Locating his room was laughably easy. It was the only one besides my own with its own set of guards.
Wes and Jeru did not look pleased to see me.
“Ren came by to tell us he couldn’t find you,” Wes said.
“I took a bath.”
“Your hair is dry.”
“I didn’t wash it. Let me pass. I have a matter of urgency to discuss with the Heir.”
Jeru glanced at Wes with a shrug. “He told us she could enter as she pleased.”
My brows lifted. He did?
Wes knocked on the door twice. “Sire?”
“Enter,” came Arin’s distracted voice. Wes sighed and swung the door open for me. Arin didn’t glance up when I slid inside. Wes closed the door with a resentful thud.
The Nizahl Heir had his back to me. He wore a pair of loose sleep pants, tied low at his waist, and nothing else. A dinner tray sat abandoned on the bed. Arin bent over a table, hip cocked to the side as he scribbled on some parchment. I studied the strong slope of his shoulders, the notches of his spine. I vaguely wondered if his back would be harder to break than the soldier’s.
“Your room is bigger than mine,” I remarked.
The muscles in Arin’s back locked. I dropped to the bed, flicking around the items on his tray. I dipped a piece of his bread into the dark green molokhia. It had long since gone cold, and the skin on top stuck to my bread.
Arin turned. He sat back, bracing his hands on the table. “Do you want to trade?”
I swallowed the bite in my mouth with difficulty. My gaze lingered on his chest. The evidence of our encounter with the Ruby Hound hadn’t fully healed. The bandage looked much cleaner than the sleeves I had haphazardly wrapped around it.
“No. Mine is closer to the stairs.”
Dania’s sacred skirt, but he was so pale. As though someone stretched a thin sheet of parchment over him and named it skin. On another, I’d call it sickly, but Arin’s torso was long and lean. His body carried the kind of power gained from years of relentless combat. The elegance of his beauty shone in the sharp cut of his hips, the hollows of his collarbones.
Arin arched a brow, altogether too entertained for my taste. “Is anything the matter, Sylvia? You’ve grown pale.”
I rolled my eyes. Of course he wasn’t ignorant of his effect on others. His appeal was another weapon in his arsenal, honed to deadly perfection. “My natural complexion, I assure you.” The echo of an exchange uttered a lifetime ago.
I carried the tray over to the table, giving him his privacy. Arin swiped a tunic from the wardrobe and tugged it over his head. I exhaled when he was clothed again, pressing my knuckles to overwarm cheeks. May Vaida be damned to the tombs.
It was strange. I had spent my formative years without more than a passing interest in the men of Mahair. Even if I could bear to be touched by them, I lacked the skills needed for true intimacy. A hand too near my throat, any sudden pressure—I was more likely to hurl a lover into the wall than wrap them close.
The Alcalah was not the time to entertain such absurdities. I snuck a glance as Arin deftly laced his vest and I immediately regretted it. If Arin’s mind was a finely sharpened dagger, then his body was its armor. I couldn’t imagine how anyone touched him and remained whole. Being with him would be honeyed annihilation, too much for a flesh-and-bone body to bear.
Enough. I rolled my shoulders. Too little sleep and too much near-death was my problem.
The Heir arranged himself on a wooden chair. “Is there a purpose to this late-night sojourn, or did you just want my dinner?”
“I would like to strike a bargain.”
Arin settled back, gloved hands weaving over his stomach.
I told him everything. How Vaida lured me to her wing of the palace, the ring she pressed into the wall to unseal Baira’s hideaway. Describing the sentient darkness proved harder, and I shied away from recounting the fear that slashed through me when the candle died. I had tripped over the stairs in my rush and fled past the stoic guards.
“There are names of people she’s killed. Names of Nizahlan spies living in Lukub. Faces… cut-off faces that may belong to those same spies.” Arin’s expression didn’t flicker until I talked about Vaida’s threat. The offer she proposed if I lost the Alcalah.
“And you are telling me this with full knowledge I cannot stop you from acting on Vaida’s offer, nor can I prevent her from sheltering you in Lukub. Not unless I expose you as a Jasadi, which would ruin me, stall the Alcalah, and give the Mufsids and Urabi an opportunity to target a new victim.” Arin’s eyes gleamed with approval. “Impressive.”