Her, the head of the Trust, Warrick’s mother and the very reason the king refused to chance Nim.
“He loved those who were taken. He loves them still. It is only made worse that they were lost in their attempt to save him and the kingdom.”
Nim stared up at the painting, her fingers curled into her palms. It was her father, tall and proud, dressed in all the finery of his station as adviser to the king. And it was her papa, handsome and strong, calloused hands wrapped casually around the hilt of a sword. She stepped forward, a hitch in her breath. “Thank you,” she whispered. “I haven’t—I haven’t seen him in so long.” The last time she had, he’d looked nothing like the painting. He’d been thin and wan, his familiar dark hair and laughing eyes lost in some intangible way, the magic having taken so much from him that he’d seemed not like himself at all.
“Would you like me to have it moved to your rooms?” Warrick’s tone was measured, nothing but reassurance that neither choice was wrong.
“No.” She swallowed hard. “Let him rest.” At the intimation she sensed from Warrick, she looked at him, knowing trust was the only way to move forward, the only way to know more. She could not keep her secrets from him any longer. “I always thought—I was afraid to bring him to mind. Because when I was in the undercity and I thought of him…”
He stepped closer to place a hand at the small of her back. “It doesn’t work that way, Nim. It’s true that the desire to see him could have drawn you, that it might have been used to bring you nearer the well of magic, but any desire you have cannot affect him. It does not hurt him to be remembered. He could only have been harmed by his own desires, by his own thoughts and actions.” And you, only by your own, he seemed to think, but Warrick did not say it. Because Warrick’s desires and actions could hurt her too. There was a surety with his words, though, that said her father was long past the point of wanting and that everything she’d known of him was gone.
That, at least, was of no surprise to her.
Warrick’s brow pinched, and Nim turned toward him, away from the image of a man she could no longer hope to see again. “What is it?”
“Will you tell me how it is that you came to be able to sense what was happening to you?” He wanted to know how she could tell the magic was drawing her, when so many others could not, how she could feel intimations from them and know when she was being touched by someone whose energy was tied to what waited below Inara. How she had kept herself safe.
“When my father made his bargain, something”—she paused and shook her head—“something came over me. I was home in my bed, the room dark and everyone asleep.” She shivered at the memory, and he ran a hand over her arm. “It was cold, unseasonably so, and my feet were bare.” Her eyes met Warrick’s. He still bore a tiny mark on his brow from the scuffle with his brother. “I walked all the way to the undercity in my night clothes, alone and unafraid. I didn’t remember doing it and have no earthly idea why no one stopped me, but I’ll never forget what I saw there, how the torches lit my path through the catacombs, how the magic tugged me down to her rooms.”
Warrick’s other hand tightened against Nim’s waist, but any unease he felt at the mention of his mother was kept tied within him. He had never told her such secrets—that the head of the Trust was his mother and Calum his brother.
The woman was a queen, but her kingdom was nothing like Inara. The undercity was dark and dangerous, swimming with a current of ancient magic unfathomable in its strength. “She was there, with my father, his blood trailing over his arms, pooling onto the stone floor.” Nim closed her eyes. “It was as if he had no idea I was there, but she… she looked up at me, her eyes as black as onyx. Like Calum’s but darker. Deeper than anything his might ever be. She smiled at me, the queen of all that power, and I could feel it beneath us, around us, lashing me tighter as she smiled… and her…”
“Nim.” Warrick’s tone was sharp, snapping her from the memory to jolt back alert. His concern washed over her, close and warm. He was afraid.
“I’m sorry, I…” She shook her head. “I don’t—I try not to think of her.”
Warrick drew her against him, folding her into an embrace. “Don’t, then. Don’t think of her, Nim.”
As if, returned to her home, the place it all began, such a thing felt possible at all.
Chapter 3
When they returned to her suite, Nim glanced around the neat and tidy space, rich with lush fabrics, dark wood, and heavily cushioned chairs. “This isn’t my room.”
Warrick stared down at her. “I hope you don’t mind. I prefer you in this one instead. I had Maris bring your things.”
“My lady’s maid,” she said.
He replied with a low hum, his hand stroking idly over her arm. Nim pursed her lips.
“I do think I’ll like her. But would it be—” She sighed. “I suppose it’s impossible to have my valet.”
Warrick pinned down the beginning of a smile, his hands sliding to clasp casually behind his back. “Not, I suspect, the best tactic when trying to keep a low profile.” He shifted, and she had the sense he wanted to reach out to her, to touch her again.
She was fighting the same compulsion, and she hated that she would have to give up throwing decorum to the wind. It would be particularly difficult when it came to him.
“You’ll be free to visit them at the manor as you wish, provided you take along Wesley or your personal guard.”
“Thank you,” she said. For trusting me. For protecting me. For setting me free. “And I’m sorry for what I did to the other guards.”
Warrick’s expression fell. Evidently, he had not resolved to forgive every indiscretion. “We should agree not to talk about that.”
She made a show of pressing her lips tightly together.
His eyes lingered on them for longer than was commonly considered polite. “I should go,” he said.
“When will I see you?” She forced her voice to sound as practical as possible, but he couldn’t have been fooled. Anyone could see she was besotted with the man.
He gave her a devastating smile before he turned. “Soon enough, should the fates allow.”
Nim watched him stride from the room. She’d been averse to commitment nearly all her life. Her only friends were Allister and Margery, and she’d done her level best to keep anyone she didn’t want to get hurt at arm’s length. The only thing she’d shoved at harder was magic. And yet, she’d chosen Warrick, despite his magic, his connections, and a warning from the king. She’d chosen him, it was terrifying, and she still had every desire to walk right through behind him.
She was still staring at the at the door when Maris finally came through. “Oh, my lady. I didn’t realize you were back. Would you like to sup in your room this evening or go down to dinner?”
Nim glanced around the space again, her eyes catching on a fine writing desk positioned just so that light from the window would lie across its surface come morning. Upon it was the set of steel sheers from her other room. “Here,” she said absently. “If it’s not too much trouble.”