Quill and Cobweb (The Chronicles of Whynne Book 2)

by B. A. Lovejoy

  “I just want this done,” Adam said, looking away from Theo.

  “There’s no need to look so glum,” he said. “It’ll all be done soon, my friend, and then you can go back to having a wonderful time and go on trips again, kissing young women and having your fun. You can even come visit Camden and I occasionally, when you don’t have those dreadful General duties.”

  I had a feeling that Adam wouldn’t visit, not if he could help it. He would still not look at Theo.

  I felt Camden sit on the couch beside me as I watched Adam, clearing her throat to create the illusion of manners. Her hand was on me though, a threat. “Wren,” she said, her voice in that artificially high tone. “It’s time for us to ask you some questions.”

  I thought that when I looked at her this close again, I wouldn’t feel that same strange terror. I was wrong. She was just as terrifying as she was before, perhaps even more so now that she was touching me.

  “You’re going to answer them honestly,” she said. “Aren’t you?” There it was, that heavy undertone, the implications of which she would not say, ones that Theo did not seem to acknowledge. There was something about her voice that hinted at—no, practically screamed—that she expected me to agree, seeing as the house was now full, and there were so many things that could go wrong if I were to lie.

  Winry was in my room, Kristin was sitting in Luka’s, and Luka—the King hadn’t hesitated to shove him away earlier.

  “Why did you go into the woods?” Camden asked, her voice hard. Theo was still looking at Adam, bothered by his hesitation to make eye contact with him, so she took the lead.

  “I heard sounds, and I saw movement in the woods when I was talking to Nikolas. I was afraid, and I wanted to see what it was.”

  “What were you talking about with Nikolas?”

  “That he loves me,” I hesitated to say.

  “That would be a better option,” Theo said quietly, and Camden looked behind herself at him, a conversation passing between their eyes.

  “I do not want him,” I said.

  “You’ll find that the things that you want in life matter very little,” Camden dismissed, but I turned my frosty stare towards Theo, knowing that he was already unnerved.

  “What happened in the woods?” Camden carried on, ignoring a furious scream that sounded from behind Adam. “What made you go further into them?”

  “I heard noises,” I said. “They sounded like my friends… They sounded like people that I loved.” I knew better than to say Luka. “I wanted to follow them. I thought that they would lead to a way out.”

  “And they didn’t?”

  “They led further in the forest, to a fae, an incredibly beautiful fae. One I could not resist.”

  Her eyebrow went up, expecting elaboration.

  “He looked Seelie,” I said, only half lying.

  “Thank god for that,” Theo said, turning away from Adam, “at least there’s hope for her. Maybe someday she will be normal and find someone more reasonable than that pompous brat.” Pompous? From him? I could have laughed.

  “Where were you when you saw it?”

  “In a clearing,” I said. “But not a real clearing, just one where the leaves blocked the light overhead. A circle of trees. It was large and cold; I think he lived there.”

  “Did he say anything to you about it?” Theo pressed, stepping forward. It seemed I had finally captured his interest.

  “Just that—” I began, and then I stopped entirely, thinking of what Bugul Noz had said. Thinking of the story I had been told days prior. Suddenly, I did not want to tell him. “No,” I said, and though the lie felt thick and bitter on my tongue, I tried to make it sound convincing. “Not much, not anything that wouldn’t embarrass me. He read how plainly I show my desires and that… I’d prefer not to say,” I said in mock shame.

  Theo nodded slowly, thinking. “If you had to, do you think you could go back to that place?”

  “No,” I said. “I was called to it; I wouldn’t remember it. I would never be able to find it.” Another bitter lie. I wondered if Camden could tell, if she would know. She couldn’t lie herself, but maybe she knew the signs?

  “Go back to Winry,” Theo said. “Leave Camden and I to discuss the future,” he gave her a meaningful glance. “We have much to talk about, especially with what your friend Mylene has told us.” What on earth could she have told them?

