"What about our escort?" Clarice asks, still keeping trying me upright. I can feel her own fatigue wearing down on her, but I don't want to push her away.
"They're outside the town at the lake's shore," Rohana answers.
"Thomas and Katarina are already at the inn with a change of clothes for everyone," Willa continues. "Lance is staying with the escort to make sure nothing bad happens."
Clarice shifts on her feet at the mention of her brother's name. She hasn't said anything about his missing presence the last few days, and I've grown rather used to him being near, which is why it's weird to know he's not here now. He would've been all over the place helping people. I'm worried about him, but I know better than to try and pry into his head and make him talk. He's like his sister. He'll talk if he wants to, not when others want them to.
"Now go get some rest," the woman orders, her own tiredness sagging her shoulders. "This is only one day out of many that you'll face something like this, and it's only going to get worse from here." She mists without another word, leaving the rest of us to walk a block to the inn. My legs say no, but my mind needs the touch of the brisk night wind and its silence.
We start walking, but it's not long before I feel Clarice's body start to succumb to its own tiredness. I give Benny who has been keeping to her other side a nod.
"Let me take him, Clarice," he offers, putting a hand on her arm.
"No, it's fine. I got it."
"Clarice," I insist. Her eyes find mine, and it doesn't take much before she sighs and nods to Benny.
He slips in behind her and takes her place. She stumbles a few steps in front of us, not arguing when Garrison scoops her up in one fluid motion. She rests her head on his shoulder and is asleep within seconds. A part of me is jealous that he's the one holding her, but the other part of me is glad that he is. The two of them have grown a rather unlikely friendship. I'll admit, it's odd to not hear their bickering or the sounds of punches being exchanged, but it's nice to see her so peaceful as she sleeps in his arms.
Benny and I share a glance as we near the only building with all of its lights still on.
"Don't look at me, I'm not carrying you." I roll my eyes at him, thankful for his playful words.
The inn owner is a broad-shouldered man. He's built like a damn boulder, and the tiny size of his short-haired wife is completely at odds with his size.
They welcome us in, the large dining room and bar the first room we enter. They ask if we prefer meals down here or in our rooms. The Ginerva and half of the Bhaltayr stay in the dining room to eat, the smell of the warm bread, seasoned meat, fresh rolls, green beans, and mashed potatoes making my stomach rumble as the rest of us walk through the courtyard, and then up the stairs to the second floor where they've given us our rooms.
Kainda, the innkeeper's wife, leads us through the open arched halls that are left exposed to the chilly night air. The Bhaltayr share four rooms, the Ginerva only one since two of them will take watch outside. Me, Benny, and Garrison who still carries Clarice follow Kainda to a pair of mahogany double doors.
"It's the biggest room we have, and we've been told by many noblemen that the room is quite comfortable and suiting. We just hope it's suitable enough for Your Majesties," she says. I refrain from telling her that even a servant's room would've done for the night, as I don't want to insult her in any way shape, or form. I'm not sure her rather large and very muscled husband would take kindly to that
Instead, I thank her and offer her a smile as she opens the doors.
This...this is more than comfortable.
The doors open straight into the bedroom, the bed large enough to hold five of us. The hardwood floors are covered with soft carpet, and the walls are decorated with paintings of the town and lake. The bedposts have thin sheer curtains tied to them, easily being able to be released to enclose you within its comfort. The windows on each side of the bed look out at the lake and the town that sits at its edge. I can see the moonlight reflecting off of the water, the town's buildings a dark silhouette against it. Curtains hang on them as well, patterned perfectly with the rest of the rustic yet soft decor. Two couches sit in the center of the room before the bed, plush and cream-colored.
The room is warm despite there being no fire as if the room itself is alive and made to simply hold in the warmth within its body. As Benny helps me limp in, I catch a glimpse of the bathroom through the open doorway to the right. It's just as large as the bedroom, the basin in its center half the size of the bed. Another white fur carpet lays beneath it, a rack of towels hanging on one wall, several colored bottles, and bars of soap on another.
