Saddlebags lay heaped on the floor, and my gaze skipped past the chair in front of my desk—a symptom of Orpha’s half wraith blood. She wasn’t so much invisible as… hard to look at. Literally. Wraith magic made your eye skip right past her as though there was no one there.
It made her a useful operative, but it meant I had to stand still and draw a long breath before I could force my eyes in her direction. The fact I could do that much was only thanks to years of practice.
Grinning up at me, sharp teeth on display, Orpha sat back in the armchair and tossed a hazelnut in her mouth. Her pale eyes were a few shades lighter than my own, though not as light as her white hair. She might’ve been beautiful, but looking at her directly made my eyeballs itch.
“Brynan said you were waylaid.” She shrugged and scooped up a handful of berries and nuts from the bowl on my desk.
“I see he ensured you were looked after, though.” Thank the gods for Brynan. I’d completely lost track of time with Kat. I needed to watch out for that. Gaze skipping away from Orpha, I sank into the wingback chair behind my desk. Another deep breath and I shoved my attention back to her. “Well?”
“I swept the area. No sign of…” She shrugged and wriggled her fingers through the air. “Well, the power coalescing or anything like that. In fact, it seems to have dissipated almost entirely.”
Exhaling, I nodded. “Good.” The last thing we needed on top of Hydra Ascendant was a repeat of that situation.
“But—”
I stiffened.
“—there was one significant change. The time disturbance around the house has faded, so I was able to get into the ruins without being gone for months.”
Rather than craning forward, like I wanted to, I forced my elbow onto the arm of my chair and leant my chin on my fist. Orpha would ask for an astronomical bonus if she got a whiff of my interest in what she found. “And?”
“Dust and rubble, mostly. It was like centuries had passed rather than just a couple of years. No fabric or wood remains, only crumbled stone.”
I nodded, encouraging her to hurry along while I buried my disappointment. With the age of the place, I’d hoped it might contain lost relics, but it sounded as though it and its contents were utterly destroyed.
“But Rose said there was a library, right?”
I raised one eyebrow. “She did.”
“I found it. I had to move some hunks of rock and wade through dust up to my knees.” She rolled her shoulders as if remembering the weight. I didn’t doubt they were significant chunks—her wraith blood also made her stronger than her slight frame appeared. “With the state of the place, I wasn’t hoping for much, but beneath it all, I found some books that…” She shook her head. “They were pristine. And chained up.”
Pulse speeding, I gave up fighting and sat forward. “And you brought them back. Show me.”
She grinned and popped a berry in her mouth before standing and rummaging through the bags. If these books were what I suspected, she was welcome to the bonus.
A couple of years ago Faolán and Rose had found themselves trapped in an ancient mansion hosted by a woman who only called herself Granny. If anyone else had given me the report of what happened there, I’d have called them mad, but Faolán wasn’t the type for flights of fancy. He was as solid as the stone beneath this palace and almost as talkative. For him to spout that story—it had to be true. And Rose backed up every word. She’d even offered to take arianmêl to prove it was true.
Dark things had happened in that house. Sacrifice and blood drinking. The kinds of things people accused the unseelie of doing. Through that forbidden magic, the place had gathered immense power over the span of centuries, and when it fell, thanks to Faolán and Rose, we ran the risk of that power falling into the wrong hands.
Hence the regular visits from my operatives and obscuring the location from all maps. Thank the Stars, the magic had dissipated harmlessly over time.
Where I’d hoped for artefacts, perhaps the house was going to give me secrets instead.
And weren’t secrets power?
With a thud, Orpha hefted a stack of books on my desk.
There was no shift in the air as often came with powerful magic—just as Kat had felt on the bridge—but I caught the scent of scorched earth and woodsmoke. Ash and blood. Dust and age.
Old magic.
Yet the books looked as though they’d been bound yesterday—fresh leather and crisp gold leaf. The top one was a deep forest green with gold lettering across the front. Orpha explained how she’d snapped her favourite crowbar breaking through the chains, while I fingered the debossed design.
My heart thudded heavily in my chest as my mind skipped to Kat’s book and the way she’d touched it so reverently. Then to the sight of her earlier as she’d taken in her bedroom. The curve of her lips and the point of her chin. The unconscious gesture as she’d touched the glossy finish on the purpleheart wood furniture I’d chosen for her. I wasn’t sure she realised she’d grazed her fingertips across its surface, as though the richness of its colour called to her and she just had to experience it.
But most of all, the sun hitting her hair, turning it aflame, so she looked like a phoenix rising from the dull ashes of the world.
I wasn’t meant to want her. I wasn’t meant to be this wrapped up in her, in the sight of her, the springtime scent of her, or the way she made me think of the crisp cleanness of fresh sheets or a new page.
But I was.
Good fucking gods, I was.
Whoever had made her marry that man, I wanted to disembowel them. Slowly.
Not that I was a better man. And not a more deserving one, either. Not after what I did in Lunden.
Yet I’d never have failed her as he had. I’d never have mistreated her in the dark as he had. Any destruction I turned upon her, I made into the little deaths that she made such sweet sounds for.
But I was a decade too late. Her husband was too fucking alive. And her country had marriage laws too barbaric to contemplate.
We’d taken a different path that had led here.
She’d spent ten years stuck in a crumbling estate. Ten years bound to a husband she hated. I didn’t want her to resent me in the same way.
Of course she resents you. You betrayed her. You used her.
The hurt had rolled off her before she’d let the poison in her system coat her tongue and unleash its sharpness on me. Just once. Just briefly. But it was enough.
She didn’t just resent me—she hated me.
Maybe it was for the best.
“Bastian?”
I blinked and found Orpha watching me, one eyebrow raised.
Completely fucking distracted. Stars above, what was wrong with me?
I cleared my throat. “The book.” Lifting it as if that was an explanation. Not a lie, since it had made me think of Kat. “What were you saying?”
“There’s another stack of books in here, but I don’t want to cover your desk. Where do you want me to leave them?”