A Baron of Bonds (Conduit of Light #2)

51. Saelyn

Chapter 51

Saelyn

I would be seventeen in two days and fretted over the silliest things.

“No, no, like this ,” I corrected, exasperated with Thevin and his inability to correctly arrange a single paper banner across the trees.

“That’s what I did,” he grumbled, stepping down from the enormous tree stump, watching me correct the angle of the string.

“No, yours were all wonky and sad,” I retorted, ensuring my correction would not fall by securing it around a low branch of the tree.

“You’re all wonky and sad,” he mumbled under his breath, catching me at the waist as I jumped down from the stump. I faltered slightly, but his strong hands held me steady, keeping me from falling as I landed into his hard chest.

By the love of my mother , I wanted to stay there.

My breath quickened and a red flush covered my neck and face. I could feel it there, creeping through my skin without permission as he grinned down at me, my hands pressed to his chest. The small cleft in his chin had become more charming now that his age had overtaken mine by over a year since he spent so much of his time outside of Felgren.

I swallowed, his hands still at my waist. “Am not,” I murmured, not wanting to move away from his body, but doing so anyway. “Can you help me with these laynterns?”

“ Lay nterns?” he laughed.

I giggled, shaking my head. “ Lan -terns.”

He nodded, picking one up and hanging it on a tree. “You always did struggle with names.”

I pretended offense, “I was very small, and to be fair, Pah-Pah’s name is not the easiest to pronounce.”

He laughed and crossed his arms, looking up at the colorful banners and lanterns that now wove through the trees where the party would begin in less than forty-eight hours.

“I like it,” he commented, glancing around at all the little details I’d added.

I grinned and found a low branch to hang another lantern as he finished, “It’s very…you.”

I blushed at that too, but turned alway quickly to calm my stupid heart down. “Busy and excessive?”

He laughed, walking to me and casually putting an arm over my shoulder. “I was thinking colorful and bright. Like the sun when it shines on a meadow.”

If my heart beat any faster, it would burst from my chest. He couldn’t just say things like that, but did more and more the longer he was here.

“Thank you,” I murmured, taking a quick glance to look up at his face, seeing his clear, blue eyes already on mine.

“I mean it, Sae. It’s beautiful.” His eyes narrowed slightly and he brushed my long waves back from my face, his hand lingering by my neck.

“You’ve outdone yourself, Saelyn!” Pah-Pah’s clap of approval startled us both. We turned to see him coming into the small clearing.

Thevin’s hands found themselves in his pockets and mine wrung on my skirts.

“Thank you. There’s very little left to do, but I keep thinking I’m missing something.”

He shook his head and walked to me, his arms outstretched for an embrace, and hugging me, he whispered, “Looks like you have everything you need.”

I think I’d die right there if Thevin heard that.

He pulled himself back as I pinched his arm.

“Shall we get some lunch? Your mother has set up something for us to share.”

I raised a brow and looked at Thevin who shrugged, saying, “Sure. I could use some nourishment if I’m to keep working with this tyrant over here.”

I smiled wide just as he did, loving his teasing, loving the way his cropped curls brushed across his forehead because I knew I was a goner.

Not only had I fallen madly in love with the one person I so rarely got to see, I had started to wonder if he was slowly falling for me.

“ Saelyn .” My name brushed lightly on the wind and chills racked through my body, stealing my ability to move.

Pah-Pah turned to lead us back to my mother, and Thevin frowned my way.

“What is it?” he asked.

My eyes darted through the trees, the flowers, the underbrush, looking for any sign of where my name had come from.

“Sometimes I—” I closed my eyes and shook my head. “Never mind. It’s nothing.”

I walked forward and he slid up beside me. “It’s not nothing if it makes you look like that.”

I shrugged, choosing to ignore whatever it was that was obviously haunting me. Whatever it was that had been haunting me for years.