Thomas and Kat walk out of the bathroom, clothes and towels already filling their arms as they lay them on opposite sides of the bed. That's when the realization hits me. Clarice and I will be sharing the room. We'll be sharing one bed. I suppose its grand size will allow us some respectable legroom, but the idea of sharing a bed with her, even when my heart skips and my stomach flutters at the thought, has protests stacking up on my tongue.
Kainda speaks before I'm able to. "The water's warm, and there's already buckets along the wall full of more hot water. I'll have your food brought up shortly, and, uh...I'll make sure some poultices are brought up as well to all of the rooms."
And here I was thinking we all hid our aches and sores pretty well. "Thank you, Kainda. We greatly appreciate your hospitality and offerings."
She smiles politely and curtsies. I don't miss the curious and yearning glance she passes to Clarice as Garrison carefully sets her down on one of the couches. There's something she wants to ask, but she turns and leaves before I can tell her it's alright to speak her mind.
Benny helps me onto the other couch, telling me that I need to lose some weight before easily dodging my rather pathetic punch and following Kainda out the door. Garrison is on his heels, and when he turns to close the doors behind him, he glances over to the bed and gives me a look as if knowing that I'm more than uncomfortable with sharing a bed with someone who I once never minded being in such close quarters with.
"What in ten hells happened?" Kat seethes, rushing over to find the reason for my limp.
"You don't want to know," I mutter, settling deeper into the couch. "She should bathe first."
Kat squints her eyes at me, knowing I'm avoiding her question and debating whether to either force it out of me or not. Whatever she sees in my posture has her working her jaw before turning towards Clarice and kneeling in front of her.
"Clarice," she whispers. "Clare, wake up."
Clarice moans, settling further into the couch. Thomas rolls up his sleeves before putting his hands on his hips and shaking his head while he eyes my disgusting clothing. I haven't really had a moment to notice how the black stuff from the Banevenin and the blood have made my clothing stiff and crumbly. Clarice looks just as bad.
"Clarice you need to bathe," Kat insists as Thomas starts trying to untie my boots.
"Idonwanna," Clarice slurs.
"You smell like cow shit and ten-year-old rotten sewage."
Clare's eyes shoot open, her brows drawn. "I do not."
"No, you're right. You smell twice as bad as that." Clarice groans as she tries to bury her face into the pillow. "Now come on. The faster we get this...stuff off you, the sooner you can fall asleep again. Up, up! Now!"
It takes Kat pulling on Clarice's arm until she falls out of the couch for Clare to stand and woozily walk to the bathroom. The two of them argued the entire time it took for Kat to scrub the filth off of Clarice.
Meanwhile, Thomas and I tried not to gag as we slowly uncovered me layer by layer. His eyes snapped to the now pink line across my stomach once I threw off my shirt after a good few minutes of struggling to do so. It wasn't as badly dirtied as the rest of my clothes are, seeing as my original shirt was practically torn off of me and I had to replace it earlier, but it still had blood from tonight all over it.
Thomas hasn't said much, but I haven't missed how often his eyes go to the scar.
Food was brought in by one of the women who work here at the inn while Clarice was still in the tub. I ate without hesitating, thanking the woman and asking that she relay my thanks and compliments to the rest of the staff. I forced Thomas to sit down and share my plate, though I didn't miss how he only took a few bites of everything before standing to fiddle about the room.
When Clarice came out wearing nothing but an oversized shirt, she headed straight for the bed. Kat ran in front of her before she could fall into it and nearly threw Clarice back onto the couch and shoved the second plate of food into her lap. For someone who was eager for food earlier, she sure did protest rather grandly to the roasted chicken, sweet potatoes, and sautéed vegetables.
I left to take my own bath which Thomas had already changed the water out of while she ate. My skin was raw and red from how furiously I scrubbed everything off by the time I got out and changed. When I walked back into the room, Kat was gathering our clothes in a basket and Clarice was dead asleep in the bed, settled on her left side.