  Chapter Twenty

  “We’re getting you out of here,” Winry declared when I entered my bedroom, evidently having changed course from screaming and kicking at the door just minutes before. The small trunk I had brought with, the one mostly filled with Luka’s things, was dumped out on my bed, my few possessions had been thrown into it. She hadn’t realized, however, that that was it, all I owned now, and was still looking for more. “I do not care if I have to crawl with you out of this window, we are taking you home.”

  “Winry,” I said, looking at the books strewn across my bed. “Winry, you should just repack this stuff, that’s it—”

  “He’s not coming with you,” Winry decided, looking at the pitiful amount of possessions in my trunk and reeling backwards, shocked that someone could own so little. “We’ll strike a deal and leave him behind, then you will be able to go,” she rationalized, as if it were that simple. “So, we should leave his stuff behind, unless you’re particularly fond of it. He might get cross, but I’m sure most things would be replaceable.”

  “Leave Luka behind? Strike a deal? Winry, it’s not that simple—”

  “Yes, it is!” Winry said, snapping the lid to my trunk shut, pulling down each of the latches. “Once you had to pay for my mistakes, for my selfishness, but now you do not. You were released from your contract; you do not have to marry him. You do not need to marry him! There is no need to inconvenience yourself.” She shook her head frantically, looking up at me. Her eyes widened as I slumped down to the ground, still weak from the Unseelie. “Look at that! Oh my god, it is all my fault. I should have just done it. I should have told father I would take my rightful place; I should have married Kristin— Then you would be fine. Then you would have nothing to do with any of this, you’d just be happily making your copies like you should be now.”

  “I do not want you to marry Kristin,” I proclaimed, struggling to pull myself up on the side of the bed. “I do not want you to marry anyone if that is not your wish. I would not be happy making my copies if you were forced into a loveless marriage with Kristin.”

  “He was the better option, Wren. Luka may have been my friend, but you obviously have terrible taste, look at you now!” Her voice was shrill as she quickly paced around the room. “I thought you were going to die. Imagine her face if you were going to die, your mother, imagine if she were here. Imagine if she knew what I’d done! What I let my parents do! She raised me better than this.” She was in hysterics then, looking at me with watery eyes. “All of this to not get married, all in order to pursue science. You could have died! Everyone must think me to be selfish. She would think me to be selfish.”

  “Winry,” I groaned, holding myself up on the side of the bed.

  “You don’t have to pretend anymore,” she proclaimed. “You will not need to play at liking him again, I am here and I see it all now. They tried to hide it from me, but I will be the one to rescue you.”

  “I’m not pretending!” I proclaimed, far more exasperated by her than any fae magic that had overcome me. “I’m embarrassed to say, especially knowing him, that I have never pretended to feel anything towards him.”

  “Of course, you are pretending,” Winry asserted, “you hated him! And with good reason too. How could I not see it? How could I keep making mistakes and rationalizing to myself? It was simply convenience, Wren, and now it will come to an end, and hopefully things will make sense again. No more of this nonsense about powers or wars or Unseelies; just normal things again; just normal Wren, the girl I know.” She was about to go on another ramble when the door beside her
crashed open, sending her careening back into the wall.

  “It is a mad house out there,” Kristin proclaimed, grimacing as he plastered himself against the door. “And I only got out of it by promising to check that you’re not dead...” He stopped, eyeing the trunk. “What are you doing? Where are you going?”

  “She is going away,” Winry said quickly. “I am going to make a deal and she is going home,” she said with a sort of finality.

  “But that’s…”

  “I am deeply sorry for your brother,” Winry huffed, “but that is what we have decided.”

  “For my brother? Why would you be sorry for him?”

  “We’re leaving him behind.”

  “That is what she has decided,” I responded, unable to keep bracing myself and instead slumping against the floor. “Where is Luka,” I demanded. “I need to see him.”

