Queen of Shadows (Throne of Glass 4)

So he did, until he got to the knowledge he’d been holding in all night.

“Just say it,” she said, with a direct, unyielding sort of look. He wondered if she realized that for all she complained about his alpha nonsense, she was pure-blooded alpha herself.

Rowan took a long breath. “Lorcan’s here.”

She straightened. “That’s why you came.”

Rowan nodded. And why keeping his distance was the smarter move; Lorcan was wicked and cunning enough to use their bond against them. “I caught his scent sneaking around near Mistward and tracked it to the coast, then onto a ship. I picked up his trail when I docked this evening.” Her face was pale, and he added, “I made sure to cover my tracks before hunting you down.”

Over five centuries old, Lorcan was the strongest male in the Fae realm, equal only to Rowan himself. They’d never been true friends, and after the events of a few weeks ago, Rowan would have liked nothing more than to slit the male’s throat for leaving Aelin to die at the hands of the Valg princes. He might very well get the chance to do that—soon.

“He doesn’t know you well enough to immediately pick up your scent,” Rowan went on. “I’d bet good money that he got on that boat just to drag me here so I’d lead him to you.” But it was better than letting Lorcan find her while he remained in Wendlyn.

Aelin swore with creative colorfulness. “Maeve probably thinks we’ll also lead him right to the third Wyrdkey. Do you think she gave him the order to put us down—either to get the key, or afterward?”

“Maybe.” The thought was enough to shoot icy rage through him. “I won’t let that happen.”

Her mouth quirked to the side. “You think I could take him?”

“If you had your magic, possibly.” Irritation rippled in her eyes—enough so that he knew something else nagged at her. “But without magic, in your human form … You’d be dead before you could draw your sword.”

“He’s that good.”

He gave her a slow nod.

She looked him over with an assassin’s eye. “Could you take him?”

“It’d be so destructive, I wouldn’t risk it. You remember what I told you about Sollemere.” Her face tightened at the mention of the city he and Lorcan had obliterated at Maeve’s request nearly two centuries ago. It was a stain that would forever linger, no matter what he told himself about how corrupt and evil its residents had been. “Without our magic, it’s hard to call who’d win. It would depend on who wanted it more.”

Lorcan, with his unending cold rage and a talent for killing gifted to him by Hellas himself, never allowed himself to lose. Battles, riches, females—Lorcan always won, at any cost. Once, Rowan might have let him win, let Lorcan end him just to put a stop to his own miserable life, but now … “Lorcan makes a move against you, and he dies.”

She didn’t blink at the violence that laced every word. Another part of him—a part that had been knotted from the moment she left—uncoiled like some wild animal stretching out before a fire. Aelin cocked her head. “Any idea where he’d hide?”

“None. I’ll start hunting him tomorrow.”

“No,” she said. “Lorcan will easily find us without you hunting him. But if he expects me to lead him to the third key so he can bring it back to Maeve, then maybe …” He could almost see the wheels turning in her head. She let out a hum. “I’ll think about that tomorrow. Do you think Maeve wants the key merely to keep me from using it, or to use it herself?”

“You know the answer to that.”

“Both, then.” Aelin sighed. “The question is, will she try to use us to hunt down the other two keys, or does she have another one of your cadre out searching for them now?”

“Let’s hope she hasn’t sent anyone else.”

“If Gavriel knew that Aedion is his son …” She glanced toward the bedroom door, guilt and pain flickering on her lovely features. “Would he follow Maeve, even if it meant hurting or killing Aedion in the process? Is her control over him that strong?”

It had been a shock earlier to realize whose son lounged at the kitchen table. “Gavriel …” He’d seen the warrior with lovers over the centuries, and seen him leave them at Maeve’s order. He’d also seen him ink the names of his fallen men onto his flesh. And of all his cadre, only Gavriel had stopped that night to help Aelin against the Valg.

“Don’t answer now,” Aelin cut in with a yawn. “We should go to bed.”

Rowan had surveyed every inch of the apartment within moments of arriving, but he asked as casually as he could, “Where should I sleep?”

She patted the bed behind them. “Just like old times.”

He clenched his jaw. He’d been bracing himself for this all night—for weeks now. “It’s not like the fortress, where no one thinks twice about it.”

“And what if I want you to stay in here with me?”

He didn’t allow those words to sink in fully, the idea of being in that bed. He’d worked too damn hard at shutting out those thoughts. “Then I’ll stay. On the couch. But you need to be clear to the others about what my staying in here means.”

