*

Her visage in the room’s little table mirror had appalled her. Not because she was dirty, nor that her hair was tangled and lank, or that she wore still-healing scratches and bruises on her arms and legs—she had, after all, grown up running around town barefoot, climbing trees and playing in yak pastures. No, it was how fatigued she appeared that startled her, and not only from the physical privations she’d experienced, but undoubtedly due to the emotional toll that the last few days had taken on her. When she had been a little girl and her grandmother had passed away, she had witnessed the very same weariness in her mother’s face. It was not only sleep that was required to mend such weariness, but time.

Lily had lain the mirror face down on the table and avoided looking at her reflection again until she had finished eating, bathing, and brushing out her hair. Time moved of its own accord, but she could at least choose to spend that time seeing to her immediate needs. The food Vetch had ordered for them was hearty and plentiful, and was as much a balm to the ills of the forest as being clean again was. At some point a young woman had tapped on the door and offered to launder her clothes. Gratefully, she had agreed and handed her torn and road-abused dress around the door, and also asked that more hot water for the bath be sent up later for her companion. It only occurred to her after the woman had left that she only had her undergarments to wear until her dress was returned in the morning, and that Vetch would return well before that to the room. It should have been a less than negligible worry, given the circumstances they were in, but it was there all the same. In her next thought, she recalled how she had already entrusted herself to him for when she must Slumber. Well, there were things they would both have to become accustomed to, weren’t there? Him seeing her in her underclothes was likely the least of her problems. In fact, the idea suddenly sent an odd little thrill through her.

“Lily, is this really the time and place for thoughts like that?” she cautioned herself. She considered what Mage Marigold’s answer to that question would be. “And definitely don’t think about that right now, either,” she added. “Not wise.” She couldn’t come up with any reason why it was not wise, nor why she should have to be wise at present, but considering the rush of confusion such possibilities brought her, she settled on the idea of just taking herself to bed. Even after having spent much of the day in Slumber, true sleep was a very attractive prospect.

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She peeked out into the hallway from around the door, but saw no one, and there was no view of the common room below. She wondered if Vetch was having any luck learning about where they must go next, and she prayed to all the spirits that whenever they got there, they would find Marigold and somehow be able to secure her release. Perhaps it was a childish wish, believing that saving her mentor would somehow restore something of her old life. As much as she hoped it would, she had to be realistic. It was difficult to imagine how either would come to pass. Still, it was all she had left to cling to. The faint hope stuck with her.

Too many thoughts racing in too many opposing directions. Sleep. That’s what she needed. She stoked up the fire in the room’s little hearth, moved the saddlebags away from where the stable boy had dropped them in the middle of the floor, so that Vetch would not stumble over them when he came in, and then blew out all the candles except for the one on the table where the food was set out. He would be able to see it and the bathtub waiting for him. She slid under the warm blankets and sighed in pleasure at the feel of a soft mattress cradling her, luxurious after days of sleeping on the hard ground. The bed was not big, but big enough to accommodate two in close proximity. She left room for Vetch and was asleep before she realized she’d even closed her eyes.

The sound of him taking off his boots woke her and then apprehension kept her awake as he ate and went through the routine of undressing and bathing. He was as quiet as possible throughout, not even so much as lighting more candles so he could see. The effort flattered her, and yet almost she wanted to sit up and tell him he didn’t need to be so courteous on her account. But he was in the bathtub now! Vetch, bathing in the same room, only a few feet behind her. No. Stop that, she thought. Her cheeks flushed and, very pointedly, she remained perfectly still and huddled in the blankets, though she wanted the throw them off, as she was suddenly suffused with warmth. What was she supposed to do? She listened with cats’s ears and a pounding heart. He stepped out of the water, he dried off, he blew out the candle. She heard a shuffling of fabric and she waited for his weight in the bed beside her.

It did not come. The sound was him spreading her travel blanket out on the floor. Had she really not considered he might do something other than share the one bed they had acquired for themselves? She had even gone to sleep balanced on one side of the bed to give him room. What was this she felt as she heard him settle and yawn and become silent, leaving the entire bed to her? Relief? Disappointment?

His breathing steadied. Asleep. It was long before she could return to the same.