He had wept tears of joy inside as he’d stood at his post in his uniform, a tunic-like jacket called a sherwani falling down to his knees. Her eyes had fallen on him, dark and passionate. A fleeting glance and a shift of her posture were all he’d needed to know that she’d seen him. Ached for him.
“With her there, I worked harder. All the men flocked about her, yearning for her beauty, but only I had seen her naked face.” He could remember the night he’d removed her mask and witnessed her dusky features. As beautiful as the evening sun setting over Mount Qaari’s flank. “We met in secret. How I worshiped her. In my arms, we created such harmony. The Tone of Creation before Niszeh’s Disharmony shattered everything into separate pieces.”
Avena had an almost wicked smile on her lips, her cheeks rosy. He blinked at the passion in her eyes. She nodded, eager for the story, not caring about the farmers drifting out to find their beds. Her tongue flicked over pink lips. Talking of the past had ignited fire in his loins, sensations suffocated by the last years of murky existence. She looked so vibrant, colors shining, not muted.
Dulled.
“She must have found you so gallant,” Avena said, her voice a touch breathy.
“She did. Or I thought she did . . .” The pain of what followed, the betrayal, throbbed across his heart.
Avena frowned. “What happened?”
He swallowed and grabbed his tankard. He brought it halfway to his lips before realizing he’d emptied it. He refilled his cup from the pitcher and took a long, deep drink of the sour beer, the warmth a balm against past injustices. The entire time, Avena watched with gold-flecked eyes, a tremble to her lower lip.
“You don’t have to speak,” she said.
“I loved the wrong woman,” he said, the truth burning. The darkness rose, a thick tide.
“I’m sorry. There was another . . . ?” She swallowed, her cheeks paling. “I mean, was she unworthy?”
“Worse. I killed a man over her,” he said, voice scraping. He felt the knife in his hand. He glanced at the sable glove, surprised it wasn’t stained with Taim’s life. “A good man.”
“Is that why you’re here?” she asked, eyes shining. She took husband again. “You’re a criminal in Tethyr?”
“Qoth, and, no.” He gripped her hand. “It was her betrothed I killed. He was . . .” He racked his mind for the Lothonian word. “Prince. I thought he was forcing her to marry him, but she’d found a way to achieve what she wanted. My path was too slow. But he wasn’t a . . . handsome man. She took from me the pleasures she couldn’t get from him, though she did let him into her bed, too.”
Tears swam in Avena’s eyes. He focused on them. Who does she grieve for? Surely not me.
“He and I dueled,” he finished, unable to speak about that time in the mines with Taim, their conversation on Foonauri’s actions. “I won.”
Shame burned through him, devouring the last of his fond memories. He hadn’t won fairly. It was cowardly what he’d done. Back then, Ōbhin couldn’t admit to himself the truth of Foonauri. He’d clung to his idealized version of her, the girl he’d placed on a pedestal in his youth. She’d been his world, his drive. She couldn’t have betrayed him. Taim had to be wrong. Lying.
“Afterward, she came with me from Qoth, but I couldn’t give her what she needed. In Guirreu, she found it with another.”
Maybe, he thought to himself as Avena wiped away tears, if I hadn’t been so lost after killing Taim, I could have given her what she needed. I broke that day, didn’t I? My soul cracked, and Niszeh resonated through the gaps.
He poured himself more beer.
*
The pain in his eyes swelled that hole in Avena’s heart. She felt a kinship with him. Their naked guilt swirled around them. She seized her tankard, craving the soothing heat. She hated the empty feeling, tried anything not to experience it. The beer did nothing.
“It’s my fault Chames died,” she whispered. His admission placed a weight upon her. The only way to set down the burden was to confess her own guilt. She’d never told anyone.
His dark eyes found hers. No condemnation, only questions. They were sharing truths.
“I begged him to take me out there. After we shared our Red,” she said, “the squall came upon us fast, sweeping over the lake. In moments, the icy shower drenched us. He threw his coat over me to protect me. His shirt was soaked. His hair plastered to his face. He was shaking before we got halfway back. The spring fever fell upon him.”
Emotion overwhelmed her. The way he’d hacked and coughed, the watery sound of his breathing like he drowned with every breath. She’d waited outside Dualayn’s lab as he’d worked to save his son.
“Dualayn tried,” she croaked. “He emerged after two days from his lab crushed. Chames had perished. Despite the new topaz healers. Despite Dualayn’s knowledge, the spring fever claimed Chames.” She stared at Ōbhin with reddened, raw eyes.
She looked down to her tankard.
“He sounded noble,” Ōbhin said. “Valiant.”
“I tried to convince myself it wasn’t my fault,” she said, the guilt squeezing about her heart. “That I hadn’t pestered and begged and cajoled him to take me out.” Avena finished off her ale. The warmth felt