Thomas gestured to my neck as I stood awkwardly at the foot of the bed, waiting for them to leave. I glanced down and found the ring hanging at the end of the still around me. It had black stuff on the chain, yet the ring was somehow left untouched. When I looked back up he held out another clean silver chain for me. I gave him a look saying that I still hated him for giving me the damn thing in the first place, and he just looked at me blankly, clearly saying that he could care less.
Sighing, I unclasped the golden chain, slid the ring off, and then slid it on the silver one. Thomas waited until I clasped it back on before nodding and heading for the door. Kat followed him, and she stared at the ring with narrowed eyes as she walked by.
When the doors closed behind them I stood in the room like an idiot. I looked at the bed longingly, knowing that that was where I wanted to fall asleep, but a voice in the back of my head told me to grab the quilt at the foot of the bed and sleep on the couch. It's just...I haven't shared a bed with Clarice since...
I don't want her to wake up and question why we're in the same bed or get frightened that we are. I know that the whole King and Queen thing has been a question mark for her. She understands that she's a Queen, at least, after Rohana and the others have answered her questions she does. It's just the whole title and them usually meaning that one is connected in a certain...relationship with the other that still gets to her. I know it.
Whenever someone says "the King and Queen," or when the Ginerva refers to us as the "Maiestatis," I see how her eyes will glance at me and then skitter away. She'll bite her bottom lip and then her fingers will fiddle with each other while she tries to make herself look small. I don't know. Maybe I'm being paranoid. Maybe I'm thinking too far into it. Or maybe I'm right, and I should just lay on the couch and forget ever thinking about it.
Frustrated, I run my hands over my face and look at where she still lays fast asleep on the left side of the bed. She always slept on the left side of the bed.
I remember that first night when she sat with her back against my headrest, telling me to sleep and not worry about the new demon monster that had awoken in me coming back. She stayed up all night, and the next night I tried to kill her again, but she stayed. Every night she stayed, and just feeling the small dip of the bed on her side would allow me to go to sleep and not fear what would come, even if I woke up with two different colored eyes.
I sigh and rub my face again. Sleep is rushing through me fast, and if I don't choose soon, I'll end up knocked out on the floor.
Letting out a frustrated growl I close my eyes and let my legs make the decision. They end up at the other end of the bed, and before I can stand here and think about it further, I slide beneath the covers and settle into the pillow.
It's not long before darkness clouds my vision, and I fall into a dreamless sleep.
*****
I don't know what wakes me, but something does. I feel the bed shift and settle deeper into the sheets myself, trying not to be too quick with my movements so I don't wake Clarice. Just as I start to fall into darkness again the bed jerks, and my eyes shoot open.
Clarice still lays on the other side of the bed, but the sheets are tossed off of her and she's spread out like a starfish. Her hair looks tangled, and I try not to let the sudden desire to untangle it with my fingers take action.
I glance around the room once, not finding anything in the shadows or the light of the smaller candles still burning. The bed moves again, and this time I catch Clarice tossing and turning. She flips onto her right side, her back now to me, but that doesn't seem to do it for her and she returns to her left side. She mumbles something, the words muddled together too much that I can't make them out. Her brows knit then bow in concern, and then she's begging someone not to hurt someone else, not to hurt her.
"No. No, please. Don't do it."
"Clarice?" I wince at the scratchiness of my voice. She keeps whispering those words until she's begging in a louder tone.
"Clarice." I sit up and rub the sleep out of my eyes.
"Darius." I look at her, but her eyes are still closed. She's still dreaming. "Darius. Darius, no. No. No-no-no. Darius!" Tears roll down her cheek as she kicks the sheets further away and moves to lie on her back.
I shift closer to her, staying out of reach of her waving arms and kicking legs. "Clarice."
"Darius."
"I'm right here. Wake up, Clare. Clare-" Vines start wrapping themselves around her arms slowly like snakes surrounding their prey.
"Clarice, wake up," I urge, eyes on the growing vines. "Clarice."
"Darius."
"Clare!"
