“Ivetta. Ivetta!”
I jerked awake with a gasp, heart pounding, drenched in sweat. A face hovered over me, hidden in the shadows of night, but even with fear clawing at my throat and my mind in chaos, I knew it was Chevalier. His silhouette framed in starlight from the window, his voice calling me out of the nightmare, his distinctive smell of roses tinged with the musk of sweat—he was as familiar to me as my reflection.
“You’re safe, Ivetta.”
A nightmare. It had all been a nightmare.
“Chevalier,” I choked out, grabbing his shirt. He wrapped his arms around me and lay back against the mattress, holding me close and stroking my hair while I buried my face in his chest, clinging to him desperately. The snapping of flames drawing grotesque shadows on dark stone walls, the metallic creaking and clanking of chains above my head, the painful bite of that bloody dagger, all disappeared, memories from long ago and never again. Here, with Chevalier, I was safe. I was always safe with Chevalier.
Gradually, the trembling stilled. Eventually, my heartbeat slowed. I focused on his breathing, working to match each deep inhale and long exhale with mine, and my mind cleared a little with every breath.
And with clarity came guilt. As always.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
He sighed. “When will you cease apologizing for matters that are beyond your control?” he asked, a weariness in his voice that drove the guilt deeper.
“I don’t know,” I said, shaking my head. “I just—I didn’t want—”
“Ivetta,” he interrupted softly. “This isn’t your fault. It’s happened before, and it will happen again. I knew that when I chose you, and I would rather be here to comfort you than leave you to face it alone.”
He kissed the top of my head and nuzzled into my hair, and I felt relief flood the empty spaces left by the tension draining from my body. I always felt guilty when I woke from a nightmare, because I was always inconveniencing someone, but I couldn’t deny how good it felt for Chevalier to be that someone. He could hold me and kiss me and give me a sense of security I couldn’t get from anyone else. When he said I was safe, I really was safe.
It would still be a while until I could get back to sleep, though.
“Chevalier?” I asked tentatively, peeking up at him from the cocoon of his embrace. “Could we…sit outside? Just for a few minutes? Sometimes…sometimes it helps.”
He sighed again and nodded, brushing my sweaty hair back behind my ear. “After you change.”
I followed his eyes down to my damp nightgown, something I never thought about until the sweat dried and the shivering started. “Oh. O-okay.”
He loosened his arms around me, and I crawled out of bed, hurrying to my trunk and stripping out of my nightgown before the chill set in. It felt gross to put a clean nightgown on when I was still sweaty, but I knew Chevalier wouldn’t budge on that point, even if I told him I used to sit outside in a sweaty nightgown for hours on end without getting sick.
Especially if I told him that.
I pulled the fresh nightgown on as he opened his trunk beside mine, withdrawing his cloak, and a flash of golden metal caught my eye before he closed the lid.
“Is that your sword?” I asked.
“Yes.” He fastened his cloak around his shoulders and slipped an arm around my waist, bringing me to his side and enfolding me in the cloak’s warmth, too. “You didn’t think I’d leave it behind?”
“No, but I haven’t seen it since the day before our wedding.”
I hadn’t missed the sword, but I’d missed his cloak, I realized, comforted by its familiar feel and smell as we went out into the cool, whispering night. The faintest of breezes brushed across the new spring grass, the vibrant green muted and tinted blue under the inky black sky. Though the chattering birds of daylight were gone, the hum of insects filled the air with their much softer night song, and an owl hooted somewhere nearby. Chevalier had brought a blanket with us, and he spread it across the hillside where we’d read together earlier in the afternoon. Unlike then, when I sat down, he sat behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist and his cloak around us both.
“I thought you would sit beside me,” I said, folding my arms over his. “But this is nice.”
He kissed my cheek. “I don’t want you getting cold.”
