33. Hector

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

HECTOR

" W hat are you doing?"

I'd barely set my bare feet on the carpet before Helena bustled into the room and shoved me back down.

I huffed, glaring up at her, too annoyed to admit that the sudden motion had made me dizzy. Her push had been firm—not quite enough to hurt, but enough to upend my fragile sense of balance.

It seemed my sister's time among the Raven had made her bolder. Perhaps under other circumstances, I wouldn't have minded the change.

As she loomed over me, it was less than charming.

"I cannot stay abed forever," I grumbled, shuffling the blanket up around my hips.

Truth told, I had no business getting out of bed. I was still running hot, then cold, never sure how my temperature would turn. My body ached. I didn't want to eat a damn thing that wasn't carried ever-so-carefully by a spoon perched on Killian's graceful fingers, and only then, so I could enjoy the sight of them.

But I was tired of being an invalid. If staying still did me no good, perhaps movement would. Or?—

Well, I didn't know. I was simply restless, and I'd thought to sneak out of bed without anyone noticing.

Helena had been hovering since she'd arrived, alternating shifts with Paris and Esmerelda—a kind older woman from the Hawk Clan who'd recovered from Avianitis before. Once a day, the healer came to assess my condition, and Rosaline kept bringing me fresh, warm loaves of bread as if they'd cure any ailment.

But that morning, I'd woken up alone, and I'd thought to take advantage and see how far I could push myself. I hadn't accounted for Helena's quickness.

"You can," Helena snapped, "and you will. You'll rest until the healer gives you leave to do otherwise. You cannot risk yourself for nothing."

"Paris thinks I'm past the worst of it."

Helena's nose flared. "Forgive me for not taking Paris's blind optimism as law. We're listening to the healers."

I sighed, but right then, didn't have the strength to argue with my sister. Had she always been so stubborn?

The door opened, and a flash of silver had me sitting up against the headboard, smiling.

Killian came in, carrying a tray with breakfast. It smelled warm and faintly spiced—probably oats.

Didn't matter. What I wanted, more than food, was Killian sitting beside me. I hoped he'd stay long enough to talk some. I wondered if he'd written to Nia down south, if they knew why he'd been delayed.

If I weren't so damn selfish, I'd have told him to go on, back to the wall, and I'd follow soon after. I just... hadn't yet.

I wanted him there. The need was constant, tingling at the back of my skull. As long as I was stuck in bed, I had to keep him close.

"Good morning," I said.

At the very same moment, Helena snatched the tray from him. "Nice of you to make time, Crane."

I grimaced. "That's what he's doing now—making time."

"Certainly," Helena said. "That's why he's spent every moment he can out of doors with a weapon in hand?—"

"You mean training?" I asked.

Already, Killian looked chagrinned. He said nothing in his own defense, and I?—

This was absurd.

"He should be at your side," Helena hissed, throwing her elbow out at him in a way that rattled the plates on the tray she now held. "He caused this. The very least he could do is care for you through it."

"He has ," I insisted, holding not Helena's eye, but Killian's. "He has given me all that I asked for and everything I've wanted."

Helena scoffed. "He drifts from your side as if he does not care in the slightest! Distracts himself with—with war games and?—"

"Helena!"

My sister straightened at once, taken aback by the sharpness of my tone when I turned to her.

"Do not presume to know the Crane's heart or his mind."

The sound of a door scuffing against its frame drew my eye, and Killian slipped out. I caught the briefest glimpse of his tight jaw before he disappeared.

I sighed, sinking deep into the pillows. There went my morning's pleasures.

"He stands alone in currents we've never faced," I said as I sank heavily into the pillows. "I won't have you drive a wedge when I would stand beside him."

Helena's brow pinched. "You deserve someone who will care for you."

At that, a soft laugh escaped me. How horrible it would be, to stay in bed and be tended. I could think of nothing worse than surrendering myself entirely to another's care. It'd only been a week, and already it was driving me mad.

"He does , but in the ways that I wish to be cared for."

Helena crossed her arms, her brow rising in an exact mirror of how Paris did it.

"He hasn't let me on the wall," I admitted. It was no point of pride for me, but with my safety-minded siblings, perhaps it'd do the trick. "Despite me being there to serve our years and fight the war with the southlands, Killian has arranged for me a place in the smithy, with work I like and work that matters. But it is not dangerous, the way I had imagined when I'd agreed to go south. He doesn't risk me—doesn't risk anyone—unnecessarily."

"But you're—" She waved a hand at my bedridden body.

I shook my head. "Not a risk he'd have taken if I hadn't asked him to."

She sucked in her cheeks. "I just think he should be here."

It was my turn to arch a brow at her. "If he felt welcome, he might."