Page 53 of Fierce Highland Magic
I stood there long enough to consider the alternatives. Stay alone, in a market that had seen me give away the most important memory I possessed and would likely want know what else I had.
Follow the man who had claimed me as his guest without consent, spent some invisible resource to purchase a path I had specifically told him not to buy, and continued to answer direct questions as though honesty were a rash he could avoid by wearing better clothing.
The second option was appalling.
It was also better.
I followed him.
Blue-Lamp lane began beneath a low stone arch half-hidden by a tent selling clocks with no hands. The lamps hung in iron cages along the passage walls, each flame burning a strange underwater blue. Their light didn't push back the darkness so much as stain it.
At the archway, the cobbles ended. Black water began. It filled the lane from wall to wall, smooth as glass and still enough to reflect the lamps with perfect, wavering precision. Beneath the surface, pale shapes moved slowly through the dark.
They weren't fish. They weren't anything I had words for.
The passage beyond stretched perhaps thirty feet to another arch, where dry cobbles rose into the old quarter. It should have been a simple crossing. Short. Contained. A path.
Rowan stopped at the water's edge.
"Stay close," he said.
"No."
He glanced at me.
"No?"
"You don't get to give me instructions as though I am the item you just purchased."
"I purchased passage."
"You purchased it for me."
"For us."
"I didn't ask."
"I know."
"Then stop behaving as though this is generosity."
For a moment, the blue lamps made his eyes look almost black.
"That would be easier," he said quietly, "if you stopped behaving as though accepting help is the same as surrendering."
The words hit harder than they had any right to. I folded my arms.
"Don't diagnose me."
"I wasn't."
"You were."
"I was making an observation."
"You make a great many observations for someone who dislikes facts."
His mouth curved without warmth.