I leaned back against his chest and looked up at the stars, thousands of white points poking through the quilt of night. The moon had hidden its face behind a cloud. Chevalier rested his chin on my shoulder, and I thought about all those nights sitting alone on the riverbank, wishing he was there to hold me like this. I remembered closing my eyes and imagining his arms around me when I'd felt scared and so alone, recalling his words that I was safe and he wouldn't let anybody hurt me again, and it helped. It had made me feel a little less small, a little more like I mattered. Like I was worth something.
“Chevalier?”
“Mm?”
“Thank you.”
He kissed my cheek again. “I love you, little dove.”
A smile tugged at my lips. “I love you, too.”
The music of the river was missing, but its music had been dangerous sometimes. When the pain was too great, the gentle burbling seemed to promise it could make it stop, take me away from everything, and only my responsibility to Mother had kept me from taking the plunge. I never really wanted to do it. I’d just wanted some relief. Fortunately, my heart knew what my head didn’t. When she died, my feet took me to Chevalier, not the river.
He was warm against my back, warm around my waist, warm on either side of me, mimicking my pose of feet flag on the ground and knees up. I felt his strength surrounding me, and I knew he didn’t need his sword to keep me safe. Although it was strange for him to keep it hidden away.
“Chevalier?”
“Mm?”
“We’re under guard, aren’t we?”
“Yes,” he said without hesitation.
“I should have known. You always keep your sword within reach. I don’t know why I didn’t think about it.”
“I didn’t want you to think about it,” he replied, his breath warming my ear. “Let me handle our security. All you need to do is relax and enjoy yourself.”
“I am.” As if to prove the point, I yawned. “Sorry.”
He chuckled. “You’re apologizing again.”
I felt a smile stretching my cheeks. “Sorry.”
His right hand left my waist to reach across me and press his fingers into my left cheek, turning my face to look at him. “That one was intentional,” he said, the night darkening his crystal blue eyes and adding a silvery sheen to his soft smile. “Are you feeling better?”
“Mm hm.” I closed my eyes before he leaned in, anticipating his feather-light kiss. His lips were as warm as the rest of him. “I guess we should go back inside,” I murmured.
“We can stay out here longer.”
“Not worried about me getting cold anymore?” I teased.
He answered with another brief kiss. I turned my body toward him a bit, nuzzling into the crook of his neck.
“This could be another way to upset the court ministers,” I said. “Sitting outside in our pajamas in the middle of the night.”
He brushed my hair behind my ear, and his hand followed it down to my waist. “I don’t want anybody seeing you this way.”
“What way?”
He paused for a moment. “Vulnerable.”
“Hm.” I sighed contentedly as his hand continued stroking my hair from my neck to my waist in long, rhythmic strokes. “I don’t like anybody seeing me vulnerable, either,” I admitted.
“That has always been apparent.”
We sat in silence for a while, and then I asked, “How many days do we have left here?”
“Two full days. The carriage will arrive the morning of the third day.”
“And you’ll go to work right away when we get back?”
“Yes. You can get settled in our room while I handle my brothers.”
I smiled at the thought of it. “‘Our room,’” I repeated. “Although I’ll have to handle Theresa and her interrogation, which I'm sure will be worse than anything your brothers can come up with.” I hugged his torso and asked, “So, how is it going to go? Do you want me to wake you up in the mornings, or let you sleep in?”
“I want to wake up looking at you.”
Well, that made my heart do a happy dance in my chest.
“Then I’ll just have to wake you up in the mornings,” I replied, smiling so widely my cheeks hurt. “And we can have breakfast together, and then you can go off to work. And then…well, I guess I’ll still have lessons, and social engagements. I’ll have to figure out my schedule with Sariel. Handling anything that needs doing with the servants will be easier first thing in the morning.” I yawned again. “What about traveling? Do I get to accompany you on all your boring inspection tours now?”
“If you’d like.”
“Because the only reason I didn’t before was temptation, wasn’t it?”
“And safety.”
I heard the smirk in his voice, and I grabbed his hand just as it left its established route through my hair to trace my curves. “Yes, and now, I’m much more familiar with how dangerous you can be when you give in to temptation,” I remarked, pulling back from him and meeting his mischievous gaze. “I think it’s time we go back inside. To sleep,” I added firmly. “And don’t even try giving me that look. We have two whole days left for you to misbehave.”
