A Court of Dark and Decay

Chapter 15- In The Forest

"Nesta, are you listening?" 

She snapped her head up, away from the misty mountains sealing her fate. Nesta realized that Jaida had been talking to her. 

"Um.." She swiped a stray hair behind her ear. "No. I wasn't." 

She'd only been here an hour and she was already letting people down. 

Jaida, though, only smiled, moving to the stone seat next to Nesta. 

Cassian's eyes were trained on Nesta, but she ignored him. Despite the magnet behind her eyes that pulled them to him, she focused her attention on Jaida. She straightened the parchment and began again. 

"You're schedule is parallel to mine, at least for these first weeks, so I will be here for you every step of the way."  

Nesta scanned the paper, eyes swimming in a sea of words like cooking and cleaning and nursery. The thought of having to care for any child horrified her, but something else caught her eye before she could comment.

Nesta's brow furrowed as she saw the words 5:00- Training as the first thing listed every day, scrawled thinly in the top margin in a dark blue ink- different then the black of the rest of the paper. 

She looked up to Jaida. "I thought I was only training once a week? This says I have training before the sun even rises every day."

Cassian's head perked at that, looking from Nesta to Jaida. But the wise female only plucked the parchment from Nesta's hand and pulled something else from under her corset. 

It was a capped ink pen. 

She uncapped the pen, small drops of ink flinging from it, and drew two dots and a curved line at the top of the paper. A smiley face. In blue ink. 

Jaida handed the paper back to Nesta, who was both confused and impressed at how every Illyrain female she had met thus far had managed to completely uproot all of her preconceived ideas about them. 

Jadia turned just as a familiar form emerged from the tent nearest to them. 

"Oh, hello, Nesta. I didn't think you'd be here already." 

"Verra?" 

Their icy blue eyes were unmistakable. Nesta had thought that they were just a lowly healer from Velaris, but what were they doing here? 

Cassian stood and offered Verra his seat, which they took and nodded a thanks. This was now seeming more and more like the evening in Feyre's estate when everyone had confronted her. Nesta was suddenly very uncomfortable with all the eyes on her. 

"What is this?" She asked, somehow finding herself asking Cassian and not the other two Illyrians. Her eyes had simply found his, and the mounting anxiety in her ached as he crouched in front of her, effectively closing the group off the rest of camp.

"This," Cassian started eyes darting to Jaida and sharing some secret smile, "is something you cannot tell anyone about." 

The mischief in his voice stirred awake that feeling in her core, and though she did everything she could to mush it down, it only grew when he put a careful hand on her knee and smiled up at her. 

Damnit. 

"I think it's time we show you your living quarters, yeah?" Cassian said, the warmth in his hand leaking through the layers of her dress. 

He knew exactly what he was doing, and she loved it. 

Easier then what? 

Easier then loving you.