“What can you tell me about the duel tomorrow?”
“If Her Highness wanted you to know any details, she would have told you. She always has a plan, and she does not make mistakes. All you can do is rest tonight and kill the king tomorrow.” Morgant pointed to a dark wood dresser. “Clothes in there. Your door will be heavily guarded. Do not try to leave.” He stepped closer and lifted my chin, his eyes piercing mine. “Do not try to see your Seelie dog, or you will both die. And then I get the pleasure of putting the cur out of his misery. It will be worse than death by a sword. You understand?”
A wintry shadow swept through my mind, and I imagined the vines around us snaking over him, dragging him away.
I swiped his hand away. “Don’t touch me again.”
The corner of his lip curled. “Maybe you do seem like one of us.
“Why do you hate Torin so much? ”
A breeze rushed into the room, toying with his hair. “He sends assassins after us, using fae with the ability to move between worlds. Once, I woke to find a Seelie assassin in my room. I was able to kill him, but my brother was not so lucky. Torin had him slaughtered in his sleep.”
Oh. That explains the reception we’d received.
Morgant turned, and the door slammed closed behind him.
I sat in silence, my body buzzing with exhaustion and nerves. I still clung to one thread of hope: that Torin had learned something from that crone. If not, we would need to find a way to free ourselves. We’d turn our swords on the queen if necessary—break free or die trying. Or maybe there would be a loophole of some sort?
“Stab,” she’d said. “Skewer.” What if I skewered a pinkie? An earlobe? Fae were bound by oaths, weren’t they? She’d have to let one of us free if we skewered a little bit of skin. The freed person could summon help from Faerie.
After a few minutes, I poured myself a hot bath and slipped into it, breathing in the scent of basil and lavender. With the fire crackling next to me, my mind started to drift, my vision going hazy. For a moment, it almost looked like the vines were crawling over the stone, writhing like a living thing. My breath caught, and I sat up straight in the bath.
As I blinked, the vision slid away again.
I tightened my jaw. The stress was getting to me. I stepped out of the bath, water dripping off my naked body in little rivulets. The humid breeze swept into the room, raising goosebumps on my skin.
I snatched up a towel, leaving wet footprints on the flagstones as I crossed to the dresser. When I pulled open the drawers, I found neatly folded white nightgowns. I pulled one on and snuffed out the candles in the room.
As I crawled into bed, a shadow’s movement on the balcony caught my eye, and I sat up, clutching the sheets to my chest. A silhouette loomed outside my window. Within the next heartbeat, I recognized the athletic shape, the ice-blue eyes that pierced the shadows. He wore a shirt now, crisp and white.
Torin.
My pulse roared. Had he lost his mind? With his eyes on mine, he prowled into the room, a finger on his lips.
I flung off the covers and tiptoed closer to him, closing the distance between us until I could feel the heat radiating off him. He brushed my hair behind my ear, leaning down to whisper, “I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow, Ava, and I don’t know if it will be possible. But if we have a chance to escape, we must take it. We must use our swords to free ourselves.” He brushed his thumb over my cheek. “I don’t know how. For the first time in my life, I honestly have no idea what to do.”
My heart tightened. “So, I guess you didn’t see the Veiled One?”
He shook his head. “The castle seemed empty, as far as I could tell. ”
I sucked in a deep breath. “What about a little stab? I have this feeling that she is very particular in how she chooses her words. She didn’t say we had to kill each other, did she? What about a little piercing, somewhere harmless? One of us could go free and get help.”
He nodded. “Good. Stab me, then.”
I shook my head. It made more sense for him to leave, I thought. He was the king. But we didn’t really have time to argue about it. “Did you hear what she said she was going to do if she caught you in here?”
He brushed his knuckles against my cheekbones. “I do hope to avoid that fate, changeling. But I had to see you.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t want to be without you any more than I have to.” Instead of leaving, he leaned in and pressed his lips against mine. He kissed me lightly, but when I ran my hands over his white shirt, feeling the hard muscle beneath, his kiss deepened. I melted into the slow, bittersweet kiss. Right now, I wasn’t worrying about the duel or his kingdom, or thinking of anything else in the world except him and the feel of his tongue sweeping against mine, his hands sliding down my nightgown, pressing me close to him.