As soon as I’m underneath, the pelting rain softens into a snapping sound as it hits the fabric. The moist air follows me in, but at least the rain isn’t stinging my eyes anymore. Two cots are set up at the back with blankets folded neatly at their bases. A flap separates a small portion of the left side of the tent from the rest of the large space.
Arlo heads toward the cot without the bag already sitting on it, instructing me to put my things on the empty one behind the flap. I plop my own bag down, and water oozes out, dashing any hope of dry clothing.
“Where’d the shogun go?” Arlo asks, turning back to the guard.
Good question. Glad I didn’t have to ask it.
“He’s, um—” The guard blinks and turns to look into the downpour. “Ah, he’s there.”
Arlo and I walk to the edge of the tent and follow the guard’s finger. Rayce is barely visible through the rain, helping a woman unfold what will soon become her shelter from the storm. He walks backward, spreading out the water-resistant fabric. Arlo and I glance at each other, and he smirks, shaking his head.
“He just can’t help himself,” he says, walking back to his pack.
I watch as Rayce rushes over to grab the first pole, and I take a step toward him. The way the water runs through his hair, dripping down the deep ridges of his scar and sticking the fabric of his white shirt onto his skin captivates me. I wonder what it would be like to run my hands through his wet hair and press my lips against his drenched skin. Would he taste like the rain?
“Don’t bother offering to help,” Arlo says, making me jump. I blink and turn away from Rayce. “He’ll just make you come back here if he sees you, since we’ve been traveling through this downpour.”
“Oh.” I step back into the tent. “Right, thanks.”
“Anyway, sorry for putting you in here,” Arlo says. “Rayce had you with Marin, but I thought she needed to focus on her portion of the mission without having to also watch out for you. I hope you don’t mind.”
“No, that’s fine.”
Arlo lights lanterns, the closest to a fire we’ll get tonight. I walk into my small section of the tent and pull the flap that separates me from the rest of the tent closed tight. I listen for Arlo on the other side of the curtain, and as soon as I hear a pot clang, I peel off my wet clothes and spread them out to let them dry.
I unpack my bag, in search of something halfway dry to change into. My quilt squashes underneath my fingers, but it protected Oren’s book from getting wet. I grab it by the spine and shove it under the pillow on my cot. Maybe tonight I can face those words, but even imagining cracking open the pages and letting more secrets spill onto the floor causes my heart to thud against my chest. As Rayce suggested, I should keep the past where it belongs. Dreaming of a dead future won’t keep me alive in the present, and right now I can’t afford to fall apart.
And still, the need to find out what Oren wants me to see pulls my hand near the pillow.
As I brush the sharp corner of the book, Arlo shouts from behind the tent flap that dinner is ready, shattering the last of my nerve. I leave the book tucked away, relief and disappointment warring within me, as I head back into the main portion of the tent.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Rayce, Arlo, and I gather around one of the lanterns in the main section of the tent for a dinner of cold rice, grapes, and day-old fish. Neither Rayce nor Arlo attempts to make conversation, with the threat of tomorrow’s mission looming over our heads. While I pick at my food, my mind wanders back to the book resting under my pillow and whether I should read it.
After excusing myself, I pull the flaps to my section of the tent closed and dim the lantern to almost nothing. I cloak the dry blanket around my shoulders and sit in the middle of the cot, crossing my legs. Outside, the rain still falls, but it’s lightened up to a soft pattering.
Oren said he marked a passage in the book. He wants me to know something. Maybe I could just peek.
I scratch an imaginary itch behind my ear and reach under my pillow before I can talk myself out of it. The cloth cover is bumpy against my fingertips. I place the book on my lap and stare at the cover that resembles the night sky, the silver title gleaming like cold stars in the lamplight.
I should open it now before I risk my life tomorrow. Wouldn’t it be better to know what Oren knows? Especially if something goes wrong, and the list of things that could go wrong is endless—Rayce’s distraction doesn’t work, someone else gets captured, I fall trying to walk across a rope I’ve never seen, or the girl isn’t where she’s supposed to be.
I run my finger along the book’s spine, and the yellowing, beveled pages call out to me. My eyes find a folded corner near the middle of the book.
If I do this now, am I already accepting that something will go wrong tomorrow? Giving up before the fight?
“Rose, are you awake?” Rayce whispers.
I shove the book back underneath the pillow while turning to the flap that separates me from him and the rest of the tent.
Rayce appears just inside my portion of the tent, illuminated by the lamplight in a white shirt that hugs the line of his shoulders, his hair flattened on one side from lying on it. His dark eyes glow in the warm yellow pool of light, and tiny nicks and scars covering his arms catch the shadows.
“Oh, good, you are,” he says, sleep coloring his voice husky.
I avert my eyes quickly. I would have seen Rayce like this every night if my father hadn’t lost his kingdom. This would have been normal for us, but now it feels anything but.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, pulling the covers tight around my middle.
“I couldn’t sleep.” He combs his fingers through his hair. “I never can the night before a mission. I’d like some company…if you don’t mind?”
