Although Penelope didn’t notice his stiffness in the moment, Crow knew she was going to figure him out in the morning, just as the last guard had. His fake smile wavered at the thought. He had told her about the content of his nightmares, but he didn’t want her to find out about the sort of effects the dreams had been taking on him when he woke up from them. Knowing her, she was just going to worry about him more, and he didn’t want to take her attention away from convincing his father to end the war. He could handle a few bad dreams; he [i]couldn’t[/i] handle seeing the destruction of his homeland and possibly losing the knight to an even more dangerous war.

As she went on to say that she would, in fact, be posted by his room all night and the night following, the viceroy shifted his weight nervously. Even if he got lucky and he didn’t wake up screaming from his nightmare tonight, he doubted he would go two in a row without facing it at all when it had come back so strong. “Thanks, love,” he said in a low voice despite his internal worries. “But I think I’ll be fine… You don’t need to do anything for me.”

At her apology, he shook his head. “Convincing my father to negotiate with Younis is far more important than my personal issues,” he casted her a teasing smile. “I meant what I said before: I don’t want you to let this distract you from doing everything you can to get him to see reason.” Casting a quick glance down the long corridor to make sure they were alone, he took a step forward and wrapped her in his arms in an embrace. “Just do what you can, when you can do it. I don’t expect anything more from you than that, okay?”

[i]And there probably isn’t anything that can be done to help anyway,[/i] he added silently to himself, still pessimistic that she would be successful in finding a cure for his dreams.

After a pause, he touched a quick kiss to her cheek and stepped back again, offering her a tired smile, “I should get some sleep. It’s been a long day, and with those plans of yours, I have a feeling the coming days are going to be even longer.” He pressed one more kiss to her lips. “I love you, Penelope. Goodnight.”