Page 201 of The Mercy of Dawn

He would stick it out for however long she needed. It would be tantamount to cruelty to leave her on her own now, and the thought of not being around her made him wholly uneasy. Whatever wild fucking implication that had, he would process it later.

“Good.” She patted his chest and stepped away, but he caught the amusement that crept into her face just before she said, “I thought that might be the case, considering how thoroughly invested the two of you are now.”

Mikael blinked. Did she mean…

He looked from his mother, over to where his father had leaned back against the sideboard that housed all the crystals and stones his mother liked to keep for good measure.

“You two reek of each other,” Lars chuckled, “And there is no mistaking that for anything else. I’m just surprised it took this long.”

“The scent of you two was almost indecent at lunch,” Runa added, less than helpfully. Mikael wasn't usually one to find himself embarrassed, but this conversation? He could do with being no part of it. “And that bruise I saw on her throat, Mikael? Am I mistaken in thinking you almost made a very hasty decision?”

Yeah, he would not be part of this discussion anymore.

Cyril’s well-being and her future? He could handle that.

His mother dishing out thoughts on their intimate dealings? Not a fucking chance.

“How you are mistaken, Mother, is thinking any of this is your business.”

He headed out of the sitting room and heard his father mumble something in agreement with him. They’d agreed on more in the last day than they probably had in ten years, and it was unsettling. His mother, of course, followed him out.

“Mikael, you both better be taking a tonic!” she called after him, but Mikael waved her off and kept on down the hallway.

He had Cyril to take care of.

Pools of the thinning, late afternoon sun greeted Mikael when he pushed open the door to his room. Cyril’s head lifted from where she was curled up on her side on the bed.

“It’s just me,” he said softly, and her head sank back down.

Mikael toed off his boots and walked over. Sitting on the bench at the foot of his bed was a folded pile of clothes that looked awfully like what she had on earlier.

“You found something to wear?” he asked.

“I took one of your shirts.” Cyril’s eyes tracked him for a moment as he rounded the bed. She tugged the blanket up around her face and her heavy eyes slipped shut. “I hope that’s okay.”

Patience, he reminded himself.

“Of course it is.” Mikael brushed a section of hair back from her face, sweeping it behind the delicate point of her ear. She’d taken the time to wrangle it out of the braid she wove it into earlier, and run a brush through it, from the looks of things. “Did you not want the curtains closed, or…?”

“Couldn’t be bothered,” she sighed into the blankets.

Her apathy was palpable.

Mikael worked his way around the four windows in silence, pulling the heavy drapery shut on each until nothing but a thin stream of light trickled in between the navy blue panels.

“Can I join you?” he asked because this was the sort of territory he wanted to make zero assumptions in. He hoped she would say yes, that she would entertain the need he felt to be close to her and take care of her.

He didn’t expect her to whisper, “Please.”

Mikael’s heart ached as he eased under the blankets behind her and wrapped every fiber of his being around her little, broken frame. She settled back against him with a quiet noise that sounded almost content, and some deep-seated part of him breathed the smallest sigh of relief.

“Are you alright, Cyr?”

Even though he knew the likely answer, he felt like he had to ask.

She was calmer now than she’d been an hour ago. Maybe she’d had an epiphany while she sat in here alone. Maybe she realized that this dark and lingering night could give way to a dawn where she had choices, where she had freedom and—

“No.”