38. Sage

Iate the evening meal with Kit, Payne, and Lewin painfully aware that even more men watched me with disgust and anger as well as now a hint of curiosity. Hushed conversations came to an abrupt halt when I drew near, and it was obvious they were talking about me. Everyone in the Tower had to have heard what I'd done last night, and I had no doubt by tomorrow morning, if not sooner, everyone would have heard that one tap from Lord Rider made me collapse in pain.

The guys had asked me how training went, and I'd given the briefest replies as possible while wolfing down my meal, determined to get away from all the prying eyes as fast as I could. I had to get back to— hell, get started with being unnoticed and to do that I needed to stop drawing attention to myself.

The other novices had already shown that they wanted to put me in my place and the sooner it looked like I was there, the better. And it certainly didn't help that I'd drawn the attention of the Captain of the Gold Tower.

I couldn't let the others think Talon was giving me special treatment. That would only increase their desire to remind me that I wasn't a noble anymore, that I was no longer anyone special. And while my body wanted special treatment from him, Lord Quill and — shadows! — even Lord Rider, the rest of me really really didn't.

I was now almost done my half shift in the stables and my body still throbbed with the need Talon had inspired just by looking at me.

That moment just outside the pasture gate had been breathtaking and consuming, filling me with such yearning that it had taken everything I'd had to resist his command and take my shirt off.

Great Father I still wanted to take off my shirt and all my other clothes as well. And while a part of me was relieved I hadn't, another part was shaken at how close I'd come to ruining everything on my first day. And an even larger part of me couldn't stop thinking about Talon's gorgeous body, the last trickles of water trailing over his sculpted muscles and his large?—

What would it feel like to have him pushing into me? To have his swirling, mesmerizing gaze capturing mine and him fulfilling the promise inspired by his magic?

It didn't seem to matter that my whole body hurt from a full day of physical labor. The achy part low within me that had awakened last night when that man had put his mouth on me throbbed with a need I feared I wasn't going to be able to satisfy. Especially since I was sure going to the Garden had been a mistake. And now that the burn of the magic binding me to the Black Tower was gone, I was never going there again.

I gritted my teeth and ran the large grooming brush down the side of the dappled gray mare in front of me. She eyed me but continued to stay calm, unlike some of the other horses the other stable hand had been assigned to groom, and I was grateful Kasen, the stablemaster, had taken pity on me and given me the most docile animals in the stable.

"Times up," a cheery voice said, and the man whose shift I'd been given — what was his name? Right. Vyell — strode up to the stable door with a big grin brightening his face. Except I was pretty sure the grin was for the horse and not me, since so far only a small handful of Guardsmen had been happy to see me today.

"How's he treating you, sweetheart?" he asked as he stepped inside, and ran a hand over the horse's flank. "She looks good."

"She better," Kasen said from his spot a few stalls down. "He spent double the amount of time he should have on her and the other nine horses he's groom so far."

"Yeah, but his arms are so short, he probably has to do double the brush strokes to get the job done," Vyell called back with a chuckle.

Kasen huffed a gruff laugh. "You better have groomed fifteen by the time your shift ends tomorrow, Sawyer, or I'll hold you back to finish your work. Now be gone with you."

I handed Vyell the brush and hurried out of the stables before Kasen could change his mind. I'd been slow because I didn't have a lot of experience grooming horses and because my whole body hurt… and because I was still thoroughly distracted by Talon and his magic.

At the thought of his name, a shiver of need rushed through me. If I was smart, I'd avoid him from now on.

With what his magic did to me, it was only a matter of time before I was no longer able to resist, and he'd learn the truth. That couldn't happen for at least a month, longer if I was really lucky, since Sawyer needed at minimum a month to get out of the Five Great Kingdoms. Except how could I avoid him without looking like I was avoiding him? Because being obvious would just raise his suspicions as well.

Maybe I could tell him his magic made me uncomfortable. Not to mention the fact that he'd used his magical influence to try to get me to undress and now I was a little afraid of him.

That was probably the best plan to get him to stay away from me, but something inside me twisted tight at that idea. I had so few allies here, and if I alienated Talon, would I also alienate Kit, Payne, and Lewin?

I didn't know how friendly they were with him since he hadn't taken the midday or evening meal with them like he had with the morning meal, but pushing Talon away risked pushing them away and, as much as I should, I didn't want to go through my time here completely alone.

Except that was the best option. Head down. No friends. Do what needed to be done and keep my secret for as long as possible.

I dragged myself up the three flights of stairs and down the halls to my room. Making friends would only make keeping my secret more difficult, but I had a suspicion that Kit and Payne wouldn't let me ignore them during mealtime. I was already trapped with an association to them and at least they didn't care that I'd screwed up and endangered lives.

Which still left the problem with Talon and my sore, throbbing body.