“You say that as if I’ve done something in error,” he commented, standing up and pulling me with him.
“Well, I could consider interrupting me while I’m cooking ‘in error,’” I replied. “Especially when an open flame is involved.”
He chuckled. “I know what I’m doing.”
“So do I. And you’re not doing it tonight.”
Another yawn interrupted our teasing banter as we headed back inside. That’s all it was, really. I knew he was tired, too, and when we climbed back into bed, we exchanged nothing more adventurous than a kiss and before cuddling up for the night.
Pancakes, I thought. I hadn’t made pancakes yet, and it would be a quick and easy breakfast, in case he was feeling frisky in the morning.
That was the last thought I had before I fell asleep, and the first thought I had when I woke again the next day.
He was still asleep, as usual. I was better at slipping away without waking him now, and he remained a motionless lump under the blankets when I finished in the bathroom and left for the kitchen. The thought of his sword in his trunk flashed through my mind again. Chevalier was always alert, always on guard. He always kept his sword within reach, and he always slept lightly, wide awake at the slightest change in his surroundings. Even more so when I was around. And yet there he was, locking his sword away, relaxed enough to stay asleep when I left the bed and the room.
How many guards did it take for him to feel that comfortable?
More than my twelve personal guards, that was certain, and it was a safe bet that none of them were getting any time off right now.
I stoked the fire in the stove and mixed up the pancake batter. Simple, tasty, and the minute or so each side needed to cook was time enough for me to think about what I could make for my guards when we returned to the palace. I liked to treat them every so often, and since they weren’t getting the weeklong break I’d anticipated, it seemed appropriate. Usually, I made them desserts, but why not pancakes this time? Pancakes weren't just for breakfast, anyway.
I had a nice stack keeping warm at the back of the stove when arms wrapping around my waist from behind and lips pressing into my neck marked Chevalier’s arrival.
“Good morning, Chevalier,” I giggled, flipping the next pancake.
“Come back to bed,” he murmured in my ear.
“Don’t you want breakfast first?” I asked teasingly, knowing full well what his answer would be. It was all there in that low, husky voice that woke the butterflies in my stomach.
“Later,” he replied, sliding his hand down and across the front of my body from the left side of my waist to my right hip. A shiver ran down my spine, one that I tried very hard to ignore as I watched the edges of the pancake bubble.
“Now is really not the best—ooh!” I interrupted myself with a gasp when he nibbled at my earlobe, somehow keeping my knees under me when they threatened to give out.
“Why not?” he asked, rolling the fabric at my hip up, bit by bit.
This wasn’t fair. My hand was trembling as I flipped the finished pancake onto the stack. There was only enough batter left for one more pancake, but I knew I would have a hard time holding out long enough to make it if he kept his tricks up.
“Remember what I said about the open flame?” I asked, pouring the pancake with a shaking hand. He nipped lightly at my neck, sending a violent tremor through me. “Ch-chevalier, this is the last one,” I protested weakly.
“And then?” he breathed in my ear, his fingers grazing my now bare thigh. I had to bite my lip to keep from crying out. “You can’t resist me much longer, little dove,” he purred, stroking my thigh.
I slammed my mouth shut and flipped the underdone pancake. I wasn't doing a great job of resisting him now, and I was counting down the minute until I gave in to him. If I could make it that long. My face was hotter than the stove top; his lips were hotter still as they trailed up my neck. My eyes closed of their own accord, my head tilting to the side as a moan escaped unbidden.
“It’s burning,” he whispered.
I gasped and flipped the pancake hastily toward the stack as my eyes flew wide open. It was barely tan. And it hit the wall.
“You liar!” I exclaimed.
He chuckled in my ear, pulling me back from the stove and spinning me around in the same motion, safe from the flame and in serious danger from him. “I wasn’t referring to the pancake."
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