I want to ask him why he isn’t talking to Arlo instead, but then I’m afraid that will make him think better of asking me and he’ll leave. If I’m being honest with myself, I’d like some company, too.
“I don’t mind.” I scoot over on the cot. “Did you want to sit?”
I hope my cheeks aren’t glowing. This is the first time we’ve been alone since he was teaching me how to knead dough.
“Sure,” he says and settles beside me.
Even with the warm blanket wrapped around my body, I can feel heat radiating off him. Every inch of my skin is aware of his hands as he places them in his lap. Cold from the rain still sticks between my bones, but his nearness chases it away.
Why is my heart beating like I’ve been running?
This is the man who took me prisoner and threw me in a cell to interrogate me. But he’s also the man who helped a random soldier put up her tent in the pouring rain, who gets up early in the morning to cook and serve his people breakfast, who always carries around sweets and cleaned my wound when he’s afraid of blood. He kept his word and freed me when he believed I didn’t try to assassinate him.
I shake off my last thought, and the blanket slips from my shoulders. A small smile plays on his lips, and he reaches over to slide the blanket back up. “You’re shivering,” he says.
Yes, but it isn’t from the cold.
His fingertip blazes a trail across my bare shoulder, and I hold my breath. Our eyes meet. Only a few inches separate us, but the space is so foreign it might as well be miles. I wonder if in our other life I would have fit into those inches, welcomed them. Would we have been in love? Or just playing the part of a happily married couple for political gain?
Rayce clears his throat and breaks eye contact first.
“I’m worried about tomorrow,” he starts. “We’ve never attempted three separate missions at once. It’ll hedge our chances of everything going wrong, but it also increases the odds that something will fail.”
My heart aches at his words. I know people in every mission. If mine fails, I’ll be in trouble and so will Arlo. If Rayce’s distraction fails, he and Marin will be caught. And if Oren’s attempt to free the Flowers goes awry… My
sisters flash through my mind, and I grip the blanket.
“That has to be a lot of pressure on you,” I offer.
“It always is,” he says through a sigh. “Sometimes more than I can take. I want to help you and Piper, but all those men and women out there are counting on me to get them back to their families, too.”
“So why do it, then?” I ask, looking up at him.
His brow furrows and he frowns. “Why wouldn’t I help if I could?”
“Because helping is tough. Being responsible for so many people. Sometimes I don’t even think I can be responsible for myself.”
“Yet the only thing you’ve done since leaving the Garden is to try to figure out a way to help the others,” he says. “The way you feel about them is the way I feel about all the people risking their lives under my orders. They’re my family.”
His eyes drip sadness. All I want to do is take it away from him, but I have no idea how. The confusing desire to touch him returns, and I start to reach for him, but my hand trembles, betraying my nerves. I let it fall back on my lap.
“What you do here is almost impossible,” I say. “I can’t imagine how hard. You have to make awful decisions and you hold yourself accountable for them, and I could never do that. I just want to know why you think it’s worth it.”
“Because…” He rubs the back of his neck. “War was imminent for Delmar. Oren and I knew it the moment Uncle Galon shut off the trade to Varsha and crippled most of the merchant class. And we decided that if I were ever going to earn the respect of my people, I needed to stand up to him.”
“That’s why you started the rebellion?”
“Partially,” he says, letting out a deep breath. “There was already talk of war that would rip Imperial City in half. But mostly…”
He cuts himself off and stares hard at his bare feet.
“Mostly what?” I prompt him.
“Mostly I couldn’t stand who I was becoming under his watchful eye.” He shakes his head at himself. “Three years ago, when my uncle named me his heir and I was forced to move into the palace, you wouldn’t have even recognized me. He appointed me captain of the Delmarion army by the time I was sixteen. I carried out his every order without question, because I wanted to prove to everyone that I earned my rank.” He rubs his face. “But I was always conflicted about his orders. I think he wanted to make sure I kept myself unattached. Fit to rule in case he ever passed on.”
“I can’t imagine you being that way.”
“I wish I never was,” he says. “But I used to be. The most frustrating thing is that I used to believe my uncle wasn’t a bad man. That deep down he had the capacity to be kind. But I was wrong, and it nearly cost me my soul. He’s just too logical, all about numbers.” He tilts his head the other way. “If there are more mouths to feed than food to go around, he eliminates them. He stopped seeing those numbers as people a long time ago.”
“Any man willing to make a pact with the Gardener isn’t a good leader.”
“I know,” Rayce whispers. “He’s done a lot of things over the past few years that have made me realize there’s no going back to his side, but I didn’t decide to leave because of what he did. It was because of something I did.”
His gaze flickers to my face, and he gives me a regretful smile that seems to drain the last bit of warmth from his eyes.
“You don’t have to tell me—” I start, but he’s already decided he’s going to.
“There was this small town. Just a handful of people lived there.” He holds out a cupped palm like he can scoop up the people in his memory. “My uncle assigned me a small platoon. The mission was simple: eliminate the contaminants. People were sick, and Uncle Galon was afraid of the plague spreading. I viewed it as the mission that would validate my rank.” The corner of his mouth twitches, twisting his scar. “The people, they were terrified that the Delmarion soldiers had been sent.”
