Page 40 of The Archer’s Wish

“Has anyone seen Camden?” she called. There were murmurs of several people stating they’d seen him earlier.

Someone neared and when she looked up again, Liam stood before her with a healer’s box cradled in his arm. “He sent this,” he said quietly. “There’s another man with an arrow in his arm.”

Their eyes met briefly, but enough that something fluttered in her stomach making her take a deep breath. “Thank ye,” she murmured turning back to the injured man.

She worked quickly, pressing, cleaning, stitching with practiced precision. The man gritted his teeth but didnae cry out. All the while, she felt Liam’s watchful presence beside her, steady and silent. It unsettled her in a strangely intimate way. Instinct whispered that he wished to speak. A foolish hope fluttered that he might finally voice what lingered between them.

It was utter foolishness to hope for something more than just his ensuring all was well.

When she finished wrapping the man’s head, she straightened and lifted the healer’s box. “I will take this back to Camden.”

When she began to walk, he came alongside. She paused, meeting Liam’s gaze. “Do ye require more poultice?”

He shook his head. “Effie plans to fetch it from the apothecary.”

“I see. Ye walk better today.” Beitris wasn’t sure what else to say to him, and she wondered why he continued to accompany her.

“As time passes, I pray my leg remembers what it once was,” he said quietly. “Still, I am nae fit for a horse.”

She spun to face him. “Dinnae even consider it. Ye will undo weeks of healing in one foolish ride.”

A corner of his mouth twitched. “I have nae intention of testing my leg in such a manner anytime soon.”

Her sigh trembled as she turned again, and then his hand closed gently about her arm.

“I return to the keep in a pair of days.”

The words struck like a physical blow. Her breath left her in a slow, aching exhale. Though she had known that this moment would come, when she’d not see him as often, knowing it and hearing it were very different things.

“Aye… of course,” she said after a beat. “I will arrange with Keir so that I can continue yer care there.”

“There is nae need,” he replied evenly. “I can tend it myself now. The pain has eased.”

It felt as though his hand had clenched around her heart instead of her arm. So this was how it ended.

He was closing the door, quietly, politely, finally. Keir had been right. Liam was a charmer, but only for a short while, then his attention waned and he moved on to the next woman.

“I see.” Her voice thinned. She withdrew her arm. “I must find my cousin.”

“Of course,” he said gently. “I will return to the village once…”

“Aye, I am aware after all yer family lives here,” she interrupted. Beitris hurried away before he could say more. The ache behind her eyes burned, blurring the path ahead.

After several stumbling steps, she realized she had no idea where Camden was. She blinked hard, forcing the tears back until the field returned to focus. At last, she spotted the flash of her cousin’s red hair near the far tents and nearly ran toward it, clutching the healer’s box as if it might steady her heart.

All she desired now was the quiet warmth of the bakery and the lonely comfort of her own bed, where she might finally allow herself to break. The sooner she left the archery grounds, the better.

Just as she neared her cousin, something tugged at her, an instinct she could not ignore.

Beitris glanced back.

Liam stood exactly where she had left him, unmoving amid the noise and motion of the field. His gaze was fixed on her, dark and unreadable, as though he, too, felt the distance stretching between them with every step she took. For a heartbeat, their eyes locked across the throng of bodies and color and sound.

The world seemed to hold its breath.

Then someone jostled her shoulder, breaking the fragile tether. When she looked again, he had turned away.

Beitris didn’t need a looking glass to ken her eyes were swollen. The tightness of her lids and the dull ache behind them told her as much. She had cried herself into exhausted sleep the night before, giving her sorrow free rein at last.