Chapter Five

The evening had fallen quiet, the way only late summer nights could be, when the air still carried warmth but the shadows grew long and deep. Irvine pulled her cloak tighter around her shoulders, though she wasn’t cold. If anything, she still felt restless, it was the kind of restlessness that wouldn’t let her sit still in her room, not even after she’d tried to read, tried to lie down, or tried to pretend so sleep might come.

Her father’s voice still echoed in her head from the day before my dove, my legacy, my pride. It should have filled her with a sense of belonging. Instead, it wrapped around her like a rope against her neck. What was worse than his words were the wolf’s eyes, the ones that had stared at her as life slipped from its body.

She'd been killed before on hunts, but this had been different. Perhaps it was the way the wolf had looked at her like it saw through her. Like it knew something she didn’t.

She rubbed her arms, shaking off the thought. She had sat in the living room alone for a while after Elara had left her but she was starting to feel suffocated so she slipped outside when no one noticed, and decided to go out for an evening walk.

The Liaison estate was grand, spreading out into well-trimmed gardens before filling out into the wild treeline. Garrick liked to say he kept the wild at bay, but Irvine often thought the wild kept itself alive, waiting, and bidding. Tonight, she wanted to feel it wrap around her.

Her boots pressed softly into the earth as she followed the dirt path, but soon she abandoned the walkway and wandered off into the grass, toward the darker line of trees. Every sense in her body felt too sharp, and too alive. She heard all the rustle of creatures hiding, the way the damp soil smelled, and even felt the way the air became more cold as the last light of the sun went down from the horizon.

It was supposed to calm her but it didn't.

The further she walked, the more she swore the woods themselves were watching her. She paused, turning once, twice, heart beating fast. But there was nothing. Only crickets and the far-off cry of an owl. She shook her head, muttering at herself. “You’re imagining things.”

But she wasn’t.

A figure stepped from the shadows ahead, tall and steady, the light catching against amber eyes.

Her breath hitched before she could stop it.

He wasn’t dressed like a hunter, not in Garrick’s sharp leathers or Mara’s fitted gear. He looked… untamed. A simple dark shirt stretched across his broad chest, sleeves rolled to his elbows, trousers worn, boots dusted with earth. But what caught her wasn’t his clothing, it was the way he stood, as though he belonged to the night itself.

Irvine froze. “Who…. who’s there?”

The man didn’t move closer, but his gaze didn’t waver either. “Just someone passing through,” he said, voice deep and low, carrying easily across the still air.

Something about it made her pulse race not with fear, though she told herself it should be fear. “You shouldn’t be here,” she managed. “This is Liaison land.”

“So it is.” He replied his mouth twisting into a faint smile

The tension in her chest tightened. She should turn around, she knew she should, march straight back to the estate and tell her father that someone had trespassed. But she didn’t. Instead, she asked, “What are you doing here?”

“Walking,” he said simply, as though that explained everything.

She narrowed her eyes. “At night? Through our woods?”

“I could ask the same of you,” he countered calmly, tilting his head.

Her mouth opened, and then closed. She hadn’t expected him to throw it back at her. Heat rose to her cheeks, half irritation, half… something else. Something she didn't know yet.

“You’re bold,” she said finally.

His gaze lingered on her, steady, unreadable. “So are you.”

There was silence and the wind rustled through the leaves overhead, carrying with it the faint scent of pine and something she couldn’t place but it was warm, rich, grounding. She almost thought it came from him.

She took a step closer without realizing it. “I don’t think I recognize you,” she said. “Are you from the city?”

His lips curved, faint but noticeable. “You could say that.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“No,” he agreed, and for a moment the air between them reduced, it was charged, as though his words carried more weight than words.

Irvine swallowed. The way he looked at her steady, intent, as though she was the only thing in his world, it unsettled her. Yet she didn’t look away. She couldn’t.

“What’s your name?” she asked, her voice softer now.

His pause was deliberate, long enough to make her wonder if he’d even answer. Then: “Jeweled.”

The name fit him. Strong, strange, edged with something precious and dangerous all at once. She let it roll across her tongue in a whisper. “Jeweled…”

His eyes glinted at that, a flash of something surprising? Satisfaction? She couldn’t tell.

“And yours?” he asked, voice quieter now, almost careful.

She hesitated. Every instinct told her to keep it, to guard it. But her heart overrode her head. “Irvine.”

The way he repeated it, slow, deliberate, almost reverent, sent a shiver down her spine. “Irvine.”

It suddenly felt too warm, though the night was cool. Her hands trembled at her sides, and she clasped them together to hide it. She should say something else, keep talking, but her thoughts are scattered under his gaze.

He stepped closer, not much, but enough that she could see the faint scar along his jaw, the sharp line of his cheekbones, the intensity in his eyes.

“You shouldn’t be out here alone,” he said, his voice gentler than before.

Her chin lifted, instinctively defiant. “Neither should you.”

That earned the faintest smile from him, one that sent a strange ache through her chest. “Fair enough.”

Another silence. This one is serious, and pulsing with all the things neither of them said. She swore she could hear his heartbeat, or maybe it was her own, too loud, and too fast.

She wanted to move closer to him. She wanted… to feel him. The thought startled her, left her breathless. She didn’t know this man. She shouldn’t want anything. And yet…

His eyes softened then, and he drew in a breath as though steadying himself. “I should go.”

The words cut quicker than she expected.

Her lips parted in disapproval, but no sound came out at first.

Finally, she said: “Already?”

He bent his head a bit to look at her face. “It’s late.”

It was an excuse and she felt it. He wasn’t leaving because it was late he was leaving because something held him back. And she hated that.

Still, he gave her a small bow of his head, polite, distant. “It was… good to meet you, we will see some other time, Irvine.”

Her chest tightened at the sound of her name in his mouth. She wanted to ask him to stay, to say more, to explain why looking at him felt like standing on the edge of a cliff she wanted to leap from. But her tongue betrayed her. So she only nodded.

“Goodnight, Jeweled,” she whispered.

His eyes lingered on hers a moment longer, as though committing her to memory, and then he stepped back into the shadows. Within moments, he was gone, swallowed by the night.

Irvine stood frozen, staring at the empty space where he’d been, heart racing, breath shallow. She pressed a hand to her chest, as though that could steady the ache inside her.

The walk back to the estate felt unreal and fast, her thoughts spinning in dizzying circles. She should feel suspicious and angry at the stranger who had trespassed on Liaison land. But all she felt was the way he stared at her, the way his voice sounded, the way he made her name sound more than a name.

By the time she reached her room, she was trembling again. She sat on the edge of her bed, staring at her hands, and her reflection in the mirror.

And she looked like someone that had just seen a ghost so she shut her eyes and as she shut them tight, all she could see was Jeweled.

And now she wanted more than just to see him.