He folds his hands in his lap. “When we got there, I saw a little boy run through the streets and nearly trampled him with my horse. I stopped just short of him and he reached up, offering me a piece of his bread, even though food was already scarce at that time. Seeing such generosity from people who had so little to give, from a child…I knew then I couldn’t go through with it. So I ordered my soldiers to stand down, but my uncle had already anticipated that I might bend. I tried to stop them, but I was outnumbered—” His voice catches. “I can still feel the heat of the fire on my skin as that town burned to the ground. And their screams.” He squeezes his eyes closed for a moment. “Their screams don’t ever go away.”
He looks at me, pain etched into every part of his face. “That’s why I was so shocked when you told me that screams haunt you. I’ve never heard anyone else put my nightmare into words.”
My breath stops, trying to process what he’s saying, one thing at a time. “So all of the people in the town were sick?”
“The orders were to eliminate the illness.”
The fact that he didn’t answer my question reveals everything.
“How many?” I breathe.
He closes his eyes again. “A hundred and twelve. All because I couldn’t stop it. I was powerless.”
His words sear the air. Those hands that have helped a thousand people are covered in innocent blood. Killing people like that would cripple me forever, not spur me into action. I’d hide from what I did—but he’s accepted those deaths.
Suddenly, it makes perfect sense to me why the leader of the rebellion would stay in the rain to help a woman build her tent. He’s trying to repent. He built an entire opposition—not only against the government but also against his own blood relative—to avenge those people he wronged. To make sure it never happens again.
Without hesitation this time, I place my trembling hand on top of his, the need to comfort him stronger than wanting to hide my nerves. “If you tried to stop the soldiers from murdering those people, then it isn’t your fault.”
“Like you not being able to rescue the Flowers isn’t your fault,” he says.
I purse my lips, because he’s wrong. I only had one person holding me back. He had a whole army.
He takes a shuddering breath then continues. “The moment we got back, I went to my uncle and told him everything had to stop. That I wouldn’t let him hurt anyone else. There had to be another way.” He meets my eyes. “But I’ve never been able to beat him in a sword fight. Not a single time. He challenged me to a duel right then and there, and I fought him even though I knew I’d lose. No one questions Galon without consequences.”
He winces, sending his scar dancing. And the truth dawns on me. With a single finger, I reach up and trace the puckered line running down his face.
“He did this to you?”
I feel his cheek push up into a smile underneath my fingertip.
“I think he wanted me to remember his absolute power every time I saw it.” He runs his fingertips up my arm and cups my hand in his. “And I do, just not the way he intended. Every time I look in the mirror, I’m reminded of why I’m fighting. Of what and who I’m fighting for.”
The tip of his thumb is rough as he rubs tiny circles across the back of my hand.
“I don’t think any one man should have all that power,” he says.
“Is that what you hope to accomplish with all this?” I ask. “To get him out of power?”
“That’s part of the reason.”
He lets go of my hand and rests his on his knee. Being this close and not touching is like a flower fighting its way back in the ground. It doesn’t feel right.
“But what we really want,” Rayce says, “is to create a system where no single man has all the control. Where an Imperial Council votes on issues together and that’s how the law is created. I want people like Oren on it, people who aren’t so out of touch with the rest of the population. I want to open up trade with Varsha again and let people practice art and make their own decisions. But first, we have to take my uncle out of power.�
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His voice speeds up, his fervor humming in the space between us. It’s like his words paint a new future in the air, the passion he feels for what he’s fighting for providing the red, the sorrow of past trespasses smearing blue, the life he wants to create bursting green, and I can finally start to see what Marin, or any of these folks, are willing to risk their lives for. He talks about equality, about turning life in Delmar around. About giving everyone a voice.
It lights a spark in my gut, like a piece of Zarenite beginning to glow.
And it dawns on me bright as the first rays of sunlight.
Rayce helps things shine.
“I’m sorry.” He shakes his head and starts to rise. “I’m keeping you up. You should sleep. If everything goes well tomorrow, then you’ll finally reunite with the others from the Garden.”
He rises, turning my little side of the tent to ice, and I realize that if what he says comes to pass, then this could be the last time we talk like this. Sadness wells up in my chest.
He makes for the flap, every step pulling us farther apart. The ghost of his warmth still lingers in the blankets next to me. I’m not ready to let him leave. Tomorrow I could plummet to my death. Tonight I want just want him near me.
“Wait.” I reach out and wrap my fingers around his hand.
“Yes?” he whispers.
The idea of spending what could be my last night alive completely alone breaks me. I want to go back to the moment he pressed me against him and taught my body how to breathe, trapped in the safety of his arms where nothing else existed.
Rayce’s eyes hold mine captive, stopping the world and my beating heart for a second.
Why can’t I just say the words? They bubble up on my lips, beg to be released: Stay. With. Me.
“What is it?” he asks, a half grin splitting his face. “Do you want me to stay?”
“No!” I say, so surprised to hear him voice my exact thought that I drop my grip on his hand. “I just wanted to say, um, be safe tomorrow.”
Garden of Thorns Page 20
