I rub my thumb over the stub of my missing finger top, bitten off by one of Madoc’s guard, and realize abruptly that if i told Cardan about it, he might understand. Maybe more than anyone, he’d comprehend the odd mingling of fear and shame i feel - even now- when i think of it.
“It was terrifying,” he says, “ watching you fall. I mean,you’re generally terrifying, but i am unused to fearing for you.”
“Mortals are fragile,” i say.
“ Not you,” he says in a way that sounds a little like a lament. “You never break.”
Which is ridiculous,as hurt as i am.
He does not seem like someone who has been carrying poisoned spies through the snow, someone who has braved an enemy camp. Someone who pushed his magical cloak into my hands. He seems like the person who shover me into the cold water and laughed when it closed over my head. Who tricked me.
‘That boy is your weakness.’
“A duel?” I am flummoxed.” Why would he fight you?”
Madoc grins. “For love,” he says.” And for duty.”
“Love of whom?” I can’t believe that Taryn would be any less confused than i am right now.
“There is no banquet too abundant for a starving man.”