  “You can barely stand,” Kristin marveled, disregarding my question. “You need to lay down, you need to relax. You certainly don’t need to be dragged out of here,” he said, shooting Winry a look. Not that she either noticed or cared.

  “Wren,” the door opened once more just as Winry made a decision, sending Winry swerving out of the way as Nikolas entered the room, crowding the space. “There you are, I wanted to see you, I wanted to make sure you were okay.”

  “Where is Luka,” I demanded, my head spinning with all of the commotion.

  “I’m going to go talk to the King,” Winry declared, darting out of the room.

  “You’re not going to get anywhere,” I called after her furiously, rolling my eyes. “Where. Is. Luka?” I asked again, staring down Kristin as Nikolas wrung his hands beside him.

  “I’m not quite sure, I was actually going to ask you that,” Kristin said, and I blanched. “I’m sure he’s not in any trouble.”

  “Luka?” I said, my voice breaking, “he’s worse than me. I have to go, I have to find him—"

  “Wren,” Nikolas’s hand caught my shoulder.

  “Nikolas, let me go.”

  “Wren, you’re sick.”

  “I don’t care,” I said quickly. “I have to find him.” Did he not understand? Could he not comprehend that at the moment, I needed to see Luka. That my sister was debating me being beside him, and that vulture Mylene was lurking around?

  “Wren, I might be the only one who cares about you, but—" and that was it.

  “For god’s sake, Nikolas,” I snapped, scowling at him. “Let go of me, don’t make me do this in front of Kristin. I’ve had enough!”

  His face fell.

  “I can just leave,” Kristin began, already making a beeline for the door.

  “I don’t care if you do, or you don’t,” I said, staring at Nikolas “Maybe it will finally hammer some sense into his head.”

  But Kristin did not want to see it, not really. He took one look at the trunk on my bed, another look at me, and a last glance at Nikolas, his face forming a grimace. Then, with all of the subtly he could muster, he slid into the narrow gap of the door, leaving the two of us behind.

  Leaving me to deal with Nikolas.

  Poor, poor Nikolas. He looked panicked, blindsided even, like he couldn’t fully comprehend what was going on. How could someone be so obtuse?

  “Let me put it plainly, Nikolas,” I said fiercely. “Because I am sick and tired of repeating myself and playing this game. Not while Luka is here, not while I keep watching him slip through my fingers while I have to deal with you.” I felt sick, vile, and awful, but then at the same time, I had to keep going through this over and over again.

  I had made up my mind so long ago, it felt redundant. I had felt so strongly about it, that having to say it felt mind numbingly stupid.

  “I do not love you, Nikolas. I will not love you tomorrow, nor any day after that. I will not love you if you force me to be beside you, or if you proclaim your affections day and night. I will not love you if you rescue me or do kind things for me, because at my core, I will still know it to be you, someone who I do not feel that way towards. You cannot change it; you cannot guilt me. I will not sit through another conversation with you and suddenly have this brilliant, bright light above my head that screams that I love you! Because talking to you is like talking to a brick wall and listening to you goes on and on.”

  His hand tightened around me, and I shook my head, pulling away even more, knowing what would happen. He would talk again, repeating the same things over and over again. Luka would sit there, alone, and no one else would look.

  “You cannot change that, Nikolas. You cannot fix this awful, stupid thing that we have that you find yourself so besotted with! You cannot pity me or say that you deserve me. Because I do not love you, and I never will,” I said furiously. “So, I am asking you right now to just let me go and let me find Luka. Because unbeknownst to you, I am deeply and madly in love with him, regardless of what you or anyone else happens to think.”

  He gaped, his mouth falling open, looking every bit the part of the fish. “He walked outside to look at the woods, Wren, you should not follow him.”

  I had seen a lot of things that I had not wanted to in my time. “It’s Luka,” I said tightly. “I want to see him.”

  Chaos greeted me when I opened my door, a kaleidoscope of arguments and planning taking place, far too many people involved. The whole lot of them stood around, arguing as Camden and Theo tried and failed to communicate with each other through the throngs of conversation around them.

