Tower of Dawn (Throne of Glass #6) by Sarah J. Maas

He seemed to sense it.

He told Kadja to leave his cup on the table. Told her to go.

Yrene watched as through a distant window while Chaol took her cup and lifted it to her lips.

She debated shoving his hand out of her face.

Yes, she’d work with him; no, he was not the monster she’d initially suspected he’d be, not in the way she’d seen men be; but letting him this close, letting him tend to her like this …

“You can either drink it,” he said, his voice a low growl, “or we can sit like this for the next few hours.”

She slid her eyes to him. Found his stare to be level—clear, despite the exhaustion.

She said nothing.

“So, that’s the line,” Chaol murmured, more to himself than her. “You can stomach helping me, but I can’t return the favor. Or can’t do anything that steps beyond your idea of what—who I am.”

He was more astute than most people likely gave him credit for.

She had a feeling the hardness in his rich brown eyes was mirrored in her own.

“Drink.” Pure command laced his voice—a man used to being obeyed, to giving orders. “Resent me all you want, but drink the damn thing.”

And it was the faint kernel of worry in his eyes …

A man used to being obeyed, yes, but a man also inclined to care for others. Look after them. Driven to do it by a compulsion he couldn’t leash, couldn’t train out of him. Couldn’t have broken out of him.

Yrene parted her lips, a silent yielding.

Gently, he set the porcelain teacup against her mouth and tipped it for her.

She sipped once. He murmured in encouragement. She did so again.

So tired. She had never been so tired in her life—

Chaol pushed the cup against her mouth a third time, and she drank a full gulp.

Enough. He needed it more than she did—

He sensed she was likely to bark at him, withdrew the cup from her mouth, and merely sipped it. One gulp. Two.

He drained it and grabbed the other one, offering her the first sips again before he took the dregs.

Insufferable man.

Yrene must have said as much, because a half smile kicked up on one side of his face. “You’re not the first to call me that,” he said, his voice smoother. Less hoarse.

“I won’t be the last, I’m sure,” she muttered.

Chaol simply gave her that half smile again and stretched to refill both cups. He added the honey himself—less than Kadja had. The right amount. He stirred them, his hands steady.

“I can do it,” Yrene tried to say.

“So can I,” was all he said.

She managed to hold the cup this time. He made sure she was well onto drinking hers before he lifted his own to his lips.

“I should go.” The thought of getting out of the palace, let alone the trek to the Torre, then the walk up the stairs to her rooms …

“Rest. Eat—you must be starving.”

She eyed him. “You’re not?” He’d exercised heavily before she’d arrived; he had to be famished from that alone.

“I am. But I don’t think I can wait for dinner.” He added, “You could join me.”

It was one thing to heal him, work with him, let him serve her tea. But to dine with him, the man who had served that butcher, the man who had worked for him while that dark army was amassed down in Morath … There it was. That smoke in her nose, the crackle of flame and screaming.

Yrene leaned forward to set her cup on the table. Then stood. Every movement was stiff, sore. “I need to return to the Torre,” she said, knees wobbling. “The vigil is at sundown.” Still a good hour from now, thankfully.

He noted her swaying and reached for her, but she stepped out of his range. “I’ll leave the supplies.” Because the thought of lugging that heavy bag back …

“Let me arrange a carriage for you.”

“I can ask at the front gate,” she said. If someone was hunting her, she’d opt for the safety of a carriage.

She had to grip the furniture as she passed to keep upright. The distance to the door seemed eternal.

“Yrene.”

She could barely stand at the door, but she paused to look back.

“The lesson tomorrow.” The focus had already returned to those brown eyes. “Where do you want me to meet you?”

She debated calling it off. Wondered what she’d been thinking, asking him of all people to come.

But … five hours. Five hours of agony, and he had not broken.

Perhaps it was for that alone that she had declined dinner. If he had not broken, then she would not break—not in seeing him as anything but what he was. What he’d served.

“I’ll meet you in the main courtyard at sunrise.”

Mustering the strength to walk was an effort, but she did it. Put one foot in front of the other.

Left him alone in that room, still staring after her.

Five hours of agony, and she’d known it had not all been physical.

She had sensed, shoving against that wall, that the darkness had also showed him things on the other side of it.

Glimmers had sometimes shivered past her. Nothing she could make out, but they felt … they had felt like memories. Nightmares. Perhaps both.

Yet he had not asked her to stop.

And part of Yrene wondered, as she trudged through the palace, if Lord Chaol had not asked her to stop not just because he’d learned how to manage pain, but also because he somehow felt he deserved it.