There were so many lines that needed to be held. She was off-limits—completely off-limits, for about a dozen different reasons. He’d thought he would be able to deal with it, but—

No, he would deal with it. He’d find a way to deal with it, because he wasn’t a fool, and he had some gods-damned self-control. Now that Lorcan was in Rifthold, tracking them, hunting for the Wyrdkey, he had bigger things to worry about.

She shrugged, irreverent as always. “Then I’ll issue a royal decree about my honorable intentions toward you over breakfast.”

Rowan snorted. Though he didn’t want to, he said, “And—the captain.”

“What about him?” she said too sharply.

“Just consider how he might interpret things.”

“Why?” She’d done an excellent job of not mentioning him at all.

But there was enough anger, enough pain in that one word, that Rowan couldn’t back down. “Tell me what happened.”

She didn’t meet his eyes. “He said what occurred here—to my friends, to him and Dorian, while I was away in Wendlyn—that it was my fault. And that I was a monster.”

For a moment, a blinding, blistering wrath shot through him. It was instinct to lunge for her hand, to touch the face that remained downturned. But he held himself in check. She still didn’t look at him as she said, “Do you think—”

“Never,” he said. “Never, Aelin.”

At last she met his stare, with eyes that were too old, too sad and tired to be nineteen. It had been a mistake to ever call her a girl—and there were indeed moments when Rowan forgot how young she truly was. The woman before him shouldered burdens that would break the spine of someone three times her age. “If you’re a monster, I’m a monster,” he said with a grin broad enough to show off his elongated canines.

She let out a rough laugh, close enough that it warmed his face. “Just sleep in the bed,” she said. “I don’t feel like digging up bedding for the couch.”

Maybe it was the laugh, or the silver lining her eyes, but he said, “Fine.” Fool—he was such a stupid fool when it came to her. He made himself add, “But it sends a message, Aelin.”

She lifted her brows in a way that usually meant fire was going to start flickering—but none came. Both of them were trapped in their bodies, stranded without magic. He’d adapt; he’d endure.

“Oh?” she purred, and he braced himself for the tempest. “And what message does it send? That I’m a whore? As if what I do in the privacy of my own room, with my body, is anyone’s concern.”

“You think I don’t agree?” His temper slipped its leash. No one else had ever been able to get under his skin so fast, so deep, in the span of a few words. “But things are different now, Aelin. You’re a queen of the realm. We have to consider how it looks, what impact it might have on our relationships with people who find it to be improper. Explaining that i

t’s for your safety—”

“Oh, please. My safety? You think Lorcan or the king or whoever the hell else has it in for me is going to slither through the window in the middle of the night? I can protect myself, you know.”

“Gods above, I know you can.” He’d never been in doubt of that.

Her nostrils flared. “This is one of the stupidest fights we’ve ever had. All thanks to your idiocy, I might add.” She stalked toward her closet, her hips swishing as if to accentuate every word as she snapped, “Just get in bed.”

He loosed a tight breath as she and those hips vanished into the closet.

Boundaries. Lines. Off-limits.

Those were his new favorite words, he reminded himself as he grimaced at the silken sheets, even as the huff of her breath still touched his cheek.

Aelin heard the bathroom door close, then running water as Rowan washed up with the toiletries she’d left out for him.

Not a monster—not for what she’d done, not for her power, not when Rowan was there. She’d thank the gods every damn day for the small mercy of giving her a friend who was her match, her equal, and who would never look at her with horror in his eyes. No matter what happened, she’d always be grateful for that.

But … Improper.

Improper indeed.

He didn’t know how improper she could be.

She opened the top drawer of the oak dresser. And slowly smiled.

Rowan was in bed by the time she strutted toward the bathroom. She heard, rather than saw, him jolt upright, the mattress groaning as he barked, “What in hell is that?”

She kept going toward the bathroom, refusing to apologize or look down at the pink, delicate, very short lace nightgown. When she emerged, face washed and clean, Rowan was sitting up, arms crossed over his bare chest. “You forgot the bottom part.”

She merely blew out the candles in the room one by one. His eyes tracked her the entire time. “There is no bottom part,” she said, flinging back the covers on her side. “It’s starting to get so hot, and I hate sweating when I sleep. Plus, you’re practically a furnace. So it’s either this or I sleep naked. You can sleep in the bathtub if you have a problem with it.”