His gaze flicked over her impassively before returning to me. “Dawn’s coming,” he said. “Forgive me if I need to steal my wife away, Lady Evelaena.”
Evelaena ignored him, her hand going to his chest. I watched the press of her fingers against him and had a hard time looking away.
“Tell me, usurper,” she murmured. “How did my uncle’s dying breath feel? I have so wondered.” Her fingertips rose, dancing over the bridge of his nose, the hollow of his cheekbone. “Was it cold against your face? Or warm?”
But gently, politely, Raihn took Evelaena’s wrists and moved them away, instead slipping a wine glass into her grasp.
“I didn’t take any pleasure in that death,” he said.
And his gaze flicked over her shoulder at the end of that sentence—spoken so solemnly, with far more truth than I expected.
He held his hand out to me. “Come to bed.”
Evelaena stepped aside, still staring at Raihn with a blank, indecipherable look on her face. I placed my hand in Raihn’s.
And then I jumped as Evelaena burst out into uproarious laughter.
She laughed and laughed and laughed. She laughed as she threw her head back and drained her glass of wine, and she didn’t stop as she turned away and staggered back down the hall, not even bothering to put her dress back on.
As her voice faded down the hall, Raihn shot me a silent, wide-eyed, are-you-hearing-this? look.
He leaned close and murmured, “I almost wished I didn’t interrupt, just to see where that was going to go. Wasn’t sure if she was going to seduce you or eat you.”
Honestly, I wasn’t, either.
“I had it under control,” I said.
He squeezed my hand, and it was only then that I realized I was shaking. He pressed his other hand over mine, as if to still the tremors, before letting go.
“I can’t wait to get out of here,” he muttered.
22
ORAYA
Lahor was, so far, not very helpful.
Evelaena had given us all suites near each other. They were once-grand apartments that were now dusty and rat-infested, with cracked windows that let in flecks of the overnight rain over the tile floor. When Mische pulled back the covers of her bed and several roaches ran out, she simply stared down at it with a look of utter disgust on her face, threw the covers back into place, and said brightly, “This can be Septimus’s room.”
This, Ketura had found exceedingly amusing. I think it was the only time I’d seen the woman laugh.
Not that we were doing much sleeping, anyway. The keep had gone eerily quiet, even to the vampires and their far superior hearing. That was when we acted. We went through the libraries, the studies, the empty bedchambers. Septimus’s companions were excellent at slipping through hallways unnoticed, bringing back anything that looked even remotely as if it could be useful. Soon, our chambers were full of a comically mismatched assortment of objects—books, jewelry, weapons, artwork, sculptures. All of them were seriously damaged, reeking of mold or rust. All were presented to me with a silent raised eyebrow of, Well?
After a dozen instances of this, I held the half-rotted atlas between two fingers. A few bugs scurried from between the pages, irritated at having their home disturbed for the first time in what appeared to be centuries.
Clearly, this was it. The answer to all our problems. The key to historically unknown power.
I gave Septimus a deadpan stare that must have said everything my words didn’t.
“We came all this way,” he said, letting out a puff of cigarillo smoke through his nostrils. “Have a little patience, dove.”
“Evelaena said that Vincent never returned here.”
“Evelaena doesn’t seem like the most reliable person. Not to insult a host.”
“No,” Raihn said, “but she doesn’t seem like she would just forget that the uncle she’s obsessed with showed up.”
“Unless she’s keeping it from us intentionally. He kept plenty of memorabilia from this place. Why else would he do that?”
“Nostalgia?” Mische offered, but even she didn’t sound convinced.
Vincent had no love for this place. I’d suspected that before, and now, there was little doubt of that in my mind. He wasn’t the type to wax nostalgic about the past, especially not parts of it that he felt little affection for. Lahor certainly fell into that category.
If he’d kept any connection to this place… it would have been for a reason.
I sighed.
“What am I supposed to do?” I muttered. “Just touch everything in this castle and see… what, exactly?”
Septimus shrugged.
“You’ll know.”
“What if I don’t?”
“Then we wasted a trip and will try something else.”
More time to search. More time for the Bloodborn to sink their claws into this kingdom. More time for Raihn to establish his hold on it, too.
I heaved another exasperated sigh and kept wading through objects.
Hours and hours and hours of useless shit.
Eventually, we gave up. So much of the keep was so badly damaged. Even the artifacts that seemed like they had once been quite valuable were now little more than junk. I doubted that I would just magically “know” when I would come across a possession of Vincent’s, but even still, it was obvious to me that these were worth nothing to him.
Eventually, when we’d made it through all the unoccupied, safe rooms of the keep, we allowed ourselves to rest.
My suite had only one bedroom—Raihn, to my relief, took the couch without complaint, leaving Mische to sleep beside me. She was snoring within minutes of crawling into bed, limbs sprawled out in all directions.
I curled up into a little ball and stared at the window at the glimpse of night-drenched Lahor through the opening in the curtains. Dawn was still at least an hour away. Sleep called to me, but I didn’t want to know what I’d see in its depths.
Eventually, I couldn’t just lie there anymore.
I slipped out of bed and grabbed my blades, going out to the sitting room to see— “Where are you going?”
Raihn stopped mid-movement. He was half-shrouded by gauzy curtains, leaning out the open window.
He looked me up and down, an eyebrow raised.
“Did you sleep in your armor?”
I glanced down at myself, briefly self-conscious.
“Where are you going?” I asked again, instead of answering.
“Probably the same place you were. Feeling restless, too?”
I didn’t want to admit it aloud.
I glanced back at the open bedchamber door, and Mische sleeping beyond it. Reading my face, Raihn said, “Oh, don’t worry about her. Nothing wakes her.”
Then he outstretched his hand. “Come on. Let’s go get into some trouble.”
I didn’t move. Fine, he was right, I was going to sneak out into the city. Admitting that to him was a whole different concession.
He sighed.
“I know you, Oraya. Don’t tell me you aren’t curious.”
I peered over his shoulder, out the open window to the eerie, desolate skyline beyond.
He smiled. “I thought so. Come on. Let’s go.”
This was a stupid idea.
I took his hand anyway.