Torin stood and watched as Moray washed the prison grime from his face and hands. He combed the mats from his hair and stripped out of his stolen Tamerlaine clothes, then dressed in a dark blue tunic embroidered with shining purple thread. He knotted clean boots up to his knees, belted a dirk to his waist, and set a circlet of woven silver on his brow.
Transformed, Moray sighed and leaned his head back, closing his eyes.
Torin didn’t like the expression on Moray’s face. The calmness, the confidence. He didn’t like the way his hand wrapped around the dirk’s hilt, or the way the silver flashed on his brow when he moved.
“If you’ve come home to hurt her . . .” Torin began, but his chest was full of embers. Flaring heat that made his throat ache. He couldn’t finish the threat, but he saw that his voice startled Moray.
He opened his eyes and turned in Torin’s direction, squinting. “Ah yes, I forgot all about you.”
Moray began to approach him, and Torin held his ground. But his heart was frantic. He could feel both fear and fury tangling within him.
“Do you think I’d hurt my sister then?” Moray asked in a languid voice. “After everything I’ve done to bring her home?”
Torin knew Moray was baiting him. He knew it, and still he rose to it. But words were just as sharp as steel. And they became the sword in his hands that night.
He said, “She is more of a sister to me than she ever will be to you.”
Moray’s face went pale with rage. A vein rose in his temple, and his lip curled, revealing his clenched teeth. But then he smoothed his expression into one of neutrality.
“Hello, Laird,” he said with a hint of amusement. “I was wondering what had happened to you, ever since Sidra came to visit me.”
Hearing Moray speak Sidra’s name was a bruise to Torin’s spirit. He winced, his hands curling into fists. Moray was baiting him again, and this time Torin had to be the one to swallow. To bury his worries and emotions, let them sink down into darkness. Because he could feel it: he had already spent too much time here in the west. He needed to return to his mission.
He also needed to punch a hole in Moray’s confidence.
“The power you stole from Orenna is waning,” Torin said smoothly. “Whatever your plan is, you should hurry.”
His words found their mark.
Moray left his chamber and rushed through another set of winding, torch-lit passages. Twice, he almost stumbled into the path of attendants, who were carrying away dinner trays. That was what Torin hoped would happen—that Moray’s plans would be foiled when he grew careless and was discovered. But then he reached his destination, coming to a stop before a carven door.
Moray reached out to touch the iron handle, his eyes narrowing, as if he expected to find it locked. The door opened, and Moray stepped inside.
Torin melted through the wall.
He knew this was Adaira’s room. He knew because, even though she wasn’t there, Jack was, sitting at the desk as he wrote on a sheet of parchment.
Moray stopped upright. He was surprised to see Jack, but he drew the dirk from its scabbard.
“Jack!” Torin shouted. “Jack, behind you!”
Jack couldn’t hear him. Captive to the words he was writing, even the opening and closing of the door hadn’t drawn his eyes. But then he said, “How was the talk with your parents?”
The answering silence made him lift his head as Jack sensed the shadow that had fallen over the room. Torin’s pounding heart. The fire burning dimly from the hearth. Moray’s cold, oily presence.
Jack dropped his quill and stood in a rush, overturning the chair. But Moray had already closed the ground between them, dirk in hand. Teeth flashing in a wide smile.
“Hello again, Bard.”
Chapter 29
Adaira took the cup of gra Innes offered her. They were sitting before the hearth in the laird’s wing, a surprisingly cozy honeycomb of chambers. Boughs of juniper hung from the rafters, casting a sweet fragrance in the room. Hundreds of candles were lit across mantels and shelves and flickered above from iron chandeliers. The soft light breathed over tapestries and painted panels on the walls, and Adaira took a moment to admire the stories they told. Unicorns chasing fallen moons. Flowers blooming from the footsteps of wolves. A sea monster rising from the tides.
“There’s something you want to ask me,” Innes said.
Adaira drew her attention away from the walls. She sank deeper into the soft sheepskin draped across the back of her chair. Yes, she had a few things to say to Innes, and she wasn’t completely sure how to go about this confrontation. Ever since the culling, she had felt a shift between them, and she knew Innes sensed it too. Adaira took a sip of the gra before she spoke.