a great cat. Even Common Sense was at a loss for words.

Her mouth was a little dry as she said, “Clean clothes are scarce in the house right now, and these are of no use sitting here.” She pulled out a shirt and held it up. “I hope it fits.” Sam had been eighteen when he died; Rowan was a warrior honed by three centuries of training and battle.

She pulled out undershorts and pants. “I’ll get you proper clothes tomorrow. I’m pretty sure you’ll start a riot if the women of Rifthold see you walking down the streets in nothing but a towel.”

Rowan huffed a laugh and strode to the clothes hanging along one wall of the closet: dresses, tunics, jackets, shirts … “You wore all this?” She nodded and uncoiled to her feet. He flicked through some of the dresses and embroidered tunics. “These are … very beautiful,” he admitted.

“I would have pegged you for a proud member of the anti-finery crowd.”

“Clothes are weapons, too,” he said, pausing on a black velvet gown. Its tight sleeves and front were unadorned, the neckline skimming just beneath the collarbones, unremarkable save for the tendrils of embroidered, shimmering gold creeping over the shoulders. Rowan angled the dress to look at the back—the true masterpiece. The gold embroidery continued from the shoulders, sweeping to form a serpentine dragon, its maw roaring toward the neck, the body curving down until the narrow tail formed the border of the lengthened train. Rowan loosed a breath. “I like this one best.”

She fingered the solid black velvet sleeve. “I saw it in a shop when I was sixteen and bought it immediately. But when the dress was delivered a few weeks later, it seemed too … old. It overpowered the girl I was. So I never wore it, and it’s hung here for three years.”

He ran a scarred finger down the golden spine of the dragon. “You’re not that girl anymore,” he said softly. “Someday, I want to see you wear this.”