Zoe Reed - Breaking Legacies

“You needn’t be afraid, Kiena,” she told me, reaching for my hand and taking it across the small table with her so she could sit down again.

And that comfort in the contact of skin—which had been so useless when I tried to get a confession from her—worked wonders on me. “What I needn’t be and what I am are quite at odds.” She didn’t say anything, but I could see the question in her eyes: why ? Instead of answering that question, I took my hand back and folded my arms on the table, groaning as I dropped my head onto them. “I hadn’t wanted you to see my weakness.”

“If fear is weakness,” Ava said, “then everyone is weak.”

“Your life is in danger,” I replied, lifting my head and blushing at the fact that there wasn’t a bit of amusement in her expression. I don’t know why it was more awkward for me that this wasn’t funny to her, but the last thing I wanted her to do was worry. “Your fear is reasonable.”

“I have others,” she said, her head tilted almost scoldingly. “I have many. My greatest is never finding somewhere to belong.”

My eyebrows furrowed. “But this entire kingdom is yours.”

“Is it?” she asked with a skeptical chuckle. “Were it mine, it wouldn’t mean the entire kingdom should be home. I belong at this inn no more than you do.”

“And the castle?” I asked.

“The castle has many parts, and is thus many things,” she answered. “I’ve yet to find a part that feels like home.”

I’d been speaking to Ava so freely, and so without formality this entire morning, that it didn’t cross my mind to watch what I said until now. “What about Ellerete?” It was a personal question—the implications of which could be wildly offensive—but this was as good a time as any. “Might a soul feel like home?”

Ava’s eyes narrowed the slightest bit with concentration, as though she weren’t sure I meant what I really did. “Indeed,” she began, the hint of a smile reaching one corner of her lips, and for the first time, her cheeks shaded. “Ellie was a stability amongst the castle’s commotion, and, when privacy permitted, a dear friend.” I don’t know if it was intentional, but Ava’s gaze fell and lingered at my mouth, so that by the time she met my eyes again, I’d colored furiously. “But I’ve yet to share that depth of the soul’s intimacy.”

I hadn’t the inkling of a clue now what to say. She hadn’t expressed a single displeasure at the nature of the question, or even the smallest of disapproval at my suggesting she might share that intimacy with a woman. She was making it increasingly hard to mind my station, and to keep from thinking of her as a friend rather than my princess. But she was my princess, and it wasn’t my place to be asking those kinds of questions, or to be thinking the kinds of things I was to make me want to ask those questions. It was so clear to me that she already considered me a friend, and, as she’d considered Ellie one of her dearest friends, she didn’t mind my lack of title. The truth of the matter was, however, that once my task was seen through, whether I took her north to her father or south to her own destination, it was likely I’d never see her again. I don’t know why, but I felt the pang of that thought in my chest.

“Kiena?” Ava prompted, breaking my silent reflection. “Why snow storms?”

I glanced toward the motionless shutters while I took in a deep breath. “I taught myself to hunt as a child, out of necessity,” I began to explain, feeling far too vulnerable to meet Ava’s eyes. “Albus was just a pup the first time we went out on our own. Mother was sick, she needed something of substance, but I hadn’t learned to read the weather yet, not like I can now.” Having heard his name, Albus finally got off the bed and trotted over, setting his head on my lap as if he knew the story I was telling. “A storm came only shortly after we’d gone out, a bad blizzard that lasted days. I couldn’t see more than a couple inches before my eyes, and Albus was too young to know the way home. We got lost.”

“For days?” Ava asked in concerned understanding.

“Aye,” I answered. “I knew not to wander, so we curled up beneath a fallen log. It was so cold. I held Albus to my chest to keep us warm, but we were both wet and frozen and shaking.” I scratched behind my dog’s ear. “By the time the storm ended, dear Albus was stiff. I thought I’d lost him.” Ava reached out to stroke Albus’s back, like she felt the immediacy of the danger all those years ago. “I hardly had the strength to run home, but I did. I warmed him back to life.” I laughed at myself, my cheeks tinting while I admitted, “I cried so many apologies into his fur it was hard to dry him by the fire.”

Ava smiled at that, the warm kind of smile that eased my bashfulness. “You know better now,” she offered. “You won’t be caught off guard again.”

“No, I won’t,” I agreed, leaning back in my seat and feeling strangely comforted having shared my discomfort. “But the cold is a glutton, and its greed chips at me whether I permit it to or not.”

“Your fear is not ill-founded,” she said. Albus turned away from me to meet Ava’s loving hands, and ran his tongue up the side of her face so that she giggled her bell-chime laugh. “And Albus seems to have forgiven you.”

“I’m grateful to you,” I told her, but her eyes met mine with confusion. “For your concern.”

“You needn’t thank me,” she said, pushing Albus’s face away when he tried to lick her again.

“Still,” I said.

At the tone of my voice, she looked at me with a somber understanding. “You’re welcome.” After a moment’s pause, she grinned and picked up something else on the table that I hadn’t noticed until now. “A traveler had parchment,” she said, holding up the paper, “I got him to part with some.”

“I don’t suppose you should be making the acquaintance of travelers.” I tried to narrow my eyes in rebuke, but I couldn’t help smiling at how excited she looked. “And educated ones at that.” She was more likely to be recognized by the educated.

“What’s done is done.” She set her teeth in a grin in response to the look on my face. “May I borrow your dagger?”

My eyebrows rose at that. Ava stood and walked to the fire, picking a long, cool piece of charcoal from the edges. It became apparent to me that she wanted to sharpen the charcoal to a point, so I removed my knife and handed it to her as she sat back down. She held the charcoal over her knee and proceeded to carve over one end, and I managed to watch her calmly for a minute before she nearly skinned herself.

“Be careful!” I exclaimed, wincing at how close the blade had been to slicing through her trousers. Then I realized my protest had been too forceful, and added, “If you’d please.”

Ava smirked, and I’d seen her smile enough by now that I knew she was about to tease me. “Tell me, Kiena, how many times have you cut yourself with this blade?”

I reached out to take it when she handed it back, answering, “Too many to count.”

“Alas,” she said, doing what she could to hold back that smile. “Here you are, alive and well.” I pursed my lips as though I wasn’t amused in the slightest, though truthfully, even Ava caught the entertained glimmer in my eyes. “Perhaps I should be a bit more reckless to prove I’m not so fragile.”

“Is it your goal to suffer me an early death?” I replied. “By the gods, you’re well on your way.”

Ava laughed, testing the point of her charcoal at the corner of a parchment. “You weren’t so uptight about me a couple of days ago.”

I stood to walk to the saddle on the floor, reaching in one of the bags for my sharpening rock. “I hardly knew you a couple of days ago.”