Shadows, I was so tired, and I wasn't looking forward to another morning of shoveling shit or being tripped on the running trail.

I entered my room, making sure the latch had caught on my door, then took off my vambraces and jerkin before unlacing the ties on my shirt and pulling it off. The strips of cloth flattening my breasts were a little loose, but still tight enough to hide my figure even after an afternoon of running and fighting and grooming. The bruise running up my side and over my chest was an ugly dark purple and had grown bigger since I'd woken this morning.

It was no surprise both Talon and Lord Quill had looked shocked when I'd showed it to them, and I'd known the moment Talon had told Lord Quill to take a look that I'd had to at least give them a peek. I was just grateful bringing up Edred's bad temper had been enough of a distraction that they hadn't demanded to see all of it.

Although it had been a huge surprise that Lord Quill then wanted to go and rescue me.

Had he felt the same strange compulsion I had when we'd first met? I'd thought I'd been unable to stop looking at him because I'd never seen a fae before or because he had a magic that compelled someone to look at him.

But now I'd experienced real compelling magic and that hadn't been what I'd experienced with Lord Quill. It had been softer, warmer, a call to something deep within me that made my pulse flutter.

As it was, I could only hope Lord Quill accepted my explanation and wouldn't want proof that I was safe. That, and while it hadn't been the whole truth, it made for a good excuse as to why I'd been stupid enough to use the ring after dark. Maybe word would get out that I'd done it in defense of family and the men would go back to thinking I was an insignificant runt not worth their notice.

I could only hope.

I finished getting undressed, put the plug in the basin and filled it halfway. Using just the basin wasn't going to be the easiest or fastest way to clean myself, but it beat using the baths in the middle of the night and hoping no one stumbled across me. I worked the sweet-smelling soap I'd taken from the towel room into a lather and scrubbed at the grime on my hands, making sure the scrapes I'd gotten from my fall on the running trail were thoroughly cleaned.

Exhaustion pulled at me, the world turning soft and dim, and my thoughts stuttered. I'd been turning the soap around and around in my hands and not moving into the next step of washing the rest of myself.

Jeez. I had no idea how I was going to manage more mornings in the stables or afternoons of running and sparring. One day and I was ready to collapse. How was I going to manage a whole rotation of it or more?

Darkness fluttered across my vision.

If I didn't hurry up, I was going to pass out half washed. Good thing the room was so small it'd be easy to make it to my bed before I collapsed.

I dunked one of my small towels into the water, worked the lather into it, and ran it up my arm, trying to pick up my pace, but the darkness swelled, suddenly overwhelming me and a sense of fear and urgency surged inside me.

My pulse tripped. Another premonition? But I'd had two yesterday. I'd had as many premonitions in the last two days as I'd had all last year.

A thick, cold mist rushed around my legs and swept over the basin, and my muscles started to tremble. I tried to reach for the basin to catch my balance but missed and fell to my knees. Then a frozen gust of wind tore the mist away, revealing the Gray's ragged barren landscape and the towering Shadow Gate off in the distance.

The basin was gone and so too was the wall to my room. In front of me lay a body with a shock of red hair dressed in the black uniform of a Guardsman. He lay facing away from me, but I knew the body could only be Sawyer's. While there could be someone else in the Tower with the same red hair, I doubted my premonition— no my vision would show me a stranger. Not with the same soul-crushing fear that had overwhelmed me the first time I'd been shown Sawyer's lifeless body in the Gray.

But seeing it now meant I hadn't changed the future, that I was going to be discovered and they were going to find Sawyer and drag him to the Black Tower, something I couldn't let happen.

Except I didn't know how to stop it. I'd been thinking about how to deal with Talon and the others a moment ago. Did that mean I was making a mistake by not forcing them away? Or would forcing them away make this vision happen faster.

A pair of brown boots stepped into sight and the mist parted, revealing just enough of a man so I could tell he wasn't a Guardsman but not actually see who it was. He chuckled, the sound dark, twisting my fear tighter, and he kicked Sawyer's body, rolling him over and making the mist billow around him like a thick blanket, obscuring him completely.

"Leave him for the shadows," someone in the mist behind the man said.

"Yeah," he replied, his voice a harsh whisper, and he marched away, making the mist whirl with the movement and slide away from Sawyer's body.

Except it wasn't Sawyer's body.

It was mine.

My fear snapped into a desperate panic that crushed around my heart and stole my breath. My face was a ruin mess, swelling from what had to have been multiple blows, my nose was broken and bleeding, and I'd left a large puddle of blood on the ground, while another was forming around my head as I watched. I'd been stabbed at least once, but with my black clothing and the swirling mist, I couldn't see where.

I tried to look around to see if there was anyone who'd help me, but the mist surged then bled into darkness, and my premonition spat me back into my room in the Black Tower.

Shadows! I had changed the future. Now I was the one who was going to die in front of the Shadow Gate.

To be continued…