Page 68 of Fierce Highland Magic

The silver leaves turned above us. The honeyed smell grew stronger—tea, I realized. Something brewing somewhere nearby. Something that smelled like warmth and rest and the particular comfort of being looked after.

"Your mother's line," Ailith said. "Did she ever speak of it?"

The hole where my mother's face had been ached. "I don't know what she spoke of."

"Don't you?"

"I gave that memory away."

Ailith's expression softened.

"Yes. You did."

The words held no accusation. That made them worse.

"You know what Accord-blood means," I said.

"Do I? Or do you already suspect?"

I thought of the pin warming in my hand on the road. The gate opening for me. The vendors who looked at me with something other than hunger.

The way the market had let me spend, instead of simply taking.

"It means the market recognizes me," I said.

Ailith waited.

"It means I have some kind of standing here. Not Rowan's kind. Something older."

"And does that frighten you?"

"Should it?"

"That depends," Ailith said gently, "on what you intend to do with it."

Rowan made a sound beside me—half-laugh, half-warning.

"This is the part where she makes her offer," he said. "Watch carefully. She'll make it sound like a kindness."

"It is a kindness."

"It is a leash dressed in silk."

Ailith's green eyes moved to him.

"And what would you call the guest-claim you placed on her without asking?"

His face went hard.

I should have enjoyed watching him lose ground. I didn't.

The smell of tea had grown stronger. The air around us had warmed by several degrees, as though the yew tree were sheltering a fire I could not see.

"The road was softened for me," I said.

Ailith turned back to me.

"Was it?"