She shoots upright, sweat beading her forehead and neck. Her hair has a thin layer of it at its roots, and her breathing is short and frantic. But her eyes are open.
"Clarice?" The only response I get is a few blinks, and then she's jumping out of the bed and running for the bathroom, the vines falling from her arms in the doorway. I jump out of bed after her, rushing to find what's wrong.
The sound of her heaving reaches my ears before I run in and find her bent over the bucket by the wall. Her body shakes as her stomach keeps heaving. I pull her hair away from her face before it decides to fall into the bucket. Tears still stream down her face, and when she gets a break and lifts her head slightly, I can see the terror written all over her.
"It's alright. You're alright," I coax gently, rubbing my other hand on her back.
Dee, Mak, and Amel rush in, likely having heard her cries from outside. I'm not surprised, as she did scream loudly before she woke. They stop in the doorway when they see us, relief flashing over their face before concern replaces it. I shake my head and they all lower their drawn weapons. They leave a moment later, Dee's brows knotted in a way that tells me she didn't think this would've happened tonight.
She starts gagging again until more of her dinner flows upward. Her body really starts shaking then, and I can do nothing more than hold back her hair and tell her that she's going to be alright. Nothing about this seems alright.
Clarice never had nightmares before, or at least, none that I was aware of. Then again, considering everything that she's been through, I suppose nightmares are only a natural effect of it all.
I still don't know why she was calling my name. The begging for someone not to hurt her is understandable. After all, she was being...tortured for two months. But I've never pegged her as a beggar, and even Branka said that she wouldn't do more than cry through the pain. She never pleaded, never gave them the satisfaction of hearing her beg or scream unless it was Xaxias doing the work, and then there was nothing she could've done to hold back those screams. Sometimes I think that I can hear those screams in my sleep. The one from when Xaxias had his hand on her ribs and she'd tear through the stone walls with her cries. They don't bring nightmares as they did to her tonight, but I'll hear them in the distance as I stand in darkness. It's as if she's still miles away and I can't quite reach her, no matter how loudly her screams are.
"It's okay," I say again. The vomit eventually subsides, but she still holds strongly to the edges of the bucket as her body continues to shake. "Take deep breaths, Clare. I know it's hard, but try to take some deep breaths."
She does try at first, but then she starts crying and her breathing turns from staggered to those giant gulping sobs that you can't control.
"Hey, it's alright. You're okay, you're safe." She shakes her head as she falls to the ground. Her hands still clutch to the end of the bucket. "You're safe, Clare. I'm right here. I'm safe, you're safe, everyone's safe. You have nothing to fear. I'm right here."
"No y-you...y-you were-weren't," she stutters in between her sobs. "You...You d-died...were dying...and I...I-I couldn't...I can't...I can't..." Her sobs get worse and I put my hand on her other shoulder and gently pull her towards me. She lets me, curling up against me. Her hands fist into my shirt as if to stop them from shaking so furiously.
I ignore the voices in my head telling me to leave her be and let someone else comfort her because only days ago I was avoiding her. Heathens, I was avoiding her this morning. I'm a coward for doing so, for walking away from her because I was afraid of feeling the same thing when I'm with her as I have felt with everything else. Nothing.
The day we got her back and I felt nothing seeing her lying there on the beach, fear rooted itself within me that from that moment on, that'd be all I'd ever feel again. I had more with her before, I had the thrill of uncertainty and uncontained happiness, and I lost all that and I was afraid of never getting it back - of really, truly getting her back. So I stayed away, letting myself no where near her because maybe if I wasn't around her, I didn't have to find out.
But dammit, trying to stay away from her or to not think about her is like trying to not breathe. Lord Roland was right. She was on my mind that first day I caught sight of her in the House of Jade's window, watching my mother leave, and she never left.
Avoiding her didn't work. Ignoring her was worse.
Training with her and talking to her over the last two cycles has been rough, to say the least, but I think we both needed it. A fresh start is better than nothing, and I'm torturing myself trying to ignore the fact that it's brought things back.
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