  Winry wanted to leave Luka here and take me home, Kristin wished for the opposite. Lindy was mad that she had seen something in the woods and been told not to hunt it, she wanted more money on her contract if it would continue to be like that. Theo wanted Kristin to calm down and apologize to Adam, while Camden wanted Theo to pay attention and focus. Mylene just wanted me gone. The few stray guards that stood about likely wanted rest, I guessed.

  They were trying and failing to come up with some sort of plan, Theo and Camden both unfortunately surrounded by all the others. The problem was, everyone else was so densely packed in that they had not yet found a way out.

  And Adam? Adam stood by the door, alone and looking pensive.

  “You’re going out,” Adam acknowledged with a nod as I approached the door, likely standing there solely to stop me from doing so. They were afraid that I’d escape, still half charmed, but they were all distracted. “I can’t say I’d blame you; I’d go too if I had the chance.”

  “You trust me to go?” I asked. “After what’s just happened?”

  “I have a feeling you’d push past me even if I didn’t,” he laughed, sinking further against the wall. “I suppose I wouldn’t do much to stop you either. I have an idea what you’re doing, though they’ll be mad if I don’t ask you to clarify.”

  “What if I said I was getting into trouble?” I asked.

  He took me in, my weak body and hollow stare. “I’d say good luck, I guess.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “The sun’s getting low, you should get inside,” I said, sinking into the narrow slice of ground that sat between Luka and the firewood stack, noting the lowering sun and how it turned the sky into a myriad of reds and purples. I could hear the sounds of the forest slowly grow as more and more fae stirred into activity, but they always seemed muted when Luka was around.

  He opened a single eye, looking over to me, a low exhale escaping him as I moved so close that our thighs touched. “Somehow, I don’t feel like listening to people talk about all the ways I’m ruining your life,” he said, leaning further into the wall, his voice quiet.

  I sighed, letting my head settle on his shoulder, my hand slowly inching to cover his. The effects of the day, the weakness from being afflicted with magic and the shock from the events of the forest, made it feel almost impossible to move anywhere else. My fingers loosely wrapped around his, relishing the way his warm skin felt under mine.

  “They’re right,” he said after a moment, giving in just enough to let
his head rest upon mine. “You would be happier without me.”

  “No,” I said, closing my eyes as I took him in, his soft scent and the gentle rise and fall of his body with every breath. I probably looked awful, there were probably trails of black falling down my lips from the smoke that had almost endlessly poured out of me, but I was at peace. “I don’t think I would be.”

  He swallowed, his fingers gently squeezing mine, as if too much pressure would break me. “I’m the reason you’re here. In so many ways, I am the reason you’re in trouble. If I had kept my distance, if I had left you alone in that library day after day and not gotten so close...”

  “I demanded to know what you were studying, I demanded to be beside you, I helped you break into that automobile,” I reminded him. “I made those choices; I could have just walked away but I didn’t. I’m glad I didn’t.”

  “But I should have said no,” he said hoarsely, pulling away from me. “I should have told you no.”

  I blinked at the loss of contact with him, my eyebrows furrowing as I looked at him, confused as to why he would end it. “Luka?” I asked, frowning as I reached for him again, wanting him to settle back against me just like he had before. The sun was dipping lower and lower, our time was running out, soon we would have to go back inside. I wanted to have this time with him, at least for the moment, even if a thousand unanswered questions still hung in the air.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice coated with a sort of finality that made me flinch. “Wren, I’m sorry for everything.”

  My eyes narrowed, my mouth tightening as I felt my stomach sink. I knew what he was doing, just not why.

  “I didn’t want to hurt you. I never wanted to hurt you, Wren.”

  But he did. “You kissed her,” I said. I’d tried to forget, and now here it was, brought in front of me again.

  He blinked, pulling away even further, his face coated with confusion.

  “Mylene.”